DCVC

May be, we are couple of years away from experiencing patent free video codecs based on deep learning. DCVC-RT (https://github.com/microsoft/DCVC) - A deep learning based video codec claims to deliver 21% more compression than h266. One of the compelling edge AI usecases is to create deep learning based audio/video codecs on consumer hardwares. One of the large/enterprise AI usecases is to create a coding model that generates deep learning based audio/video codecs for consumer hardwares.

This is my field as well, although I come from the neural network angle. Learned video codecs definitely do look promising: Microsoft's DCVC-FM (https://github.com/microsoft/DCVC) beats H.267 in BD-rate. Another benefit of the learned approach is being able to run on soon commodity NPUs, without special hardware accommodation requirements. In the CLIC challenge, hybrid codecs (traditional + learned components) are so far the best, so that has been a letdown for pure end to end learned codecs, agree. But something like H.267 is currently not cheap to run either.