Amazon.com Inc. is embracing artificial intelligence to deliver goods more quickly, enhance its voice-activated Alexa assistant and create new tools sold to others through its cloud-computing division, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos said in his annual shareholder letter. Changes ushered in by artificial intelligence and machine learning will help the companies that embrace them and put up barriers for those who don't, the world's second- richest man wrote in a 1,700-word letter released Wednesday. Bezos repeated familiar themes, such as the need to operate a business like it's always "Day 1" to keep a startup mentality and the ability to act quickly on limited information to stay ahead, what he calls "high-velocity decision making." His emphasis on artificial intelligence and machine learning was the most concrete indication of areas in which the e-commerce giant will continue to invest. Machine learning is the science of getting computers to act without being programmed, and is used in autonomous cars, speech-recognition and internet search engines.

New advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning promise to make some jobs obsolete through automation and change our world forever, experts say. It's hard to put into words what AI is -- many of the terms people use are very technical -- but Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos just summed up everything most people need to know about artificial intelligence in his latest shareholder letter. "Over the past decades computers have broadly automated tasks that programmers could describe with clear rules and algorithms. Modern machine learning techniques now allow us to do the same for tasks where describing the precise rules is much harder." This is a great way to describe the promise of AI.

CEO Jordi Torras sat down with Internet Retailer recently to talk about the unprecedented changes to the online customer experience as a result of emerging AI technology. He explains that "an ideal online shopping experience is like the one you would get in the real world, where the customer goes into a store and engages in a meaningful conversation about what they want with a knowledgeable sales rep." Replicating this experience digitally has proven to be one of the biggest hurdles within the e-commerce world; if the customer can't find it, they can't buy it. Realizing that online shoppers need a better way to interact with retail brands, Inbenta created an AI-powered natural language solution to better connect customers with the answers they are looking for, both within FAQs and product catalogs. According to Jordi, "artificial intelligence software is able to combine knowledge of products and how they're used to help customers find merchandise very quickly and efficiently, as well as receive intelligent answers to any questions they may have."

However, modern customers (Millennials and Generation Z) are not so easy to surprise. So, it is not enough for retailers to keep up with settled trends -- they have to be few steps ahead to hold all the aces. Artificial Intelligence (AI) becomes a life jacket in this case. How can retail benefit from Artificial Intelligence solutions? Much as television in its time or Internet accordingly, Artificial Intelligence is here yet to make a revolution in common things.

New advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning promise to make some jobs obsolete through automation and change our world forever, experts say. It's hard to put into words what AI is -- many of the terms people use are very technical -- but Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos just summed up everything most people need to know about artificial intelligence in his latest shareholder letter. "Over the past decades computers have broadly automated tasks that programmers could describe with clear rules and algorithms. Modern machine learning techniques now allow us to do the same for tasks where describing the precise rules is much harder." This is a great way to describe the promise of AI. Computers were able to simplify and automate tasks with clear rules, such as taxes or other paperwork.

In December Amazon made my holiday shopping as effortless as it's ever been. In a not-so-subtle attempt to get its Alexa Voice Service technology on a smooth surface in every home around the globe, the world's leading online retailer slashed the price of its second-generation Echo Dot to $39.99, and moved nine times more units than it had in the previous holiday season. Amazon touts Echo's ability to read the news, report traffic and weather, provide sports scores and schedules, control the lights, locks, and sprinklers, order your preferred pizza, and "so much more!" In the face of all these capabilities, the first questions my siblings and I asked of Alexa may come as a surprise. Rather than requesting music or the news, we asked Alexa to sing a song, tell a joke, or give us some insight into'her' day.

Robots are gradually moving out of the warehouse and into public and private environments where they interact directly with human owners, co-workers and consumers. One industry which has been hugely disrupted by advanced robotics technology is retail. The application of robots has long been on the minds of marketers as a way of improving processes and to entice customers back into physical stores, especially as bricks and mortar retail is threatened by online shopping. But how exactly are robots influencing retail, and how are they doing it? The most common use of bots in retail, and one you're likely to have experienced firsthand, is in online and over the phone customer services.

Shoppers may not know it, but they use artificial intelligence (AI) in their everyday lives. From turning to apps like Waze for optimal driving routes to using suggested tags on Facebook photos, consumers are immersed in AI as part of their daily routines. Despite this, many retailers continue to question AI and wonder whether it's time to start investing in these emerging technologies. But if getting closer to their customers is the ultimate goal, retailers need to embrace AI today as a powerful tool to engage shoppers and supercharge employees. Armed with the ability to research products on brands' websites, social media channels and more, today's consumers are more knowledgeable than ever.

While Amazon works towards unleashing drones in the sky, Walmart is looking to use them in its stores. The Arkansas-based firm has been granted a patent for in-store drones that would transport items from one department to another. It has been suggested that the system would'greatly improve the customer experience' by saving visitors trips across the massive facilities to fetch items or from having to wait for an employee to return with their desired merchandise. Walmart has been granted a patent for in-store drones that would transport items from one department to another. A human worker receives a request from a customer, via a'display screen or as a text message', who then attaches the item to the drone A human worker would receive a request from a customer via a'display screen or as a text message' and would then attach the item to the drone.

Amazon's impact on retail cannot be overstated. Within two decades, Jeff Bezos has taken a small website for selling books and turned it into a retail behemoth that rivals Walmart and Costco. The secret to Amazon's immense success is its relentless pace of expansion. The company is now affectionately known as the "everything store," but Bezos doesn't seem content with that. Not only is he taking the company into space tourism and artificial intelligence, but he's also trying to change the back-end of the retail industry.