Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Cognitive Computing are trending buzzwords of our time. I read about them every day in different media, but as a regular customer it is rare that I get a “wow experience” as a result of new technologies. Where are the actual implementations? I have decided to investigate this subject over the next couple of months with the aim of uncovering what new technology can do for the customer experience through specific examples. New technology opens up new opportunities, but in the very end it’s all about providing a better customer experience. In a digital world, where everything related to product and price is completely transparent, and where the distance between store and customer is shorter than ever, the 4Ps are dying. Instead, we are now talking about the 4Cs: Consistency, Content, Convenience and Contextual – with focus on the customer experience (learn more about the 4Cs here). In this article, I will…

Beyond representing the external world, humans also represent their own cognitive processes. In the context of perception, this metacognition helps us identify unreliable percepts, such as when we recognize that we are seeing an illusion. Here we propose MetaGen, a model for the unsupervised learning of metacognition. In MetaGen, metacognition is expressed as a generative model of how a perceptual system produces noisy percepts. Using basic principles of how the world works (such as object permanence, part of infants' core knowledge), MetaGen jointly infers the objects in the world causing the percepts and a representation of its own perceptual system. MetaGen can then use this metacognition to infer which objects are actually present in the world. On simulated data, we find that MetaGen quickly learns a metacognition and improves overall accuracy, outperforming models that lack a metacognition.

The neural mechanism of memory has a very close relation with the problem of representation in artificial intelligence. In this paper a computational model was proposed to simulate the network of neurons in brain and how they process information. The model refers to morphological and electrophysiological characteristics of neural information processing, and is based on the assumption that neurons encode their firing sequence. The network structure, functions for neural encoding at different stages, the representation of stimuli in memory, and an algorithm to form a memory were presented. It also analyzed the stability and recall rate for learning and the capacity of memory. Because neural dynamic processes, one succeeding another, achieve a neuron-level and coherent form by which information is represented and processed, it may facilitate examination of various branches of Artificial Intelligence, such as inference, problem solving, pattern recognition, natural language processing and learning. The processes of cognitive manipulation occurring in intelligent behavior have a consistent representation while all being modeled from the perspective of computational neuroscience. Thus, the dynamics of neurons make it possible to explain the inner mechanisms of different intelligent behaviors by a unified model of cognitive architecture at a micro-level.

Research being conducted by the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) is focused on a new machine learning approach that could improve radar performance in congested environments. Researchers from DEVCOM, Army Research Laboratory, and Virginia Tech have developed an automatic way for radars to operate in congested and limited-spectrum environments created by commercial 4G LTE and future 5G communications systems. The researchers claim they examined how future Department of Defense radar systems will share the spectrum with commercial communications systems. The team used machine learning to learn the behavior of ever-changing interference in the spectrum and find clean spectrum to maximize the radar performance. Once clean spectrum is identified, waveforms can be modified to best fit into the spectrum.

Red Box, a leading platform for voice, announces an extension of its relationship with Microsoft aligned to the launch of Conversa, Red Box's enterprise voice platform. Red Box is already a Preferred Telephony Partner for conversation intelligence, part of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales and Customer Service. This latest development in the relationship delivers a unique capture layer for enterprise voice. It combines the power of Conversa audio processing in Microsoft Azure and Microsoft AI, with seamless support of both cloud and premise-based telephony aligned with frictionless zero touch implementations. The on-premise self-install capability provided by Conversa, and powered by Azure Cloud, will simplify the delivery of'AI-Ready', real-time voice capture for those organizations that struggle to gain access to audio data.

"Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the part of computer science concerned with designing intelligent computer systems, that is, systems that exhibit characteristics we associate with intelligence in human behavior – understanding language, learning, reasoning, solving problems, and so on." Artificial intelligence is the practice of computer recognition, reasoning, and action. It is all about bestowing machines the power of simulating human behavior, notably cognitive capacity. However, Artificial intelligence, Machine learning, and Data Science are all related to each other. In the commencement of this blog, we will gain expertise in Artificial Intelligence and its major six branches.

Broadvoice, an award-winning provider of hosted voice, unified communications (UC), and SIP trunking services for businesses, is reinforcing its commitment to its indirect sales partners with the addition of two new regional sales professionals to its channel management team. Robert Sanchez joins Broadvoice as Regional Channel Manager – Mountain West and Joseph Galluzzi is now Regional Channel Manager – Northeast. Broadvoice also has regional channel managers in California, Southwest, Midwest, and Southeast. "As a channel-first organization, Broadvoice continues to expand its partner community, so we're adding resources and expertise to stay ahead of growing demand," said Kim McLachlan, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing. "We're pleased to welcome two veteran telecom sales professionals to the Broadvoice team to provide in-region sales support."

Artificial intelligence is here for a long time in many forms and ways. In recent years significant progress has been made in some areas of AI. This doesn't mean that AI, in general, is evolving as fast, just those fields. And some of them are increasingly used for different domains of digital transformation. Instead of talking about artificial intelligence (AI), some describe the current wave of AI innovation and acceleration with – admittedly somewhat differently positioned – terms and concepts such as cognitive computing. Others focus on several real-life applications of artificial intelligence that often start with words such as "smart" (omnipresent in anything related to the Internet of Things and AI), "intelligent," "predictive" and, indeed, "cognitive," depending on the exact application – and vendor.

Core Associates, LLC announced the firm has completed the process to gain Sage's product certification of TimberScan Titanium for Sage Intacct. The makers of TimberScan, the only AP automation solution designed exclusively for Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate, now offer a cloud-based solution that integrates with Sage Intacct to simplify approval workflows, document management, and related AP invoice processes from virtually anywhere. TimberScan Titanium is a new solution designed for project-intensive businesses, such as builders, contractors, and businesses in other industries, that offers a paper-free AP invoice processing experience while allowing users to stay connected to their Sage Intacct software. TimberScan Titanium reads from Sage Intacct to facilitate better data management without the need for rekeying information. With Smart Extraction Technology based on Optical Character Recognition, OCR, TimberScan Titanium is ideal for companies looking to recognize and automatically code AP invoices.

Kinetiq, the world's first TV intelligence platform to unite paid, earned and owned media, has named Rishit Shah as chief product and technology officer (CPTO) to lead product strategy and technological advancements for the growing company. In this new role, Shah is responsible for designing and implementing a product roadmap to accelerate Kinetiq's platform innovation and align product strategy with customer needs. "Rishit is an important addition to the Kinetiq leadership team and we look forward to working with him to chart a path forward for the company," said Kevin Kohn, CEO, Kinetiq. "With his strong technical and product background, there's no doubt Rishit will play an instrumental role in evolving our product strategy and dramatically scale our platform as we continue to build out a truly unique TV intelligence platform that provides unparalleled insights into paid, owned and earned media." Shah brings deep technical roots and extensive data platform development experience to his new role. Prior to joining Kinetiq, Shah held executive product and technology positions at 7Park Data and Lotame, and launched digital products for The Washington Post.