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We were delighted to be joined by over 100 Women in AI at the end of November for the first instalment of our Women in AI virtual evenings. The evening of virtual networking, discussion and keynote presentations, supported by TD Bank, covered topics including'Diversity's Critical Role in AI and Innovation', Action Recognition for Behaviour Understanding from Video in 2020 and more. Speakers included Jane Ho, Associate VP, Data & Analytics at TD Bank, Ashley Cohen, Principal Analytical Lead of Google, Tanmana Sadhu, Computer Vision Engineer at Huawei Canada, Inmar Givoni, Director of Engineering of Uber ATG, Sedef Akinli Kocak, Senior Lecturer at Ryerson University and Hakimeh Purmehdi, Senior Data Scientist at Ericsson. A summary of highlights is below, including a video recording of the panel discussion. Artificial intelligence and Machine Learning models are heavily reliant on the data that feed them. While AI can improve human decision making; however, since data can be biased based on human decisions made in the past, AI output may inherit or even amplify biases.

TD Bank is to port artificial intelligence technology into its mobile app, providing users with more personalised, contextual information on their finances.

Editor's Note: This post has been updated as of December 24, 2018. TD Bank Group is a leading Canadian bank and the sixth largest bank in North America by branches, employing more than 85,000 people. The bank provides its services to around 25 million customers, and its guiding philosophy is "legendary customer service." In short, this means that every interaction with the bank should be a memorable and enjoyable experience. Over the last five years, TD's Innovation, Technology and Shared Services team has rolled out the "Googlefication" of the business.

From Google's Arts & Culture App--which uses facial recognition technology to match selfies to thousands of artworks--to Pizza Hut's plans for driverless pizza delivery. The application of Artificial Intelligence to improve the customer experience is on the rise. In fact, this year the Consumer Electronic Show featured its first ever Artificial Intelligence Marketplace to showcase the latest innovations designed to perform human tasks. Products ranged from big data analytics to speech recognition to advanced decision-making to predictive technology. Many of these solutions are already being leveraged by great companies to add a magic touch to their services.

TD Bank, Canada's second largest bank has made a bold move into AI, purchasing Layer 6, a Toronto headquartered AI startup for an undisclosed price. In what would be an anomaly for the startup market, according to a report in the Wall St Journal, Layer 6 had up until the sale taken no venture money, with founders bootstrapping the business from day 1. Like many trending areas, AI has been a hotspot for conversations at the C-Suite level, but a sore spot when it actually comes to real investments. According to research, advisory, and consulting firm Celent, the vast majority of AI initiatives are still in the planning and consideration phase. Banks surveyed in their Understanding the Investment into AI in Banking, 2017 only showed deployments of AI technology in fraud, risk and natural language processing areas.

TD Bank just bought its first technology firm, Toronto-based artificial intelligence startup Layer 6. The Canadian banking giant, also based in Toronto, invested an undisclosed amount in Layer 6 to help it "continue to transform itself" in the industry shift from mobile-first to AI-first customer experiences, said Rizwan Khalfan, TD's chief digital and payments officer. The transaction was completed Tuesday morning. Banks always say to keep up with competition -- which now includes financial startups and retailers as well as competing banks -- their best bets are to build, buy or partner with them. But buying is rare: last fall JPMorgan Chase acquired WePay, a small business-focused payments company. In the last three years, Silicon Valley Bank acquired API startup Standard Treasury, BBVA acquired digital bank Simple, Ally acquired trading platform TradeKing.

Ta-da! TD Bank is making its intentions clear with the acquisition of Toronto-based artificial intelligence (AI) company Layer 6. Layer 6 provides an AI-powered prediction engine for enterprise data. Its founders Tomi Poutanen and Jordan Jacobs are also co-founders of the Vector Institute, an AI research and education firm that TD also supports. Vector launched last year with $230 million of backing from over 30 companies including the governments of Canada and Ontario. Michael Rhodes, group head, innovation, technology and shared services, TD Bank, says AI has the "potential to power a new generation of data-driven applications from personalised and real-time advice to predictive analytics that will shape the future of banking for millions of individuals". Financial details were not disclosed, but TD says the acquisition is "not expected to have a meaningful impact" on its common equity tier 1 capital ratio.

There is much talk in the industry about robo-advisors and automated investing. How about the potential of automated retail banking? The industry is in for a lot of AI-inspired change. In 2008, Warren Buffett famously floated the idea of a million-dollar bet against hedge fund managers. He would invest a million dollars in Vanguard's 500 index fund, while the hedge fund managers would invest however they saw fit.

There is much talk in the industry about robo-advisors and automated investing. How about the potential of automated retail banking? The industry is in for a lot of AI-inspired change. In 2008, Warren Buffett famously floated the idea of a million-dollar bet against hedge fund managers. He would invest a million dollars in Vanguard's 500 index fund, while the hedge fund managers would invest however they saw fit.