From cost reduction to privacy protection, and enabling high-value information extraction, Granica is revolutionizing how businesses harness the power of AI.
My Journey into Bit Manipulation
I got into bit manipulation—specifically, into image processing— in 2006. My undergraduate thesis centered around integrating a secure cipher into a set of images without compromising their authenticity or quality. To achieve this, I developed a Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT)-based transformer tool. This tool decomposed a given set of images into their fundamental frequencies, thus distilling them into their essential elements.
The critical insight was identifying lower-frequency components as ideal insertion points for the cipher code embedding. Imagine these lower-frequency components as the vacant basements in bustling high-rise buildings. These served as perfect spots to discreetly embed our cipher code, without disturbing the building's occupants— the image's details. This DCT-based transformer adeptly differentiated between the 'occupied' high-frequency components, crucial for maintaining an image's visual integrity, and the 'vacant' lower-frequency ones.
This experience ingrained in me a persistent fascination with data complexity and the challenge of preserving integrity while optimizing use. This fascination, which has captivated me for the past 17 years, is at the heart of Granica's mission today. The task of extracting high-value information from byte streams has never been more relevant. However, the landscape has dramatically evolved since 2006, with the problem's scale expanding a billion-fold.
Granica's Mission
At Granica, we are tackling this enduring challenge of information extraction head-on. Our approach involves exploring and exploiting statistical correlations in streams of bytes, with high accuracy, at cloud-scale. We blend fundamental research in information science and machine intelligence with distributed systems engineering, to create cutting-edge and enterprise-ready AI infrastructure services.
Our initial offerings focus on data, the foundational unit of AI and computing. We're excited to unveil our AI Efficiency Platform - a suite of services designed to make data cheaper to store, safer to use, and easier to access. Specifically, it is designed for petabyte-scale data in the cloud.
Granica is an information and computer science company. Our immediate objective is to increase the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of information. By doing so, we aim to advance our mission of making AI affordable, accessible, and safe for everyone to use. Every company will be AI-augmented, and we are determined to lead the way.
AI-Augmentation: Challenges and Opportunities
The advancements in deep learning over the last decade have been powered by ever-larger models processing ever-greater amounts of data. This trend shows no signs of slowing down, and three key elements are driving its momentum.
First, the Fuel - Data: The performance of an AI algorithm is primarily determined by the diversity and volume of data it can access. Consequently, companies possessing vast and varied data reserves have a significant advantage when developing AI algorithms. The go-to data stores are predominantly cloud object stores such as Amazon S3 and Google Cloud Storage.
Second, the Engine - Computing Power: AI algorithms require massive computational resources to train and run. Companies with access to extensive computational infrastructure can thus develop and deploy a larger variety and quantity of AI algorithms, securing a competitive edge.
Third, the Accelerator - Innovative Algorithms: The development of new, more efficient, and effective algorithms is a key driver of AI innovation. Companies that continually invest in the creation and refinement of algorithms can enhance their AI capabilities and solidify their competitive standing.
Looking ahead, AI will become integral to products and services in every domain, irrespective of company size.
Enterprises can leverage a variety of base models available through open source platforms, and utilize the computational infrastructure offered by their preferred cloud providers. Consequently, data will become both a critical necessity and a fundamental constraint, dictating the pace and direction of AI developments.
Distilling Information from Data
As AI proliferates and models are commoditized, proprietary data becomes a gold mine. The ability to build specific models using unique data sets, within secure boundaries, helps establish formidable competitive moats. Extracting the maximum information from data widens and deepens this moat. However, this golden opportunity comes with its own set of challenges.
First, cost. As data volume grows, so does the cost of managing, processing, and storing it—particularly in the cloud. Enterprises must contain these costs without compromising the value of data. Simple deletion or archiving isn't a sustainable long-term strategy.
Next, privacy risks. With the power of data comes the responsibility of safeguarding it. As the potential for insight from data increases, so does the potential for misuse. Rising public awareness about data privacy has led to stringent legislation, such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Businesses must ensure the safe use of data in AI and analytics while preserving its analytical value. This requires innovative ways to detect and anonymize data without sacrificing its core value.
By effectively addressing these challenges, businesses can reduce costs, protect privacy, and increase the information density within their data sets. Information density is the amount of meaningful information that can be extracted from a given data set. Higher information density leads to simpler, more accurate, and more insightful models. By optimizing the information density of their proprietary data, companies can unlock the full potential of AI and gain a significant competitive advantage.
Data is the bitumen. Information is the new oil.
