2018 Will Mark the Beginning of AI Democratization

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised take a prominent place within organizations in 2018, and the coming year will mark the beginning of the democratization of AI. In other words, a much broader range of companies and government departments will use AI. "Throughout 2018, AI performance will continue to improve," says Chirag Dekate, research director at Gartner. "The increased availability of AI capabilities embedded in applications and platforms like cloud office suites and deep neural network (DNN)-based virtual assistants, such as Alexa and Siri, will boost intelligent conversational interfaces to products and services." Gartner's latest CIO survey of 3,160 CIOs from 98 countries, found that 21% of CIOs are already piloting AI initiatives or have short-term plans for them.