There is no doubt that over 60% of manufacturing companies are using AI technology. AI in manufacturing cuts downtime and ensures high-quality end products. Moreover, manufacturing companies are applying AI-based analytics solutions to their information systems for improving work efficiency. AI in manufacturing will have a crucial impact on the smart maintenance of the production environment. To avoid sudden damages to machinery, manufacturers are predictive solutions.

Working hand in hand with experts from Fujitsu's AI Center of Excellence, French IT services company D.FI has co-created an AI-powered IT service desk capability that has enhanced productivity by a third. Headlines abound about exotic applications of AI technology, from piloting supertankers to composing symphonies. But there are plenty of deployments of AI in much more practical and -- for IT executives -- familiar settings. Groupe D.FI is a French IT services company that provides hosting, cloud and managed services, with revenues of around €80 million ($88.7m) and a workforce of around 250. But in recent years it has seen its ability to combine sales growth and higher productivity thwarted by a resource-hungry activity: the efficiency with which its teams can process and resolve customers' technology service requests. Thomas Meunier, COO at D.FI, explains the scope of the challenge.