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Artificial Intelligence vs. Driverless Cars: Which Tech Trend Has More Opportunity? Self-driving cars are well on their way, and many tech companies are focusing much of their attention on artificial intelligence. Here's how big these two trends could get. IHS Automotive predicts that just 20 years from now, nearly 10% of all new vehicles sold will be fully self-driving. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said last month that all of the company's new cars built from now on will ship with fully autonomous hardware (though the features won't be activated yet).

On November 6 2014, Amazon announced Echo, a smart speaker featuring a voice-controlled assistant service called Alexa. The company didn't exactly go out of its way to whip up excitement for these newcomers. In sharp contrast to the rollout of its ill-fated Fire Phone--which kicked off with a press-conference extravaganza starring Jeff Bezos--it simply disclosed that Echo existed and would be sold, at first, on an invitation-only basis to Prime members. But Echo spoke for itself--and not just literally. People quickly saw that the pint-size cylinder was a genuinely new kind of consumer-electronics device.

"With mobile payments adoption on the rise, merchants are searching for new ways to keep customers coming back," said Tony Rose, director of mobile product management at Vantiv. "One way merchants can increase brand loyalty is with offers such as mobile coupons and loyalty programs, but most merchants don't know how to use these programs because they don't know their customers' preferences. We believe merchants would best be served to invest in new technology such as putting smart targeted offers and coupons into mobile wallets where they are organized and transmitted automatically, offering not only environmental benefit but a much more convenient consumer experience." Not only are younger generations leading the charge for alternative ways to redeem offers, Millennials and Gen Xers are also the most likely to share promotions with their family and friends, especially through social media. The ShopTalk survey shows Millennials and Gen Xers (43 percent) are more likely than Boomers (12 percent) or Retirees (three percent) to share promotions through Facebook.

Sundown AI announces their recent integration of Chloe, an Artificial Intelligence platform, with Magento, Inc. a worldwide leader in cloud digital commerce innovations. Chloe enhances mobile commerce by providing a voice powered interface for Magento Online Stores. Chloe AI can be found in the Magento marketplace: https://marketplace.magento.com/sundownai-chloe.html With Chloe, Magento website visitors now have the ability to get immediate assistance to their product or service questions directly from their smartphones while navigating through a Magento store. While explaining how Chloe works is useful, a Chloe mobile demo is even better: https://youtu.be/9hsCAfTqIHs Chloe uses proprietary technology to automatically process a company's customer service data and identify the policies that will guide her behavior.

Intel has unveiled its Shooting Star quadcopter drone, designed exclusively for light shows. The company, which put its own drone swarms in the air around the world in 2015, has come out with another model -- one with a software that will help a drone create an intended image. The software will even choose drones based on GPS reception quality and remaining battery life. This drone could help design elaborate light shows in a shorter duration. "With this drone, we will be able to demonstrate that drone light shows can redefine entertainment and create amazing new experiences in the night sky. " Anil Nanduri, vice president, new technology group, and general manager UAV segment, Intel Corporation, said in the official press release.

Back in March of this year, Google DeepMind had its AI system, AlphaGo, "sit down" with international Go champion Lee Sedol in a 5-game Go match with a purse of a cool $1 million. Despite Go being far more difficult than say, chess, to program for (due in part to number of possible moves), it destroyed Sedol 4-1. Now, the same company that took down the best in what many consider to be the most difficult board game in the world, is turning its sights on Starcraft II. The company made the announcement at this year's BlizzCon 2016 in Anaheim, California, and in an associated press release, says that it has established a "collaboration with Blizzard Entertainment to open up StarCraft II to AI and Machine Learning researchers around the world." For anybody paying attention to Google DeepMind, or one of its central driving forces, Demis Hassabis, the leap to 3-D video games has been expected for some time.

Useful quantum computers are closer to becoming a reality as some of the world's biggest corporations try to bring the technology from the lab into the practical world. A quantum computer utilizes subatomic particles called qubits to speed up the solving of complex computations. Near-term expectations for quantum computers range from solving optimization problems to quantum-encrypted communications, and more. With the help of CB Insights' investment, acquisition, and partnership data, we identified 18 corporate groups involved in the development of commercialized quantum computing hardware and software. They are a diverse group of players, ranging from tech industry behemoths to defense contractors to national telecommunications companies.

In its quest to advance artificial intelligence research, Google's DeepMind has created systems capable of mastering a range of Atari computer games, and besting humans at the ancient Chinese board game Go. Now, the company is seeking to overcome an even bigger challenge -- creating an AI system that can play, and perhaps master, "StarCraft II." The company announced Thursday that it was teaming up with Blizzard Entertainment -- the maker of the real-time strategy game -- to open up "StarCraft II" to AI and machine learning researchers around the world. This means that anyone with the inclination and skills to do so can test and train their AI systems using StarCraft's complex gaming environment. "DeepMind is on a scientific mission to push the boundaries of AI, developing programs that can learn to solve any complex problem without needing to be told how. Games are the perfect environment in which to do this, allowing us to develop and test smarter, more flexible AI algorithms quickly and efficiently, and also providing instant feedback on how we're doing through scores," the company said in a statement.

More than 250 leading researchers from over 50 countries will gather at the Future Technologies Conference (FTC) in San Francisco next month. Running from 6 – 7 December, this event will focus on the future trends in technology and various experts will explore a plethora of topics such as: artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, security, IoT, robotics. She will speak about cognitive computing and how recent changes in the availability of data have driven rapid advances in analytics, enabling smarter applications, and bringing us to this new era. "We'll see how Watson, the Jeopardy!-playing Ruzena Bajcsy, Professor at the University of California, Berkeley will explore about the development of personalized models of kinematic and dynamics of an individual during physical activities and its applications in improving healthcare. Ella Atkins Professor of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan will describe long-term research in improving safety and robustness through autonomous contingency management with application to manned and unmanned aircraft. Dr. Atkins will also summarize her research on the use of nontraditional databases and real-time data to reduce risk to people and property. Other speakers include James Loudermilk - Senior Level Technologist at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Science and Technology Branch, Bin He - Director of Institute for Engineering in Medicine, University of Minnesota and Arjuna Chala - Sr. Director of Innovation and Emerging Technology at HPCC Systems. In two days, the conference will host a total of six keynotes, five project demonstrations and 190 paper presentations organized into thirty sessions. The conference program also offers various networking opportunities including an evening reception which will give attendees the chance to mingle with other researchers after a day full of speakers, meetings, and thought-provoking topics. FTC 2016 is organized by The Science and Information (SAI) Organization whose mission is to connect global research community through journals, conferences and technical activities. Sponsors and partners for FTC 2016 include HPCC Systems, IEEE, IBM Research, University of Michigan, IBM Watson AI XPrize and Brown University. "We've invited experts from across the globe to attend and offer insights on the future of technology and research.