One hotel in Japan learned the hard way that robots are not always right for the job. Henn na Hotel in Tokyo is laying off half of its nearly 250 robots because they failed to do their automated tasks and humans had to intervene in their operations, the Wall Street Journal via Business Insider reported on Jan. 17. The hotel began employing robots in 2015 with the goal of becoming "the most efficient hotel in the world" and to respond to a worker shortage. Those laid off included Churi, a pink, egg-shaped virtual assistant assigned in each room, who could not keep up with the likes of Siri and Alexa. For instance, she failed to answer guests' questions on opening hours of local businesses.

The rise of virtual or artificial intelligence (AI) assistants has been underway for some time now with the growing popularity of products such as Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, Microsoft's Cortana, and Google's Assistant The technology -- which has been trained to understand voice commands and complete tasks for users -- is also making headway in business as organizations look to leverage AI assistants (including chatbots) for a variety of use cases, including voice-to-text dictation, team collaboration tasks, email management, customer service, help desk management, and data analysis. Get the latest insights with our CIO Daily newsletter. According to a 2018 report from online IT community Spiceworks, 40 percent of businesses with more than 500 employees expect to implement one or more intelligent assistants or AI chatbots on company-owned devices in 2019. For its research, Spiceworks surveyed 529 technology buyers from North America and Europe in March 2018. Among organizations that have implemented the technology on company-owned devices and services, 49 percent are using Microsoft Cortana for work-related tasks, followed by Apple Siri at 47 percent.

In many ways, Artificial Intelligence and marketing seem to go hand in hand. The multi layered technology is an incredibly useful tool for helping brands to engage with customers, as by analysing data, brands can glean a far deeper understanding of what consumers want. According to research from Demandbase, 80 per cent of marketers believe that AI will revolutionise their industry by 2020. However, only 10 per cent are actually using it today. Although marketers have recognised the importance of embracing AI in campaigns and content, few have put this into practise.

Slowly but surely, artificial intelligence (AI) is creeping into the workplace, creating fear that the technology will progress to the point where it will replace the human workforce entirely. We've heard it a million times – "The robots are coming to take our jobs." In the past, perhaps just a decade ago, the words may have seemed empty – the threat too far off to worry about. After all, when it comes work – running businesses, serving customers, programming computers, driving buses and flying planes – humans are indispensable, aren't they? We can't be so sure anymore.

When we think of the AI platforms that are shaping how we use voice to interact with phones, home devices and other services, we tend to think of Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, Google and Microsoft's Cortana. But there are other players that may prove to have a compelling value proposition of their own. Sherpa.ai, a voice assistant out of Spain that also provides predictive recommendations with a focus on the Spanish language, today is announcing that it has expanded its Series A by $8.5 million to $15 million as it passes 5 million active users of its app. Investors include Mundi Ventures, a Spanish VC fund focused on AI, and Alex Cruz, the chairman and CEO of British Airways. In a still-heated tech climate where startups are raising tens and sometimes hundreds of millions of dollars in rounds that sometimes happen only months apart, Sherpa's Series A has been a comparatively slow burn: the startup first announced a Series A of $6.5 million nearly three years ago.

Artificial intelligence may still be an emerging technology, but chances are you're already using it in your everyday life. AI is what is powers iPhone's Siri and Google Assistant. Gmail's smart replies, online product suggestions, and directions for the fastest route -- with traffic included -- from one place to another are all examples of AI coming into play. AI, which allows computers and other machinery to learn and adapt to its surroundings, is also active in schools and in classrooms. It runs in many educational and tutoring apps, and digital curriculum tools use this technology to assess a student's performance and suggest an individualized learning plan to help them improve their understanding of a subject.

LOS ANGELES--Here's a new way to get the daily Talking Tech podcast delivered to you first thing every morning, via an Alexa Flash Briefing. The "skill" to bring Talking Tech directly to you went live Tuesday, and it's easy to add. However, it will take a few steps. In the smartphone app (which you use to control the Amazon Echo speakers), you enable the Talking Tech Flash Briefing skill. Open the app, go to Settings, and click on Flash Briefings.

Column At the annual spectacular of crap that we optimistically term the Consumer Electronics Show, I found myself locked into a room with Alexa. And yes, disembodied AI servant though she may be, she still filled every corner of a rather spacious room with all of the various products now connected to and enabled by Alexa - everything from alarm clocks to refrigerators to automobiles to - kitchen taps? Kohler Konnect (klever) ties a connected kitchen water tap into Alexa, because... "Alexa, pour me 500ml of water." The Kohler Konnect is a kitchen robot of sorts, very good at doing exactly one thing - pouring out precisely the amount of water you need. Is that enough to justify Alexifying a kitchen?

Back in September, Amazon held a massive Alexa event, and one of the many, many products it announced was a clock. The idea was that you'd use a connected Alexa device to control Echo Wall Clock with your voice, and set timers and reminders -- it doesn't have its own speaker or microphone. However, only a month after starting to ship the clock, Amazon has temporarily stopped selling the product because of connectivity problems. "We're aware that a small number of customers have had issues with connectivity," Amazon told The Verge. The company is working on a fix, and plans to start selling the item again "in the coming weeks."

The ultimate streaming box for gamers and audiophiles is back on sale for a good price. You can pick up Nvidia's Shield TV with remote from Amazon for $149 right now. That's $10 higher than the sale price we saw in early November, but it's still lower than the usual $170 to $180 for this box, which doesn't go on sale very often. The Nvidia Shield TV is an outstanding living room device. At its core, it's an Android TV box, but the Shield TV can do so much more than simply stream Netflix and Hulu.