Shamayita Acharya

Analytics tools are one of the most crucial parts of business success in the twenty-first century. While it's not as magical as a crystal ball, analytics can provide in-depth knowledge about the state of a company and help it predict with some certainty what will happen. Grand View Research explains that predictive analytics has the potential to rapidly grow up to 2025. The reason why predictive analytics is so successful is by spotting trends and patterns within massive swathes of data. In the case of distributors, predictive analytics can change how they approach their goals.Commercial Planning is EasierIt's tough to figure out what works and what doesn't when it comes to business. Between mergers, acquisitions, and the company's growth, the dynamic nature of a business is hard to plan for. Utilizing predictive analytics can offer some support for commercial planning for companies. By experimenting with different starting values, the company can determine what is the ...

The impact of COVID-19 has been immense, nothing like anyone could have imagined. To make things worse, things don’t seem to be getting back on track anytime in the near future. It would be right to think that work from home is going to be a norm, not for weeks, but months or even years. Seeing the silver lining, the human race has shown great resilience and adaptability for coping with the virus. Companies of all sizes have switched to the remote working models and both businesses and employees are somewhat comfortable with the concept. Globally, companies are gradually learning to maintain productivity while working in this new model through a crisis like a world has never faced before. At the same time, they are going the extra mile to empower employees with the right tools to facilitate work from home. Virtual call center solutions come ahead as one of the most significant remote working tools that are serving as a lifeline for businesses in the pandemic-hit era. From ensuring top-...

Small business owners are facing a myriad of serious challenges these days. An economic shutdown has left them bereft of customers while their corporate counterparts keep growing, and an inability to adapt to the latest technological trends continues to threaten their future profitability. Nevertheless, many small business owners are refusing to allow their fledgling commercial empires to crumble easily. Dedicated entrepreneurs are embracing novel marketing methods and exhilarating new technologies like artificial intelligence to remain effective and profitable in the modern marketplace.You may think AI is only accessible to major corporations, but the truth of the matter is that it’s becoming easier and easier for everyday entrepreneurs to use by the month. Here’s a breakdown of why small businesses should embrace AI sooner rather than later.Companies are already leveraging AIPerhaps the most compelling reason that your small business should consider embracing the power of artificial ...

By Lance Eliot, the AI Trends Insider Determining where to best drop-off a passenger can be a problematic issue. It seems relatively common and downright unnerving that oftentimes a ridesharing service or taxi unceremoniously opts to drop you off at a spot that is poorly chosen and raft with complications. I remember one time, while in New York City, a cab driver was taking me to my hotel after my having arrived past midnight at the airport, and for reasons I’ll never know he opted to drop me about a block away from the hotel, doing so at a darkened corner, marked with graffiti, and looking quite like a warzone. I walked nearly a city block at nighttime, in an area that I later discovered was infamous for being dangerous, including muggings and other unsavory acts. In one sense, when we are dropped off from a ridesharing service or its equivalent, we often tend to assume that the driver has identified a suitable place to do the drop-off. Presumably, we expect as a minimum: ·...

By John P. Desmond, AI Trends Editor We recently had a chance to catch up on the career of Kesha Williams, software engineer, author, speaker and instructor. AI Trends published an Executive Interview with Kesha in June 2018. At the time she was in the Information Technology department at Chick-fil-A, the restaurant chain, with responsibility to lead and mentor junior software engineers, and deliver on innovative technology. She decided to move on from Chick-fil-A after 15 years in June 2019. Now she works at A Cloud Guru, an online education platform for people interested in cloud computing. Most of the courses prepare students for certification exams. The company was established in Melbourne, Australia in 2015. “I wanted a role that allowed me to be more hands on with the latest, greatest technology,” she said in a recent interview. “And I wanted to be able to help people on a broader scale, on a more global level. I always felt my part of being here on the planet is to help oth...

