The same Microsoft technology currently used by healthcare organizations and yes, robots, is now being tested throughout the summer months by Cricket Australia, making it the first cricketing nation to integrate the company's team and player performance platform into its decision-making processes across fitness, game strategy, player recovery and team selection. As part of the new deal with Microsoft, Cricket Australia is now one of a few sports organizations worldwide experimenting with the new platform. At the recent Microsoft Australia Developer Conference, Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella said he was "glad" with how Cricket Australia was planning to integrate "machine learning" into its overarching strategy. "Cricket is one of the richest sports when it comes to using machine data. But how could you harness the power of data to even start having a more intelligent informed conversation about performance of teams, performance of players?"

During his first official visit to Australia, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella revealed how the company will be working with a range of local organisations to push the next stage of Australia's investment into artificial intelligence [AI]. Among the world's first users of Microsoft's new high performance virtual and intelligent machines are the Australian Government, Cricket Australia, and Webjet. Microsoft will deliver cloud services to Australian developers that will underpin the next generation of intelligent apps. This comes as the largest Windows 10 deployment in the Asia-Pacific region, and will help companies around Australia generate deeper customer insights and learnings. Speaking at a technology developer's conference in Sydney on Wednesday, Nadella said the new intelligent technology to be deployed by Microsoft and will allow human-like interactions with complex business systems.