How AI Redesigned Customer Service

Across consumer-facing industries including hospitality and quality ranking sites, customer service is one of the most critical metrics determining the value of a product against competitors. Planned standards are well and good, but if a process doesn't work or malfunctions, consumers want help, and they want that help to be easy to access, able to handle the problem and resolve it quickly. Moreover, they want anybody (including our often hated self-check-in machines), to be understanding, considerate, and happy to assist. For decades this "human touch" has been the one thing the digital age could not offer, even as the shopping path, and the products themselves have become more and more interwoven with computer and internet technology. The U.S. 3D design company Autodesk has teamed up with Soul Machines, a New Zealand developer of human-like avatars, to produce its first digital customer service agent. AVA (Autodesk virtual agent) is ready to interact with customers 24 hours a day to resolve their concerns.