Artificial Intelligence is the next key game changer for business, but Irish companies are not as prepared for AI as global business, a new survey has revealed. Almost half of Irish chief executives believe AI will have a bigger impact on the world than the internet revolution, yet half of them are planning AI initiatives in their companies, compared to 77% of chief executives globally. This was one of the key findings of PwC's 2019 Irish CEO survey. "If you look at the global survey, a lot of that awareness or that belief that AI will significantly change how we do business is coming from the US," Feargal O'Rourke, Managing Partner with PwC Ireland, explained. "They are probably just getting an earlier line of sight of the impact of AI, but I think Irish CEOs are certainly waking up to it. Almost two thirds of CEOs believe that it will significantly change how they do business in the next five years, but yet only half of them have plans in place to address this, so there is a bit of a gap there," Mr O'Rourke said.

According to one of Maurice Conti's TED presentations, we arrived to a new, augmented age, in which Artificial Intelligence gains a new role. The future holds a generated era in which artificial intelligence comes up with its own designs, its own ideas, its own products instead of all our tools being passive, us telling them what to do and them doing it. From now on, tasks will be executed by robots, AI and humans cooperating, robots providing perfect execution, AI the design and humans making the necessary decisions. But in order to get to this point it is crucial to build a "nervous system" for robots through sensors. Industry 4.0 has introduced the concept of data exchange withing manufacturing, opening countless business opportunities, some that were previously unimaginable. By implementing sensors experts will be able to make use of data of all type which were not at hand before, making products become even services as well.