By AI Trends Staff The federal government continues its halting effort to field an enterprise cloud strategy, with Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, who leads the Defense Department’s Joint AI Center (JAIC), commenting recently that not having an enterprise cloud platform has made the government’s efforts to pursue AI more challenging. “The lack of an enterprise solution has slowed us down,” stated Shanahan during an AFCEA DC virtual event held on May 21, according to an account in FCW . However, “the gears are in motion” with the JAIC using an “alternate platform” for example to host a newer anti-COVID effort. Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, who leads the Defense Department’s Joint AI Center This platform is called Project Salus, and is a data aggregation that is able to employ predictive modeling to help supply equipment needed by front-line workers. The Salus platform was used for the ill-fated Project Maven, a DOD effort that was to employ AI image recognition to improve drone strike accuracy...

By John P. Desmond, Editor, AI Trends The best practices around determining whether your AI project will achieve a return for the business center around determining at the outset how the return on investment will be measured. The evidence shows it will be time well spent. An estimated 87% of data science projects never make it to the production stage, and 56% of global CEOs expect it to take three to five years to see any real ROI on AI investments, according to a recent account in Forbes . Like any other technology investment, business leaders need to define the specific goals of the AI projects, and commit to tracking it with benchmarks and key performance indicators, suggested author Mark Minevich, Advisor to Boston Consulting Group, venture capitalist and cognitive strategist. The company needs to think about the types of business problems that can be addressed with AI, so as not to set unrealistic expectations and not set the AI off in search of a business problem to solve. ...

By Allison Proffitt, Editorial Director, AI Trends The University of Pennsylvania and Intel have built a federation of 30 institutions to use federated learning to train artificial intelligence (AI) models to identify boundaries of brain tumors. Led by Spyridon Bakas at the Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics (CBICA) at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, the federation is the next step forward in a years-long effort to gather data that would empower AI in brain image analysis. “During my last few years of research, I’ve been focusing on learning predictive models of brain tumor segmentation, predicting genomics, predicting overall survival of patients from baseline scans…, evaluating the propensity of the tumor to be more aggressive by various means, toward improving the clinical outcome of patients,” Bakas told Bio-IT World . Brain tumors have multiple, sensitive sub-compartments that show up in different scans in different ways: ac...

Data Automation has now become one of the latest trends in most of the industries, including manufacturing. With the highly competitive atmosphere in the industry, manufacturers have turned to automation to save time and effort in labor-intensive processes. You can automate the way of capturing data, sharing it, and storing it with advanced mobile-based and cloud technologies. Let’s see how you can implement automation in your manufacturing business.Using Industrial Internet of Things to automate manufacturing businesses–Internet of Things (IoT)-based applications are the most profitable options in a business where faster development and product quality are the major factors to gain a higher Return on Investment (ROI). We have found a myriad of ways how IoT is benefiting the manufacturing sector.Manage supply chainIoT-enabled platforms enable you to track the global and local inventory systems. Manufacturing companies can inspect their supply chains regularly. They will get real-time i...

AI—artificial intelligence—is set to become the core of marketing strategies from 2020 onwards.The current global situation has impacted how businesses work—and the changes are likely to continue into the future.With digital marketing strategies being strongly affected, the focus for businesses has had to adapt. While social media and SEO content has its place, AI is where the future lies.Over the years, AI has seen a few ups and downs—some of the AI errors in live chats have been meme-d relentlessly.But the AI of old has seen massive improvements—and it’s fast becoming the future tech all companies want to adopt.We look at how AI is changing the marketing landscape in 2020.1. Customer AcquisitionThe digital world is powered by data—now more so than before because of the number of people who are online. The data generated from social media and website visits give marketers information about their target market.Details such as demographics, interests, and pain points can be generated, g...

Mergers & acquisitions happen when companies believe they are more valuable together than when operating separately. The companies join workforces, systems, infrastructure, and data to become a new, more powerful, more valuable, more effective entity. That is only until they realized they overlooked or underestimated the key issues with data, IT infrastructure & integration plans. In fact, most merger and acquisition plans fail miserably because of data integration challenges.Save yourself the devastating cost of a failed merger. Do not acquire a company until you evaluate its data infrastructure and adherence to quality.Why the Emphasis on Data Quality? As of 2019, the value of global M&A deals stands at 3.9tr USD. Ironically, another report concludes that up to 90% of mergers fail to meet their goals.While there are many factors to this failure (with most of it being subjective to a company’s culture, budget, infrastructure etc), we’ve seen the lack of data due diligence ...

