A silicon super-intelligence is on the cusp of transforming the world of work, giving life to a million hopes, fears and think pieces. Unlike a prior generation of "dumb" robots that replaced physical labor, cognitive technology is evolving, learning to understand your job, your company and even your industry. But what if artificial intelligence (AI) wasn't evolving to compete with you for your job, but help you be better at it? Cognitive technology (aka cognitive computing) is a kind of AI, designed to boost human insight and performance by simulating human thinking and interaction, automating and enhancing basic tasks. Everyday examples of cognitive technology include product recommendations, pricing optimization and fraud detection.

A silicon super-intelligence is on the cusp of transforming the world of work, giving life to a million hopes, fears and think pieces. Unlike a prior generation of "dumb" robots that replaced physical labor, cognitive technology is evolving, learning to understand your job, your company and even your industry. But what if artificial intelligence (AI) wasn't evolving to compete with you for your job, but help you be better at it? Cognitive technology (aka cognitive computing) is a kind of AI, designed to boost human insight and performance by simulating human thinking and interaction, automating and enhancing basic tasks. Everyday examples of cognitive technology include product recommendations, pricing optimization and fraud detection.

To help curb AI sprawl and make smarter decisions about implementation, organizations should devote more thought to defining the value they are hoping to get from implementing AI solutions. With AI, teams often lean first toward the build option, believing it gives them the most control over what will hopefully prove to be a competitive differentiator. More often than not, however, buy or partner makes more sense. Small businesses, for example, usually use APIs to access data from companies such as Visa on credit card transactions, data that can be used in AI solutions. If the needed data or expertise do not exist internally, companies need to determine who they can partner with to obtain them relatively quickly.

"You want to ride the wave rather than getting slammed by its disruption. You don't want to be Blockbuster Video or Sears, you want to be Netflix or Amazon." That was how Dave Bluey, assistant professor of practice and career advisor with the Department of Management, explained the reasoning behind the Department of Management's symposium, "How Artificial Intelligence Will Impact Your Career." Over 250 hundred students gathered for a panel discussion led by industry experts to hear about – and in some cases see – the impact artificial intelligence may have on their future careers. The event was a partnership between the Management Department and leading firms in the areas of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and robotics in an on-going Digital Transformation Series at Virginia Tech.

Today's tech-enabled marketplace has brought a fever pitch of innovation, creating ease in many ways, but also changing human interactions foundationally. We're more digitally connected than ever but opportunity for meaningful engagement sometimes appears to have been lost in the digital fray. As we settle into this new norm, aspiring innovators have the privileged responsibility of examining how change has impacted human lives around us and the opportunity to improve our day-to-day with technology instead of being ruled by it. A case study in potential for disconnect, Sweden has been recently deemed one of the loneliest cities on the planet, with an estimated 250,000 residents living alone. Swedish heating, cooling and energy company, Stockholm Exergi wanted to extend their commitment to "making Stockholm a warmer place" by influencing social good and inspiring positive change for its citizens.

Accenture Interactive has created a project for the Swedish energy company, Stockholm Exergi, that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to tackle elderly loneliness. Following medical research into elderly health, Accenture Interactive discovered that loneliness accelerated health problems including depression and early-stage dementia in the elderly. To combat this, it created a project titled'Memory Lane' that uses a voice assistant combined with conversational artificial intelligence to capture stories for future generations. Using Google Voice Assistant, 'Memory Lane' invites someone who is lonely to tell their life story. Once captures, the discussion is then instantly converted into both a physical book and a podcast.

Artificial intelligence can help to bring together the twin megatrends of digitalization and decarbonisation. There has been a lot of talk about how artificial intelligence (AI) will affect various aspects of our lives, but little has been said to date about how the technology can help to make the world more sustainable. A new report from the consultancy PwC, commissioned by software giant Microsoft, looks at how the twin, powerfully disruptive megatrends of digitization and decarbonisation could come together in future and it concludes that AI could make a significant dent in global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. PwC defines AI as "a collective term for technologies that can sense their environment, think, learn, and take action in response to what they're sensing and their objectives". Applications can range from automation of routine tasks to augmenting human decision-making and beyond to automation and discovery – huge amounts of data to spot, and act on patterns, which are beyond our current capabilities.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is seen as one of the most powerful emerging technologies that'll impact business over the next few years. Business leaders see its potential; in our 22nd CEO Survey, 72% of UK CEOs said AI will significantly change the way they do business in the next five years. Estimations are that AI could contribute up to $15.7trillion to the global economy by 2030. You'd think then that business leaders would be keen to start getting a share of this for their business, especially if it gives them an edge over competitors. But it seems despite recognising its potential, they're slightly more hesitant about actual implementation.

"Practical AI" might seem like an oxymoron to some. But that's only if you view artificial intelligence as a futuristic and unrealistic pursuit. Kirk Borne, PhD, decidedly does not. Borne is the Principal Data Scientist and an Executive Advisor at global technology and consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton. In this interview, Borne describes a number of practical AI applications in use today and offers tips on how to deploy AI for data scientists and nontechnical users. Borne will be attending SAS Global Forum this week, and we look forward to hearing more from him there.

Bottom line: Enterprises are attaining double-digit improvements in forecast error rates, demand planning productivity, cost reductions and on-time shipments using machine learning today, revolutionizing supply chain management in the process. Machine learning algorithms and the models they're based on excel at finding anomalies, patterns and predictive insights in large data sets. Many supply chain challenges are time, cost and resource constraint-based, making machine learning an ideal technology to solve them. From Amazon's Kiva robotics relying on machine learning to improve accuracy, speed and scale to DHL relying on AI and machine learning to power their Predictive Network Management system that analyzes 58 different parameters of internal data to identify the top factors influencing shipment delays, machine learning is defining the next generation of supply chain management. Gartner predicts that by 2020, 95% of Supply Chain Planning (SCP) vendors will be relying on supervised and unsupervised machine learning in their solutions.