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Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Cloud Predictions by Jerry Kurata and Barry Luijregts, Pluralsight. In this article, they share their predictions for the ways that AI, ML and the cloud will be used differently in 2020 and beyond.

This decade has seen a seismic shift in the role of technology, at work and at home. Just ten years ago, technology was a specialist discipline in the workplace, governed by experts. At home things were relatively limited and tech was more in the background. Today technology is at the centre of how everyone works, lives, learns and plays. This prominence is shifting the way we think about, use, interact with and the expectations we have for technology, and we wanted to share some reflections and predictions for the year ahead.

AI Jerry Kurata

Increased User Expectations

As users experience assistants like Alexa and Siri, and cars that drive themselves, the expectations of what applications can do has greatly increased. And these expectations will continue to grow in 2020 and beyond. Users expect a stores website or app to be able to identify a picture of an item and guide them to where the item and accessories for the item are in the store. And these expectations extend to consumers of the information such as a restaurant owner.

This owner should rightfully expect the website built for them to help with their business by keeping their site fresh. The site should drive business to the restaurant by determining the sentiment of reviews, and automatically display the most positive recent reviews to the restaurants front page.

AI/ML will go small scale

We can expect to see more AI/ML on smaller platforms from phones to IoT devices. The hardware needed to run AI/ML solutions is shrinking in size and power requirements, making it possible to bring the power and intelligence of AI/ML to smaller and smaller devices. This is allowing the creation of new classes of intelligent applications and devices that can be deployed everywhere, including:

AI/ML will expand the cloud

In the race for the cloud market, the major providers (Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud) are doubling down on their AI/ML offerings. Prices are decreasing, and the number and power of services available in the cloud are ever increasing. In addition, the number of low cost or free cloud-based facilities and compute engines for AI/ML developers and researchers are increasing.

This removes much of the hardware barriers that prevented developers in smaller companies or locales with limited infrastructure from building advanced ML models and AI applications.

AI/ML will become easier to use

As AI/ML is getting more powerful, it is becoming easier to use. Pre-trained models that perform tasks such as language translation, sentiment classification, object detection, and others are becoming readily available. And with minimal coding, these can be incorporated into applications and retrained to solve specific problems. This allows creating a translator from English to Swahili quickly by utilizing the power of a pre-trained translation model and passing it sets of equivalent phrases in the two languages.

There will be greater need for AI/ML education

To keep up with these trends, education in AI and ML is critical. And the need for education includes people developing AI/ML applications, and also C-Suite execs, product managers, and other management personnel. All must understand what AI and ML technologies can do, and where its limits exist. But of course, the level of AI/ML knowledge required is even greater for people involved with creating products.

Regardless of whether they are a web developer, database specialist, or infrastructure analyst, they need to know how to incorporate AI and ML into the products and services they create.

Cloud Barry Luijbregts

Cloud investment will increase

In 2019, more companies than ever adopted cloud computing and increased their investment in the cloud. In 2020, this trend will likely continue. More companies will see the benefits of the cloud and realize that they could never get the same security, performance and availability gains themselves. This new adoption, together with increased economies of scale, will lower prices for cloud storage and services even further.

Cloud will provide easier to use services

Additionally, 2020 will be the year where the major cloud providers will offer more and easier-to-use AI services. These will provide drag-and-drop modelling features and more, out-of-the-box, pre-trained data models to make adoption and usage of AI available for the average developers.

Cloud will tackle more specific problems

On top of that, in 2020, the major cloud vendors will likely start providing solutions that tackle specific problems, like areas of climate change and self-driving vehicles. These new solutions can be implemented without much technical expertise and will have a major impact in problem areas.

Looking further ahead

As we enter a new decade, we are on the cusp of another revolution, as we take our relationship with technology to the next level. Companies will continue to devote ever larger budgets to deploying the latest developments, as AI, machine learning and the cloud become integral to the successful running of any business, no matter the sector.

There have been murmurings that this increase in investment will have an impact on jobs. However, if the right technology is rolled out in the right way, it will only ever complement the human skillset, as opposed to replacing it. We have a crucial role to play in the overall process and our relationship with technology must always remain as intended; a partnership.

Jerry Kurata and Barry Luijregts are expert authors at Pluralsight and teach courses on topics including Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), big data, computer science and the cloud. In recent years, both have seen first-hand the development of these technologies, the different tools that organisations are investing in and the changing ways they are used.

