How to launch--and scale--a successful AI pilot project

At the US Patent & Trademark Office in Alexandria, Virginia, artificial intelligence (AI) projects are expediting the patent classification process, helping detect fraud, and expanding examiners' searches for similar patents, enabling them to search through more documents in the same amount of time. And every project started with a pilot project. "Proofs of concept (PoCs) are a key approach we use to learn about new technologies, test business value assumptions, de-risk scale project delivery, and inform full production implementation decisions," says USPTO CIO Jamie Holcombe. Once the pilot proves out, he says, the next step is to determine if it can scale. Indian e-commerce vendor Flipkart has followed a similar process before deploying projects that allow for text and visual search through millions of items for customers who speak 11 different languages.