How AI Helped Microsoft Take Back Its Position As the World's Most Valuable Company

On March 23rd 2016, Microsoft released a new artificial intelligence Twitter bot named Tay. "Hellooooooo world!!!" read its cutesy first message. Within hours, however, human users had persuaded Tay to replace its light hearted banter with anti-semitic, sexist, and racist Tweets. The media got hold of the story and pilloried Microsoft and its new CEO, Satya Nadella. While it probably didn't feel like it at the time, Tay represented the start of a significant turnaround in Microsoft's fortunes that would eventually lead the tech giant to reclaim its position as the most valuable company in the world.