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8 Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Cloud Predictions To Watch in 2020 - Irish Tech News

By Steve Dunne, Staff Writer, Workday

In a recentMcKinsey survey,only 13 percent of CFOs and other senior business executives polled said their finance organizations use automation technologies, such as robotic process automation (RPA) and machine learning. Whats more, when asked how much return on investment the finance organization has generated from digitization and automation in the past 12 months, only 5 percent said it was a substantial return; the more common response was modest or minimal returns.

While that number may seem low right now, automation is coming to the finance function, and it will play a crucial role in furthering the CFOs position in the C-suite. Research suggests corporate finance teams spend about 80 percent of their time manually gathering, verifying, and consolidating data, leaving only about 20 percent for higher-level tasks, such as analysis and decision-making.

In its truest form, RPA will unleash a new wave of digital transformation in corporate finance. Instead of programming software to perform certain tasks automatically, RPA uses software robots to process transactions, monitor compliance, and audit processes automatically. This could slash thenumber of required manual tasks, helping to drive out errors and increase the efficiency of finance processeshanding back time to the CFO function to be more strategic.

According to the report Companies Using AI Will Add More Jobs Than They Cut, companies that had automated at least 70 percent of their business processes compared to those that had automated less than 30 percent discovered that more automation translated into more revenue. In fact, the highly automated group was six times more likely to have revenue growth of 15 percent per year or more.

In the right hands, automation and machine learning can be a fantastic combination for CFOs to transform the finance function, yet success will depend on automating the right tasks. The first goal for a finance team should be to automate the repetitive and transactional tasks that consume the majority of its time. Doing this will free finance up to be more of a strategic advisor to the business. AnAdaptive Insights surveyfound that over 40 percent of finance leaders say that the biggest driver behind automation within their organizations is the demand for faster, higher-quality insights from executives and operational stakeholders.

Accentures global talent and organization lead for financial services, Andrew Woolf, says the challenge for businesses is to pivot their workforce to enter an entirely new world where human ingenuity meets intelligent technology to unlock new forms of growth.

Transaction processing is one of the major barriers preventing finance from achieving transformation and the ultimate goal of delivering a better business partnership. It's not surprising that its the first port of call for CFOs looking toward automation.

RPA combined with machine learning provides finance leaders with a great way of optimising the way they manage their accounting processes. This has been a painful area of finance for such a long time and can have a direct impact on an organizations cash flow, says Tim Wakeford, vice president, financials product strategy, EMEA at Workday. Finance spends a huge amount of time sifting through invoices and other documentation to manually correct errors in the general ledger, while machine learning could automate this, helping to intelligently match payments with invoices.

Machine learning can also mitigate financial risk by flagging suspect payments to vendors in real time. Internal and external fraud costs businesses billions of dollars each year. The current mechanism for mitigating such instances of fraud is to rely on manual audits on a sample of invoices. This means looking at just a fraction of total payments, and is the proverbial needle in the haystack approach to identifying fraud and mistakes. Machine learning can vastly increase the volume of invoices which can be checked and analyzed to ensure that organizations are not making duplicate or fraudulent payments.

Ensuring compliance to federal and international regulations is a critical issue for financial institutions, especially given the increasingly strict laws targeting money laundering and the funding of terrorist activities, explains David Axson, CFO strategies global lead, Accenture Strategy. At one large global bank, up to 10,000 staffers were responsible for identifying suspicious transactions and accounts that might indicate such illegal activities. To help in those efforts, the bank implemented an AI system that deploys machine-learning algorithms that segment the transactions and accounts and sets the optimal thresholds for alerting people to potential cases that might require further investigation.

Read the second part of this story, How Automation and Machine Learning Are Reshaping the Finance Function, which takes a closer look at how automation and machine learning can drive change.

This story was originally published on theWorkday blog. For more stories like this, clickhere.

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Automation And Machine Learning: Transforming The Office Of The CFO - Forbes

Google has an update that might make you hate your alarm a little bit less: a new feature lets it automatically change up what your alarm plays based on the time of day and the weather, theoretically playing something slightly more appropriate than the same awful song you hear day in and out. At least, itll be nice as long as youre okay with waking up to AI-generated piano.

The feature is confined to a single device for now: Lenovos Smart Clock, a small smart display that basically has the functionality of a Google Home Mini paired with a screen that can show the time and weather. Google says this feature which it calls Impromptu is part of Google Assistant, though, which suggests it should reach other smart displays, and perhaps even phones, in the future. The announcement doesnt say when or whether itll expand, however.

