How AI Will Change Everything in 2019
We dive into why Artificial Intelligence will reign supreme this year
AI’s started to take over the world. Not in a Terminator way, in a viable real-world-application way.
Fresh off Wired Italia putting us on their Top 9 Italian startups to keep an eye on in 2019, we’re buzzing for the new year. Gartner stats show that AI-use by businesses has grown an incredible 270% in the past four years, and 37% in the past year alone. Chris Howard, VP at the world-leading research company, summed it up nicely:
“If you are a CIO and your organization doesn’t use AI, chances are high that your competitors do, and this should be a concern”.
Top that with the PwC prediction that the tech will contribute $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030, or that investment in it will more than double by 2022, and you have ample reason to believe business is changing (rapidly).
We at iGenius think it’ll be a big year for us, and for AI in general. Here’s why.
AI Arms Race
There’s no reason to think these numbers will go anywhere but up. One reason being the so-called AI Arms Race — countries vying to master artificial intelligence, much like they did to get to space 60 odd years ago. According to Quartz numbers, the US and China lead the pack in AI investment, with billions of dollars being thrown around. The EU is no pushover either, aiming to pump $24 billion into the industry between 2018–2020.
Last month, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), released some fascinating stats about global AI patents. The UN agency found that US filed the most, with China, Japan and Korea trailing just behind:
With AI patent applications going up by 25% every year since 2009 in China alone, the growth has been exponential. This chart doesn’t even take into account around 150,000 lodged with the European Patent Office or WIPO themselves.
Chosen patent office doesn’t necessarily reflect the number of AI-producing companies in that specific country, but it does give a neat cross-section of where the interest lies. Either way, international intrigue in AI solutions is off the charts. But, what kind of solutions are we talking about?
Cross-Industry Application
A nice metric of how far it’s come could be how it measures up against humans in games. An AI bot beat one of the best chess players of time, proving its extraordinary capacity for strategy and complex reasoning.
Last summer, a seasoned team of Dota 2 (a popular online battle game) players lost to a team of robots — something Bill Gates called “a huge milestone in advancing artificial intelligence”.
To get there, the AI system had to play 180 years’ worth of games every day for almost three weeks.
These lightning-sharp reasoning and decision-making skills are set to transform a range of areas. Here’re a few examples in the pipeline that we’re excited about.
Healthcare
Machines will never suffer from human error (unless that plays a part in its programming).
Stats show that 80% of “serious medical errors involve miscommunication between caregivers” when patients are transferred. AI is being leveraged to buck this communication problem — with centers like the Mayo Clinic rolling out high-tech ways to share patient data.
Cyber Defense
In 2016, cyber criminals used an experimental AI system to increase attempts to lure targets to fake phishing sites by 500%. This is the dark side of AI, and cyber defense pros should continue to work on ways to fight back. This includes using the tech to sharpen up risk identification, and detect attacks far faster than humans ever could.
Environment
Countries are starting to use AI to better forecast natural disasters — floods, in particular. For example, Google has partnered up with India’s Central Water Commission to deliver early flood warnings. In a Channel News Asia report, Google AI’s COO, Irina Kofman, said they’re also working with researchers to “solve tough social challenges like healthcare, environmental conservation or energy consumption with AI”.
Business Intelligence
As you might’ve seen on our Twitter, 2.5 billion gigabytes of data are created every day. It’s essential for businesses to find a way to get actionable insights from it, quickly.
AI opens data up to workers by giving it a voice, and helps them use it to make better decisions.
This is what our virtual advisor crystal does ;)