Healthcare is rightfully considered one of the most promising industries for IoT technology implementation. This is the industry where many routine processes can be automatized with the help of IoT-based solutions. This, in turn, enhances the efficiency of the workflow in hospitals and clinics. Let’s find out how the Medical Internet of Things works and why it is worth using. Why Use IoT in Healthcare The main idea of the IoT concept is collecting, transferring, and/or processing data without human participation. There are plenty of ways to make use of this technology in healthcare. Thus, automatic collection of physical health data and its instant transferring to specialists helps in making a diagnosis, disease prevention, and remote monitoring. EHR systems help keep medical records in order and provide instant personalized access to medical data.  Internet of Medical Things As the name implies, the Internet of Medical Things is a smart system consisting of interconnec...

As we continue to adapt to the social distancing measures brought about by the coronavirus pandemic, we find ourselves relying on audiovisual (AV) technology more than ever before in an effort to maintain relationships, keep up with learning and work commitments, and in a bid to support the museum and entertainment industries. With the likelihood of Covid-19-induced closures in place for the remainder of the year, museums, concert venues and other places of public interest have turned to AV technologies in a bid to ensure their survival and longevity in a post-Covid world. Visitors can now check out some of the world’s most celebrated exhibits virtually - from the Tate Modern, to the Louvre, to the British Museum of London - and Smartify, the “Shazam for art” app, has even said it would make its museums’ audio tours free for a remainder of the year, offering virtual visitors the chance to admire more than two million artworks from across 120 museums and galleries. Using AV technology p...

With the advent and spread of the novel Coronavirus, businesses around the world pitched in to save the World. Amazon and Microsoft created partnerships with governments and nonprofit organizations in launching a relief fund to deal with the pandemic. Facebook made the announcement that it will be supporting the CDC Foundation with matching donations of $10 million as the CDC Foundation prepares to launch a fundraising effort to fight COVID-19 in the United States. However, it’s worth focusing on Chinese tech leaders Alibaba and Baidu, who paired with scientists from Wuhan to tackle an alternate solution to the problem. They leveraged recent innovations in the AI technology to fight COVID-19, and here are the details.As the scope of the Coronavirus grew larger and larger, it became common for airports to screen for the virus. Health officials used visual examinations and thermometer guns to inspect people for any signs of COVID-19.Before long, Alibaba had created a visual inspection sy...

Even though most of us have heard about blockchain technology in the past and may even share expert knowledge in the field, not many know about its use in the translation processes. Since the mechanism in question deals with more than cryptocurrencies in their varied form, it has found its use in the major industries where a high degree of accountability, control, and automation is required. It would be enough to say that dealing with the complex blocks that contain particular records is a primary goal of cryptography, yet its practical use in translation services remains a fairly new practice.Why Use Blockchain Technology in Translation Processes? The translation industry uses the blockchain concept exactly for the same reasons as it is used in the major business fields like banking or HR management. The key is to create an efficient environment where encrypted information circulates among the employees without a central management system per se. In practice, it works with the additio...

Why is Customer Experience the New Marketing Strategy?Many businesses work day in day out to devise strategies that could help them to get better traction in their businesses. However, businesses pick different aspects when it comes to giving preference. Nowadays, many businesses are giving importance to devise a strategy where customers are given the first preference. Introducing customer experience into your marketing strategy has various implications. But before going to that, it is necessary to know what all reasons are making customer experience play such an important role while deciding business strategy.Despite the various decision-making metrics, It has been found in a Forrester study commissioned by Adobe that 80% of the businesses are trying to work on their customer experience. Source: AdobeIt clearly shows that working on customer experience is going to help businesses improve results. And companies are obsessed with customers today, and that is one reason they are maki...

