The Latest Battle in Software Is All About Artificial Intelligence

Wouldn't it be fabulous if Salesforce, Microsoft, Google, and other software companies could make software smart enough to straighten out the tangle of features-and-functions they've been selling to us for the last 20 years? While none of those companies would likely describe what they're doing in those terms, they are all pushing artificial intelligence (AI) technology that they claim helps software anticipate a user's needs based on human-computer interactions and the data users deal with every day. Salesforce crm, for example, says it is enabling all of its sales, marketing, e-commerce, and other "cloud" software with AI. In theory that means the software would tell a sales rep which prospects are close to signing a purchase order and which are leaning towards a competitor based on website visits, social media posts, email, online demos taken etc. Microsoft msft is likewise adding AI to its Office productivity applications and Dynamics business software.