Introducing Granica: Pioneering AI Efficiency
At Granica, we believe that overcoming these challenges and achieving higher information density for AI applications requires a transformation in traditional AI architectures. This transformation takes the form of an entirely new, seamlessly integrated layer in the stack – a layer that effortlessly blends with your cloud-native infrastructure, ensuring that your data stays secure while providing easy accessibility through an API.
This is the solution we're building at Granica!
Granica provides a suite of cutting-edge efficiency services accessible through a single platform API. Operating within our customers' cloud environment, we ensure their data never leaves their secure boundary. Granica provides rich, granular insight into how data is stored and accessed, and it's designed to scale autonomously, from zero to any volume, eliminating the need for any tuning.
Our revolutionary business model allows our customers to pay only for the tangible outcomes Granica delivers, upending the traditional consumption-based business models. We believe this is the way forward.
Here's how our two initial services work:
Granica Crunch: A game-changer for enterprise AI, this service losslessly reduces the size of data either in the background or in-motion. It applies novel compression and deduplication algorithms to petabyte-scale data of various modalities. The result? Up to an 80% reduction in data size, leading to lower costs for storing and transferring objects in Amazon S3 and Google Cloud Storage. This reduction could translate into significant cost savings, potentially amounting to thousands or even millions of dollars annually, depending on your data volumes. Additionally, it cuts down API costs associated with accessing this data by up to 90%, offering even more opportunities for substantial savings.
Granica Screen: This data privacy service is tailored for enterprise AI. It uses byte-precise algorithms to detect and safeguard Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and other sensitive data with precision and recall rates exceeding 99% for our customers. This level of accuracy significantly reduces the risk of data breaches, potentially saving your business from the steep fines associated with non-compliance and the reputational damage that can result from mishandling sensitive data. Moreover, by unlocking sensitive data for safe AI and analytics use, Granica Screen allows you to harness more of your data's potential.
Granica Crunch is generally available now, and Granica Screen is available via early access preview. Both work together to provide a comprehensive solution, increasing information density, reducing cost, preserving privacy – driving AI Efficiency forward.
Want to see these tools in action? Sign up for a free demo today!
The Granica Spirit: Embracing the unknown
Doing novel research on fundamental problems is tough. It pushes us to question what we know and challenge the norms. Building a planet-scale system is no less demanding. It requires an intricate understanding of many moving parts and the capability to bring them into a cohesive whole.
At Granica, we thrive on this challenge. Every day, we push the boundaries of what's possible, solving what others may consider intractable. Yes, the challenges are substantial, but the thrill of making breakthroughs and leading AI efficiency advancements? That's absolutely unparalleled!
The Granica Way: Customer-value Obsession
At Granica, we obsess over the value we can bring to our customers. Every decision we make, every product we develop, every service we provide, revolves around that core principle – delivering customer-value.
To illustrate, let's consider a conversation with one of our clients who faced challenges with spiraling S3 costs and increasing privacy concerns. It's simple, yet exciting.
Rahul: Are you leveraging AI, ML, or analytics to bring innovative products to market?
John: Absolutely!
Rahul: What if we could help you slash your S3 costs by over 50%, while also detecting and safeguarding the privacy of your sensitive data across those petabytes?John: That sounds fantastic!
Rahul: And by the way, you only pay us when we save you money and meet your detection accuracy expectations. Also, remember that your data will never leave your environment throughout this process.John: That's amazing!
The outcome? Within a few weeks, we'd successfully implemented Granica Crunch and Granica Screen for this client, significantly reducing their data storage costs while enhancing data privacy and security.
This case is just one example of how we obsess over delivering value to our customers.
A Warm Welcome to the Future of AI Efficiency
From my initial foray into image processing in 2006, to the launch of Granica in 2023, this journey has been both fascinating and transformative. The challenges of extracting valuable information from byte streams and preserving integrity while optimizing use led our team to create a platform that addresses these issues head-on. But Granica is more than just an answer to these challenges—it's a visionary step towards a future where every company, irrespective of its size, can leverage the power of AI effectively and efficiently.
We're not merely selling a service. We're offering a new way of doing business, a path that melds affordability, security, and seamlessness into the fabric of your AI applications. With Granica, you don't just adapt to the AI revolution—you lead it.
With Granica Crunch and Granica Screen, we've showcased what is possible when advanced information science meets innovative engineering. But this is just the beginning. We're committed to pushing the boundaries, expanding the realm of the possible, and creating pathbreaking solutions that drive AI Efficiency forward.
So, welcome to Granica, where AI efficiency is not just a goal—it's our DNA. It's a place where we don't just navigate the future of AI—we shape it, one byte at a time.
Let's revolutionize AI efficiency together. Embark on this journey now with a free demo, and let's harness the full power of your data with Granica!
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