For the business leader or entrepreneur, every day can seem like a battle. Phone calls, text messages, setting appointments, taking notes of conversations, attending meetings. Even prioritizing your email inbox seems like a daunting task. Wouldn't it be great if you could have a personal assistant who would take care of all that for you? Well, that is the promise of Artificial Intelligence Apps.

Artificial intelligence is not the future anymore since this technology is already widely used in our lives. Most sci-fi movies predict rather tragic outcome of using the artificial intelligence. You probably remember the plots of Matrix and Terminator – quite depressive vista is shown in these masterpieces of cinema. However, it is the fantasy of scriptwriter and film directors. In reality, the AI has already gained its supporters.

Over the past year, Verto Analytics has published critical research identifying and tracking rapidly-emerging trends in consumer behavior, particularly on mobile devices. Hannu Verkasalo, CEO, Verto Analytics, introduces the conditions under which AI driven apps are influential, from the rise of multitasking to the continued influence of cross-device behavior on digital usage. One thing is clear, says the report: "consumer habits are changing faster than before, aided by an increasingly novel technologies and shorter device innovation cycles. The prevalence of Internet access, the rise of social media, e-commerce, and most recently, mobile apps, have all shaped how consumers behave with digital devices. Within the past few years, we've witnessed the rise of AI-powered apps, which harness cloud-based natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning to power a more sophisticated wave of apps and services," continues the introduction.

We've seen a big rise in apps and bots, and a lot of them have something in common besides being based on artificial intelligence and machine learning: many of them are written first (or only) for English-speaking users. Now one of the more interesting personal assistant apps created first for Spanish speakers is announcing funding: Sherpa, a personal assistant app based out of Spain, has raised 6.5 million in a Series A round. Xabi Uribe- Etxebarria, the founder and CEO, told TechCrunch that the funding will be used to continue building out more functionality in the app, as well as on more hires and to expand the reach of the app as it gears up for a much bigger Series B and eventual expansion to other languages like English and Portuguese. Sherpa is filling an interesting niche in the market that most English speakers might not even realise exists: many of the interesting evolutions in AI and natural language processing have been focused on English applications, leaving large swathes of the non-English speaking world without the same kinds of services. Uribe- Etxebarria notes that while some apps do have Spanish versions they are basic.