Earlier in this series, we learned how AI (artificial intelligence) is set to change the IT (information technology) environment, and tech players such as IBM (IBM) are leaving no stone unturned to empower themselves in the AI space. As shown in the above chart, more than 40 companies working or related to AI technologies have been acquired so far in 2016. As leading technology players make acquisitions in the AI space, it will gain visibility and spending will be enhanced. Alphabet (GOOG) topped the acquirer list with 11 acquisitions in the AI space in 2016. Oracle, Yahoo, Intel (INTC), Apple (AAPL), and Salesforce are also competing in the acquisition of AI companies.

Indian startup Boltt is claiming to have a fitness tracking system so complete that it'll force you to ditch your Fitbit, Jawbone or Moov system - all through the power of artificial intelligence (AI). The new company is offering a smart show, stride sensor and fitness band that it says will give 24-hour insights into your health and activity - and doing so all for $150 (around £120 / AU$200). Yes, you read that right: a pair of'high performance functional sports shoes', and embedded stride sensor packed with the latest accelerometers and a fitness band that can monitor sleep, automatically detect activity and monitor your heart rate. It's a lofty goal, but the brand has worked with Garmin to improve the stride-tracking accuracy and even offers payment systems through embedded payment technology (essentially, NFC in the band). We've seen all that before, but the really exciting prospect here is'B', Boltt's AI chat-bot system that will interact with you daily as a 24-7 coach to give insights into nutrition, sleep and training.

Chatbots are automated text conversation computer programs that use artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing to talk to customers/users. Want to disappear from a fleeting relationship? Ghostbot is a burner text messaging bot that will ghost you away. Need something to do to pass the time? Send a text to the Casper mattress company's chatbot and talk about anything and everything.

Galileo viewed nature as a book written in the language of mathematics and decipherable through physics. His metaphor may have been a stretch for his milieu, but not for ours. Ours is a world of digits that must be read through computer science. It is a world in which artificial-intelligence (AI) applications perform many tasks better than we can. Like fish in water, digital technologies are our infosphere's true natives, while we analogue organisms try to adapt to a new habitat, one that has come to include a mix of analogue and digital components.

Ten years of Paris hospital admissions data, plus external information including weather, patterns of flu infection and public holidays, was ingested and analyzed by the Trusted Analytics Platform (TAP). Four of the Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Paris (AP-HP) are trialing the new predictive system aimed at reducing hospital waiting times. TAP is an open-source analysis platform that uses machine learning to create tools and services across a range of industries. The AP-HP project is the first to use open source time series analysis, and the TAP engineers that worked on the system had to build new sets of code. If the project is successful, plans are to implement the prediction system through the entirety of the 44 hospitals in the AP-HP group.

It's no secret that brands have been trying to make business-to-consumer interactions more personal, and it's also no secret that the B2C relationship is far from monogamous. In order to facilitate choice, convenience and control, brands have used data to categorize (or "bucketize") customers in any number of segments and act accordingly. For example, looking at a laundry list of factors and behaviors, "Joe's characteristic make-up is A, B, C and his behavior patterns are predominantly G, P, X and Y, so we know that we'll have pretty good luck engaging him in these ways…" But business analytics and, specifically, machine learning are turning the proverbial "dating" game between businesses and consumers on its head. Instead of assembling interactions based on preconceived notions about how consumers want to be treated, machine learning enables companies to deliver truly personalized communication based on up-to-the-moment data: "Joe is uniquely Joe, and right now, he needs 1, 2 and 3." Smart, fast and personal. Data big and small has already been transforming the way brands interact with customers (or prospective customers) – whether it's remarketing ads for the shoes we abandoned in our online carts, curated playlists based on our listening preferences, or automatic notifications to refill our prescriptions based on our typical use.

Perhaps the coolest thing about IBM's 9th "Five Innovations that will Help Change our Lives within Five Years" predictions is that none of them sound like science fiction. "With advances in artificial intelligence and nanotechnology, we aim to invent a new generation of scientific instruments that will make the complex invisible systems in our world today visible over the next five years," said Dario Gil, vice president of science & solutions at IBM Research in a statement. More on Network World: IBM says soon you won't need passwords; mind reading will be routine; the so-called digital divide will cease to exist and junk mail will become important Among the five areas IBM sees as being key in the next five years include artificial intelligence, hyperimaging and small sensors. In five years, what we say and write will be used as indicators of our mental health and physical wellbeing. Patterns in our speech and writing analyzed by new cognitive systems will provide tell-tale signs of early-stage mental and neurological diseases that can help doctors and patients better predict, monitor and track these diseases.

The partnership between car brands and their timepiece counterparts extends longer than you and I can even imagine. We've seen these partnerships manifest themselves in one form or another, with some even taking the form of obscenely expensive, limited edition watches. If there ever was a new frontier for the partnership between these two industries, Swiss watchmaker Swatch may have opened that door. A report from watch-dedicated website TwentyTwoTen revealed Read More ... Places: Americas North America United States The two models posed near their flashy cars as they reunited for the sexy photo op. Both Chyna and Amber posted the three photos to their Instagram accounts as they showed off their curves and cars.

With the majority of consumers spending significant time on various messaging platforms, brands are turning to these messaging platforms to better interact with consumers. The increase in private messaging between customers and brands is driving companies to turn to chatbots for improved social customer care. The Watson Conversation Service offers a simple, scalable and science-driven solution for developers to build powerful chat bots to address the needs of various brands and companies. As developers leverage Watson Conversation to build cognitive solutions for various, one recurring question is: "How much time should I plan to train my solution" or "How do I know when my model is trained sufficiently well"? While the answer depends greatly on the problem being solved and the data powering the solution, in this blog we offer a common methodology for training the machine learning (ML) models powering your chat bot solution.

Artificial neural networks are a fascinating area of study, although they can be intimidating when just getting started. There are a lot of specialized terminology used when describing the data structures and algorithms used in the field. In this post you will get a crash course in the terminology and processes used in the field of multi-layer perceptron artificial neural networks. Crash Course In Neural Networks Photo by Joe Stump, some rights reserved. We are going to cover a lot of ground very quickly in this post.