People around the world marched for climate change on September 20, 2019, with protests taking place across 4,500 locations in 150 countries, all inspired by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg. It is obvious the call for a healthier planet is being demanded by more and more people internationally. But what is the answer? Millions of people across the globe marched on September 20, 2019 to demand urgent action on climate change. One of the questions being posed: Can Artificial Intelligence (AI) and tech companies help address climate change and save the planet?

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a major part of all our lives and societies. From popular voice command applications like Siri and Alexa; to business spam filters; and connected cars like Tesla; AI is all around us. Increasingly, AI is being introduced within the public service sector with a view to improving efficiency, reducing costs, saving time and enhancing quality. Yet with ethical and privacy concerns being the opposite side of the coin, last month the UK government released draft guidelines for AI procurement within the public sector. According to document the new AI procurement guidelines "will help inform and empower buyers in the public sector, helping them to evaluate suppliers, then confidently and responsibly procure technologies for the benefit of citizens."

Qualcomm executives this week attempted to draw contrasts and explain how their approach to cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI), and mobile edge computing is different than other technology companies and operators. "Our focus is different than the rest of the industry," Jim Thompson, CTO and executive vice president at Qualcomm said during a media gathering at the company's headquarters. AI, an area of technology that Qualcomm has been working on for the better part of a decade, plays a big role in Qualcomm's vision for what it calls the "edge cloud," Thompson explained. "Our focus has been deep neural networks, deep learning for low power, for devices that you would have a battery in and have limited thermal capability," he said, adding that Qualcomm's interest is not the cloud essentially. "AI is very good at consuming large amounts of data. It comes from the edge of the network, it comes from what people do, it comes from sensors, and all of that is at the edge of the network," he said.

With paperless boarding passes, biometric self-service security and in some places robots to assist customers as they make their way around terminals, it is clear to see that technology is impacting the way we travel. However, as well as changing journeys themselves, technology is having a significant impact on every part of the travel process. With the announcement earlier this month that travel agency Thomas Cook had gone into administration, it is clear that even established brands are in danger of collapse. Therefore, the need to keep up with customer demands for a frictionless booking process is of high importance in the industry. Technology is one way of achieving this.

This is the third and final instalment in our blog series on last month's BrightonSEO conference. We're rounding off with our three favourite takeaways from the day, all of which we think will be key focuses for the digital marketing industry over the coming years. The first lightning talk of the day in the main auditorium was by Greg Gifford of Wikimotive. Greg's talk, entitled "Beetlejuice's Guide to Entities and the Future of SEO", was a fascinating journey through the state of SEO today and where it's headed. It was a brilliant combination of being highly technical, but also clear for SEO beginners to understand. In broad summary, Greg's message was that SEO has become a lot less about ranking factors such as links, meta descriptions, and keywords.

Preparing for the adoption of new technologies is challenging for many large enterprise organisations. That's why savvy CIOs and CTOs seek information and guidance from vendors that can assist them on the journey to achieve digital business transformation. Meanwhile, investment in artificial intelligence (AI) systems and services will continue on a high-growth trajectory. According to the latest worldwide market study by International Data Corporation (IDC), spending on AI systems will reach $97.9 billion in 2023 - that's more than two and a half times the $37.5 billion that will be spent in 2019. The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for AI in the 2018-2023 forecast period will be 28.4 percent.

Namita Pandey from Cambridge Assessment English introduces Linguaskill a new English language test with Artificial Intelligence capabilities and explains how it's really helping recruiters meet this challenge head on. How do you recruit talent with the English language skills they need to succeed? How can you ensure your existing employees get the training they need to improve their English? This is a challenge for HR professionals and there is a growing demand in the recruitment sector for an effective solution that takes the guesswork out of assessing English language skills for the workplace. The importance of English for business has become more prevalent in the last decade. This is because more and more organisations are realising that good English language skills are essential for fostering international commercial relationships with colleagues, customers, partners and global organisations across the world.

AI is great at cutting operational costs. For media, entertainment and telecommunications companies, in fact, some of AI's best uses to date have focused on reducing fraud and squeezing inefficiencies from IT infrastructure. Yet the greatest potential for AI lies in its ability to generate growth. By personalizing the customer experience, AI can help companies in high-churn sectors acquire and retain customers. Which content does the customer prefer?

The development of artificial intelligence (AI) is causing ripple effects across a plethora of industries, and higher education is no exception.

As for explainable AI, companies that buy AI-driven products look for explainability at a business level, said Arnab Chakraborty, Global managing director of applied intelligence for the U.S. West Coast region at Accenture. "A lot of our clients have to explain to stakeholders how models work," he said. So, the models need to be transparent. Accenture, a multinational professional services firm headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, has its own toolkit to help explain how AI systems work. The toolkit helps the company lay out different parameters that go into a model and how that model influences different APIs, among other things, Chakraborty said.