Data is growing at an astounding rate. Even the smartest humans could never consume all of the constantly generated data. New tools and solutions are helping companies connect and analyze internal, external and publicly available data to power decision-making across teams. This infographic series takes a deeper look at today's data landscape and how it is impacting industries including banking, telecom and manufacturing. What opportunities are you missing out on by not being more data-driven?

But what need does Watson fill here?

IBM Watson has a new job: Cybersecurity specialist. At the RSA Conference…IBM announced the availability of Watson for Cyber Security, with the aim of assisting cybersecurity professionals with threat assessment and mitigation…The company said it is the industry's first augmented intelligence technology with the ability to power cognitive security operations centers (SOCs). But what need does Watson fill here?

Artificial intelligence has been a dream in technology ever since Alan Turing first wrote his seminal paper, Computing Machinery and Intelligence, Now, thanks to advances in hardware power and algorithm design, AI is a growth industry – and it has no shortage of vocal advocates. These are some of the most vocal and influential leaders working on artificial intelligence, robotics, chat bots, virtual reality, the ethics of autonomous software and vehicles and more. Organizes the London.AI meet up and the annual Playfair AI Summit. Thanks to all who kicked off discussion on the back of my piece on "6 areas of #AI/ML to watch closely" Keep going! Designs intelligent systems into working AI systems to help understand natural intelligence.

If it wasn't already clear that AI-powered voice assistants are ready for the workplace, it is now. IBM is not only launching Watson for Cybersecurity, a cognitive computing service that parses legions of security reports to extract relevant info, but is unveiling an experimental voice helper to go along with it. Havyn lets digital defense experts ask for threat updates and recommended solutions when it would otherwise be too time-consuming. If security analysts are already hip-deep in work, they don't have to sidetrack themselves with a new research path when Havyn can produce a useful answer in seconds. The combo could be particularly helpful given Watson's depth.

PubNub BLOCKS enables you to process your data mid-stream, to execute functions on your data in motion. This is huge, because you no longer need to spin up and manage new servers to run a simple function. It's all done in the network. That's why we say that PubNub is a programmable network. IBM Watson is a powerful technology that brings cognition to applications, with the ability to understand, reason, learn, and interact. I like to say it gives your application a brain, extending the capabilities of your application beyond simply interacting through a set of rules.

The tax code is more than 74,000 pages long, and there are thousands of new changes made each year that impact a client's tax outcome. H&R Block with Watson combines the expertise of 70,000 tax pros with the powerful technology of Watson to help ensure clients get back what they deserve. It's a first in the tax prep industry, and it represents H&R Block's most personalized tax experience ever. To get there, H&R Block tax professionals and IBM development teams are training Watson on the language of taxes. They're first applying the technology to the thousands of tax-related questions and topics discussed with an H&R Block Tax Pro during the return filing process.

From visual recognition to speech-to- text, the technology landscape continues to transform itself and it's happening rapidly. In 2017, the adoption and application of artificial intelligence is a more than just a far reaching dream, but a reality for most technology users. Not only is it critical that we identity these trends, but also build a workforce that adapt to these changes and build the new technologies that will advance society. We kicked off in New York City, hosting more than 40 coders, developers, early adopters, and those just interested in cognitive technology. All attendees were encouraged to take a coding course on the Learning Lab to prepare them for the event.

After a rough 2016, H&R Block is pulling out all the stops to win this year's tax season. In December, the tax-service provider debuted a campaign with new spokesman Jon Hamm. Now, the brand is returning to the Super Bowl after an eight-year hiatus to pitch a first-time partnership with IBM Watson. H&R Block plans to use the technology of Watson to improve the tax preparation services at its 12,000 retail locations. "It's this idea of man and machine together--it's not any attempt to get rid of the experts but instead to just enhance their judgements," said Kathy Collins, chief marketing and strategy officer at H&R Block.

Have you ever wanted to bottle-up and save that feeling when you have had a great vacation? Now, that joyful excitement of travel can be bottled in'Holiday Spirit' -- a new rum that's crafted using artificial intelligence. According to Joe Harrod -- a big data analyst and Artificial Intelligence expert -- Virgin Holidays used IBM Watson's linguistic AI to interpret millions of social media posts to pick out key emotions associated with holidays. IBM Watson then analyzed thousands of rum reviews to uncover which ingredients elicit different emotions and sensations in reviewers. The second data set analyzed the language and tone of 5,000 rum reviews and tasting notes found online.