SAS buys synthetic data software from Hazy to streamline AI development [Video]

The enterprise data analytics software company SAS Institute Inc. is moving into the realm of synthetic data to boost its artificial intelligence portfolio with the acquisition of intellectual property from the U.K.-based startup Hazy Ltd.

According to SAS, the acquisition will enable it to equip its customers with the tools to create critically needed synthetic data to fuel their AI workloads. The company didn’t provide an acquisition price.

Hazy has created a platform that enables companies to put their most sensitive and private information to use in ways that weren’t previously possible. In many regulated industries, companies have collected enormous volumes of data that could theoretically be used to train highly-performant AI models, but the problem is that they can’t risk exposing that information if they want to stay compliant. Hazy gives them an alternative solution that involves leveraging their existing, highly sensitive data in order to create synthetic information that can be freely used without restrictions.

The synthetic data …