How many times have you wanted to throw your phone out the window of your car because Siri couldn't understand the most basic phrases? Then a 20-minute argument develops with a series of "Hey Siri" commands followed by a string of unwanted Google searches and maybe even an iTunes song. I personally gave Siri a British accent in hopes that would somehow change things. CEO Wibe Wagemans, along with co-founders John Ball and Beth Carey, want to help AI actually understand what you say with their new company, Pat. Wagemans previously was President of Indoor Atlas, a company developing indoor mapping technology.

At least, that's what Google and so many business and tech journalists said when the search giant first faced antitrust complaints in Europe six years ago. And indeed, Microsoft had filed one of those complaints. It was also the money-weilding mastermind behind the Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace, a group that lobbied the European Union and helped others bring complaints against arch-rival Google. But all these years later, Microsoft has removed itself from the fight, reaching an agreement with Google that says both companies will drop all regulatory complaints against each other. And yet, Google's antitrust problems are only getting worse. Yesterday, the European Union announced a new round of antitrust charges against Google, this time pointing the finger at the company's advertising service, some of the most important tech in Google's moneymaking arsenal.

Paul Taylor, a former Google engineer and founder and CEO of UK-based Fintech startup Thought Machine, is developing a blockchain-centric operating system, Vault OS, a modern banking engine and core software that runs on the cloud. Before delving into the blockchain space, Paul Taylor held a prominent position at Google as the head of the text-to-speech group at the search giant, responsible for the speech recognition software used in over a billion Android phones and devices used around the world. A Cambridge University academic, Taylor began working on Vault OS over two years ago at a tech start-up hub in London. The inventor and executive has a notable expertise in speech synthesis, machine learning, and artificial intelligence, as evident from his tenure in Google. There is a need to uproot and change the legacy systems used by banks in an age when security and efficiency are fundamental to core banking principles and that's where Vault OS can help with an upgrade to the system, according to Taylor.

In central London this spring, eight of the world's greatest minds performed on a dimly lit stage in a wood-panelled theatre. An audience of hundreds watched in hushed reverence. This was the closing stretch of the 14-round Candidates' Tournament, to decide who would take on the current chess world champion, Viswanathan Anand, later this year. Each round took a day: one game could last seven or eight hours. Sometimes both players would be hunched over their board together, elbows on table, splayed fingers propping up heads as though to support their craniums against tremendous internal pressure. At times, one player would lean forward while his rival slumped back in an executive leather chair like a bored office worker, staring into space. Then the opponent would make his move, stop his clock, and stand up, wandering around to cast an expert glance over the positions in the other games before stalking upstage to pour himself more coffee.

Join Roger Schank for an informal evening of discussion about his work, the debunking of Cognitive Computing and what learning by doing really means in the 21st Century, from an educational standpoint. Roger is a pre-eminent professor of Cognitive Science with a focus on education and improving the experiences of students in class. Dr. Schank was Professor of Computer Science and Psychology at Yale University and Director of the Yale Artificial Intelligence Project. He was also a visiting professor at the University of Paris VII, Assistant Professor of Linguistics and Computer Science at Stanford University, and research fellow at the Institute for Semantics and Cognition in Switzerland. Roger will give a 40 min talk to the top leaders of Data Science in Barcelona Tech Companies as well as host a Q&A session.

It is widely forecasted that a shortage of skills in data science and analytics will mean a great deal of money is wasted through missed opportunities in coming years. Traditional academic establishments have begun to move to fill the gap.

Scientists are hoping to use Big Data and machine learning to prevent further outbreaks of Ebola, by identifying the likelihood of various bat species carrying the virus. Ebola is what's known as a filovirus, which are long filament-shaped viruses whose genome is encoded on a single strand of RNA. Ebola is the most famous example, but there are others which are just as deadly, such as the Marburg virus that takes its name from an outbreak in the city of Marburg, Germany, in 1967. Ebola, like Marburg, is spread when people come into direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected persons. The most infamous outbreak of Ebola occurred just two years ago, in West Africa in 2014, where 11,310 people died from the disease, the World Health Organization says.

Coleman's work with low-dimensional nanostructures, as well as Nicolosi's in the field of battery development, bring 2D materials to the fore. Plummeting production costs mean that such 2D materials are emerging with a wide range of applications. Thomas Swann, for example, produces materials in commercial quantities, though the research in Ireland would largely relate to smaller measurements.

Inbenta is a company specialized in Artificial Intelligence and Natural Language Processing which was born in Barcelona and nowadays has presence in 8 different countries (Spain, USA, Chile, Brasil, Mexico, France, The Netherlands and Singapore).

In the future, the development of artificial intelligence (AI) will accelerate beyond anything we have previously imagined. It will offer limitless possibilities – changing our experiences, transforming every area of life and redefining how we interact with technology. Yet AI is not just future fantasy. It is here and now, gaining momentum through advances in machine learning, neural networks and big data. These are exciting times and the UK is right at the heart of it.