AI varies from industry to industry. There are just as many use cases for AI as there are companies. For healthcare organizations, AI is playing a role in monitoring equipment, while retailers see AI as a way to better understand customers. Transportation executives are banking on AI to drive autonomous vehicles. The common denominator across all industry groups is the rate that AI is changing the way things get done.

Government agencies requested $973.5 million in nondefense AI research spending for the fiscal year ending in September 2020. It is the first time the federal government has calculated agency-specific requests for spending on artificial intelligence. AI spending for the Defense Department is classified. Michael Kratsios, the U.S. chief technology officer, said at a Washington panel event that breaking down the government's AI spending will allow it to better identify investment opportunities, conduct strategic planning across different parts of the government and find collaboration opportunities with industry and academia. Trump administration officials said they believe the total reflects their commitment to maintaining and strengthening U.S. leadership in AI.

The announcement Tuesday of a nearly $1 billion federal commitment toward artificial-intelligence research drew a mixed response from business leaders who said the U.S. needs to do more to maintain a competitive edge in AI. Government agencies requested $973.5 million in nondefense AI research spending for the fiscal year ending in September 2020. It is the first time the federal government has calculated agency-specific requests for spending on artificial intelligence. AI spending for the Defense Department is classified.

The recent surveys, studies, forecasts and other quantitative assessments of the health and progress of AI highlighted the role of AI in cybersecurity defense and in scoring standardized tests, the relationships between data migrating to the cloud and data modernization, lax security standards for IoT devices, and that the U.S. still leads the global race for AI domination but that China is making more rapid progress. Written essays on standardized tests in 18 states in the U.S. are currently graded by natural language processing (NLP) software ("automated essay scoring engines") with only a small percentage of students' essays--it varies between 5% to 20%--randomly selected for a human grader to double check the machine's work [VICE] Based on a 100-point scale, the U.S. leads the global AI race with 44.2 points, followed by China with 32.3 points and the European Union with 23.5 points; The U.S. came out on top in talent, research, development, and hardware, while China led in adoption and data. Airbus Americas has been using AI from AppZen to review expense reports and determine if they are in compliance with company policies; in the first partial year of the technology's implementation Airbus paid off its initial investment of $50,000 and pocketed about $50,000 more; the division expects to save $100,000 this year and at least $200,000 in 2020 in the Americas; worldwide implementation is expected to result in several millions of dollars in savings [The Wall Street Journal]

The recent surveys, studies, forecasts and other quantitative assessments of the health and progress of AI highlighted the role of AI in cybersecurity defense and in scoring standardized tests, the relationships between data migrating to the cloud and data modernization, lax security standards for IoT devices, and that the U.S. still leads the global race for AI domination but that China is making more rapid progress. Written essays on standardized tests in 18 states in the U.S. are currently graded by natural language processing (NLP) software ("automated essay scoring engines") with only a small percentage of students' essays--it varies between 5% to 20%--randomly selected for a human grader to double check the machine's work [VICE] Based on a 100-point scale, the U.S. leads the global AI race with 44.2 points, followed by China with 32.3 points and the European Union with 23.5 points; The U.S. came out on top in talent, research, development, and hardware, while China led in adoption and data. And if you're someone who has a great idea but you have no data, that's going to be a big roadblock for you, and you're going to have to find some collaborators or partners who have access to the data you need"--Ben Wilson AI quote of the week: "The risk isn't that machines will get smarter.

As one (human) study participant put it: "I felt very stressed competing with the robot. In some rounds, I kept seeing the robot's score increasing out of the corner of my eye, which was extremely nerve-racking."