I’ve spent many years and millions of pounds developing systems that leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) to improve business goals.
In this post I will briefly define AI and outline some of its key benefits. I’ll also look at what its limitations are and some common misconceptions about what it can do.
Introducing Artificial Intelligence
AI is a branch of computer science which creates software that can perform tasks that have previously only been possible using human intelligence.
Computer systems are able to analyse their environment using techniques like pattern recognition and natural language processing. They can make decisions based on the analysis outputs.
AI tries to mirror biological intelligence. The aim is to give the machine the ability to act independently of human intervention and make choices as a human would do.
AI-based software might be able to recognise a cat versus a dog. It has the potential to recommend an item of shopping, suggest movies on Netflix or drive a car without human intervention.
Why is AI important?
AI achieves amazing accuracy compared with traditional approaches. Notable uses include spotting tumours and forecasting.
AI gets the most out of the data. The more data you have the better the algorithm runs.
AI algorithms use the data provided to create a representation of the world. If the data provided is of poor quality or of a limited volume then the output of the algorithm is poor.
For example: if you have a self-driving car and you only take it around a particular racetrack it will get very good at driving around that racetrack, but will struggle when you present it with a different environment, such as a rainy street or a city centre. This is why companies in this space have their cars building up hundreds and thousands of hours behind the wheel to give the algorithm enough data to have as accurate a view of driving in as many different scenarios as possible.
The algorithm can adapt through progressive learning algorithms.
The more data provided, the more the algorithm can learn about the different scenarios and patterns in the data. This leads to the algorithm being able to match real life more closely.
AI analytics is revolutionising many industries.
It is creating efficiencies in work environments and enhancing the service provided to consumers. It’s clear that the companies across all sectors with AI and data strategies at their core are the ones that will succeed the most from now on..
What AI isn’t
AI isn’t like the Sci-Fi technology you see in the movies.
It’s not a little electronic genie that does everything for you and your business that you need. It works better with clearly defined problems such as categorising or providing a prediction based on historical data. Humans are still needed to define these problems.
When you start asking AI to do things outside of narrowly defined parameters it runs into problems. Going back to the self-driving car example, if you tried to turn it into a self driving bicycle it would fail as the self-driving car algorithm is only designed to run a four-wheel engine.
At Avora we recognised the power of AI when we first started to build our solution.
Our goal is to allow companies of all sizes and skillsets to harness the power of AI. We use AI to enhance our customers’ ability to build efficiencies into their processes and to augment their customers’ experience.
To see how it works, request a demo now.