Last month, Dr Mark Van Rijmenam wrote a very thoughtful article on Datafloq about digital privacy concerns during the coronavirus pandemic. Dr Rijmenam pointed out that many countries have started introducing legislation to track citizens to limit the spread of the virus. This has created major privacy concerns as the COVID-19 crisis worsens. As concerning as this development is, other privacy concerns are emerging. They have not received as much attention, but they are potentially even more concerning. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced a growing number of people to move all of their communications online. As a result, their messages are subject to being intercepted by hackers. Both of these concerns are causing citizens around the world to be more concerned than ever about their online privacy. They may decide to start taking new precautions to protect their digital information from hackers and unnecessary surveillance. Polls show a growing concern about digital privacy Pew Re...

As you adopt applications, including CRM, ERP, and accounting systems, you need to integrate these tools to gain a complete view of your customers and deliver the level of service they expect.An enterprise service bus (ESB) has long been one way to get all your solutions to talk to each other. First coined by Gartner in 2002, the term ESB describes an architecture that integrates numerous applications by putting a centrally controlled integration hub, often called a communication bus, between them and having each application talk to the bus. This software eliminates the need for brittle, point-to-point integrations, enabling applications to more easily communicate with each system on the bus.Organizations typically adopt an ESB to increase organizational agility and reduce time-to-market for new business initiatives by integrating them with existing systems in a scalable, plug and play manner.But many ESBs are hobbled by aging technology. In this article, we cover the advantages and di...

By AI Trends Staff   AI is increasingly being put to use in the technology stacks of cybersecurity companies, but not at the expense of human experts who guide the rollout and work alongside the smart tools.  Before 2019, one in five cybersecurity software and service providers were employing AI, according to a study last year by Capgemini Research Institute, in a review of recent research published in  DarkReading . Adoption was found to be “poised to skyrocket” by the end of 2020, with 63% of the firms planning to deploy AI in their solutions. Planned use in IT operations and the Internet of Things are predicted to see the most uptick.  Increased adoption of AI does not mean that security professionals on IT staffs are ready to hand off their responsibilities. A recent study conducted by White Hat Security at the RSA Conference 2020, held live at the end of February in San Francisco, found that 60% of security professionals are mor...

By AI Trends Staff    With the energy and compute demands of AI machine learning models trending at what appears to be an unsustainable rate, researchers at Purdue University are experimenting with specialized hardware aimed at offloading some of the AI demands on software.  The approach exploits features of quantum computing, especially proton transport.  “Software is taking on most of the challenges in AI. If you could incorporate intelligence into the circuit components in addition to what is happening in software, you could do things that simply cannot be done today,” stated Shriram Ramanathan, a professor of materials engineering at Purdue University, in an account from Purdue University published on  sciencesprings .  Shriram Ramanathan, Professor of Materials Engineering, Purdue University The reliance on software with massive energy needs to make AI work is not sustainable, suggested Ramanathan. If hardware and software could share inte...

By John P. Desmond, AI Trends Editor   When six-foot-four inch Marty first rolled into Stop & Shop, the robot walked into history. Social robot experts say it is among the first instance of a robot deployed in a customer environment, namely supermarkets in the Northeast.  Marty rolls around the store looking for spills with its three cameras. It does take the place of the human worker, called an associate, that did the same thing, but it means the associate can do something else. Doing the walk-around of the store is seen as a mundane task.  Marty the supermarket robot is among the first to travel with customers in the store, looking to avoid collisions and find spills. (Credit: Badger Technologies)    Marty does not talk or tell jokes. Unlike Alexa, who many children in the store undoubtedly interact with at home, Marty will not respond. The robot does notify associates when it sees with its computer vision that something on the floor needs to b...

By Lance Eliot, the AI Trends Insider   We all generally seem to know what it means to say that someone is intelligent.  In contrast, when you label someone as “stupid,” the question arises as to what exactly that means. For example, does stupidity imply the lack of intelligence in a zero-sum fashion, or does stupidity occupy its own space and sit adjacent to intelligence as a parallel equal?  Let’s do a thought experiment on this weighty matter.  Suppose we somehow had a bucket filled with intelligence. We are going to pretend that intelligence is akin to something tangible and that we can essentially pour it into and possibly out of a bucket that we happen to have handy. Upon pouring this bucket filled with intelligence onto say the floor, what do you have left?  One answer is that the bucket is now entirely empty and there is nothing left inside the bucket at all. The bucket has become vacuous and contains absolutely nothing. An...