Without a doubt, cognitive computing systems are a hot topic around boardrooms, executive suites, and conference tables at major technology firms, which are investing both financial and human resources to bring these systems to fruition. At the same time, government offices throughout the world are holding similar discussions, and these efforts are starting to come to fruition as well. Cognitive computing systems mine both structured and unstructured data to offer hypotheses and solutions for consideration by humans. They thrive on massive amounts of data: greater availability yields better analysis. In addition, cognitive computing systems rely on humans to train them through supervised learning.

Whether your interaction with artificial intelligence (AI) is limited to science-fiction or you spend more time in your day talking to Siri and Alexa than actual humans, you can't hide from the fact AI is changing the world. This week, the UK's new digital strategy was launched, which dedicated £17.3m to research and development of robotics and AI. Out of the industries welcoming this technology with open arms, finance and banking is one of the biggest. It's not hard to see why: when companies are dealing with large amounts of data, handing over control to a machine learning system that can analyse and understand information much faster than a human being is an obvious benefit. Where is this new technology having an impact in the finance sector?

Many of you are old enough to recall the Personal Computer OS "war" of the late 80's and early 90's. I can clearly remember being pressured by my boss to make a choice between IBM OS/2 and Microsoft Windows. I chose the wrong one. Then came the browser war, followed by the smartphone war. The next technology war on the horizon is shaping up to be consumer artificial intelligence (AI) devices like Amazon Echo, Google Home, Microsoft Cortana and Apple Siri.

As I think back about our research this last year, and all we have learned, I leave you with one simple message. All the changes we discuss are no longer "interesting" or "informative" – they have become real, and essential mandates for the future. We decided to call them "rules" because we believe they are now clear, and we want you to understand them so you can experience greater levels of productivity, performance, and employee excitement in your company. As always we look forward to explaining the Global Human Capital Trends to you in person this year, and hope to hear your comments and feedback as we all learn how to build the thriving organizations of the future. About the Author: Josh Bersin is the founder and Principal of Bersin by Deloitte, Deloitte Consulting LLP, a leading research and advisory firm focused on corporate leadership, talent, learning, and the intersection between work and life. Josh is a published author on Forbes, a LinkedIn Influencer, and has appeared on Bloomberg, NPR, and the Wall Street Journal, and speaks at industry conferences and to corporate HR departments around the world. You can contact Josh on twitter at @josh_bersin and follow him at http://www.linkedin.com/in/bersin . Josh's personal blog is at www.joshbersin.com .

He wants to show you, immerse you, and get you as excited as he is. The founder and CEO of By the Bay and Chief Scientist at the Cicero Institute has made a career out of not only understanding and developing AI, but bringing startups and enterprises into the fold, as well, with his developer meetups and conferences through AI By the Bay. AI By The Bay's latest conference happen March 6 through 8 in San Francisco, and Khrabrov has made it an event that developers are clamoring to attend. Attendees don't just hear about AI -- they get a chance to see live coding of major open-source AI and hear from some of the leaders in the field about their newest innovations. Khrabrov was kind enough to not only give me his take on the future of AI, but to tell me more about his upcoming conference. I run seven different meetups in San Francisco on data engineering and data science.

Everyone today talks about AI, big data and machine learning, yet most do not delve into the fundamental properties of how they will operate and how they might be an actual threat to asset managers. Some view technological methods as tools to assist them instead of being such a threat, and it would help provide both perspectives of the argument. Deep learning is a branch of machine learning that uses particular architectures of neural networks. These are artificial networks that attempt to actually replicate how the neural structures in human brains operate. Such methods have successfully been applied to areas such as computer vision – i.e. image processing and classification – as well as speech recognition. The techniques are readily available to any undergraduate student willing to learn the process.

The next time you enter a query into Google's search engine or consult the company's map service for directions to a movie theater, remember that a big brain is working behind the scenes to provide relevant search results and make sure you don't get lost while driving. As Fortune's Roger Parloff wrote, the Google Brain research team has created over 1,000 so-called deep learning projects that have supercharged many of Google's products over the past few years like YouTube, translation, and photos. With deep learning, researchers can feed huge amounts of data into software systems called neural nets that learn to recognize patterns within the vast information faster than humans. In an interview with Fortune, one of Google Brain's co-founders and leaders, Jeff Dean, talks about cutting-edge AI research, the challenges involved, and using AI in its products. The following, done against the backdrop of the 50th annual Turing Award, an honor in computer science from the Association for Computing Machinery, has been edited for length and clarity. What are some challenges researchers face with pushing the field of artificial intelligence?

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Amazon.com Inc has launched a new programme to help students build capabilities into its voice-controlled assistant Alexa, the company told Reuters, the latest move by a technology firm to nurture ideas and talent in artificial intelligence research. The e-commerce company said it is paying for a year-long doctoral fellowship at four universities for an undisclosed sum. Working with professors, the Alexa Fund Fellows will help students tackle complex technology problems in class on Alexa, like how to convert text to speech or process conversation. Amazon, Alphabet Inc's Google and others are locked in a race to develop and monetize artificial intelligence. Unlike some rivals, Amazon has made it easy for third-party developers to create skills for Alexa so it can get better faster - a tactic it now is extending to the classroom.