For most of us, AI is synonymous with complicated, and maybe scary, technologies of the distant future. The thought of putting AI to work to solve current day-to-day data processing tasks may initially sound extremely costly and at best, about a decade too early.
But that’s not the case anymore. From Google’s Rankbrain to the algorithms analyzing the videos you upload to Facebook Artificial Intelligence is here to stay. Actually it is one of the hottest topics in earnings calls.
So how can competitive midsize and small businesses stay ahead of the curve and already leverage this emerging technology?
There are currently numerous and varied companies offering AI solutions, finding the needle in the haystack with the solution your company needs can be overwhelming
First you need to identify your top priority issues and then understand if they can be solved with your data leveraging AI. Then, if you don’t have the capacity to build your own solution or if you believe that this is a common problem, you need to identify the vendors in that space. Then you need to gather metrics about each company so you can have a short list because you can not complete a PoC or even a phone call with every AI company in a specific area. For example in recommendation personalization, there are more than 50 AI vendors. To prepare the shortlist, you would need to gather objective metrics about each company like the clients they are serving, their funding, number of employees.
AppliedAI simplifies this process. On AppliedAI.com you can identify AI use cases in the areas that interest you. AI use cases categorized according to business functions allows you to quickly and easily explore how AI can help your business. Once you find an AI use case or application area that interests you, you can find all references, case studies, how it works videos and detailed data about vendors on the platform. Essentially, AppliedAI users can window shop AI companies, so to speak, and get introduced to AI vendors they’d never previously heard of.
Finding new partners in an emerging market is a principle concern
The potential benefits of an AI solution could be huge, but given that you’re embarking on new territory – not just for yourself but probably for your industry as a whole – it is not cost effective for you to explore the whole industry on your own? The cost of gathering data and/or outsourcing has meant that AI capabilities have, up until recently, found their home in the enterprise level market, as opposed to SMEs.
AppliedAI has focused on democratizing vendor data and enabling data-driven procurement decisions to ensure that regardless of their size or industry, companies can find AI vendors that they can partner effectively with.
Ensuring you end up with a solid product can be difficult when shopping in unfamiliar territory
When dealing with complex new technology solutions like AI, you’re going to need to trust your AI vendor. Recommendations can be tricky to come by if you’re an early adopter in your industry. And most consultancy firms are high cost and aimed at enterprise-level companies, who might make suggestions for the benefit of their relationship with their AI vendor rather than making the best decisions for your business.
The market, now gifted with the democratization of objective data, has a friendly face attached to the front of the search for an AI vendor.
With companies like AppliedAI already increasing visibility for AI companies and their solutions, we can expect more and more companies to begin to get their feet wet in the AI market over the next few years.