Google says all of the music is created and chosen by Magenta, an open-source music tool built around machine learning that Google has been creating. In a blog post, Google says the system might select this song if the weather is below 50 degrees (Im assuming Fahrenheit) and early in the morning. I dont know exactly what about this song says cool and pre-dawn, but Id be down to listen to anything other than the default alarm tone that Ive heard every day for years.

The feature is rolling out globally today to Lenovos device. The smart clock, which used to retail for $80, now appears to be down to $50, making it a lot more competitive with Amazons $60 Echo Show 5.

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Google is using machine learning to make alarm tones based on the time and weather - The Verge

Discoverys data science team has been blazing new trails in the payment integrity industry through advanced analytics and machine learning capabilities.

ITASCA, Ill. (PRWEB) December 16, 2019

Discovery Health Partners has been named an honoree of a 2020 FutureEdge 50 Award from IDGs CIO. This prestigious honor is given to organizations that are pushing the edge with new technologies to advance their business for the future. Discovery will accept its award at the AGENDA20 Conference held March 23 25 at the Sawgrass Marriott Golf Resort & Spa in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.

Discoverys Case Open Logic initiative was piloted earlier this year to test machine learning as part of its claims ranking process within its Subrogation practice. Already a leader in analytics-powered technology solutions for some of the top health payers in the country, Discovery saw an opportunity to leverage its decade of case outcomes data to fuel a subrogation model that eliminates hours of manual work, results in more accurate case identification, and reduces member friction. Discovery is implementing improvements and enhancements and intends to roll out similar machine learning capabilities to other lines of business such as Data Mining, Clinical Audit and Coordination of Benefits (COB).

Discoverys data science team has been blazing new trails in the payment integrity industry through advanced analytics and machine learning capabilities, stated Discovery CIO Dan Iantorno. Combining technology innovation with our teams decades of experience in the health payer space is at the heart of how we deliver game-changing results for our customers.

The organizations in the FutureEdge 50 are doing exciting things that would have been unimaginable just a few years ago. For example, theres a project using blockchain and quantum computing to establish trust; an indoor navigation system; and many uses of AI/ML for insights and efficiency, said Anne McCrory, group vice president, customer experience and operations, events, and the FutureEdge and AGENDA20 conference chair. We are honored to showcase these innovations and many others as we enter into a new era of sophistication with cloud, devices, and environments powering the technology-driven business.

For more information about how Discovery Health Partners award-winning team and technologies are helping health payers solve payment integrity challenges to improve financial and member outcomes, visit https://www.discoveryhealthpartners.com/.

About Discovery Health PartnersDiscovery Health Partners mission is to deliver unique, actionable analytic insights and technology-powered solutions to help healthcare payers improve payment integrity, increase revenue optimization, and maximize efficiencies with government programs. Serving more than 70 health plans across the U.S., including six of the 10 largest U.S. health plans, Discovery has been recognized consistently for its growthearning a spot on the Inc. 5000 list six years in a row and the Crains Fast 50 three times. For more information on Discovery Health Partners, go to http://www.DiscoveryHealthPartners.com.

About the FutureEdge 50 Awards The FutureEdge 50 awards recognize organizations pushing the edge with new technologies to advance their business for the future. The successor to the Digital Edge 50 awards, the FutureEdge 50 will recognize not only established initiatives driving business success but also early-stage projects pursued for their watershed potential. These initiatives may be in R&D, proof of concept or pilot phases. With this, the FutureEdge 50 awards aim to bring the most cutting-edge trials and applications of emerging technologies and the innovative cultures enabling them to our audience at the AGENDA conference.

About CIO CIO focuses on attracting the highest concentration of enterprise CIOs and business technology executives with unparalleled expertise on business strategy, innovation, and leadership. As organizations grow with digital transformation, CIO provides its readers with invaluable peer insights on the evolving CIO role as well as how leading IT organizations are employing technologies, including automation, AI & machine learning, data analytics and cloud, to create business value.

The award-winning CIO portfolio CIO.com, CIO events, CIO Strategic Marketing Services, CIO Forum on LinkedIn, CIO Executive Council and CIO primary research provides business technology leaders with analysis and insight on information technology trends and a keen understanding of ITs role in achieving business goals. CIO is published by IDG Communications, Inc. Company information is available at http://www.idg.com.

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Discovery Health Partners' Case Open Logic Machine Learning Initiative Receives FutureEdge 50 Award from IDG - PR Web

In my last post, I discussed most of the top-line findings from the recent "U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] Fiscal Year 2019 Enforcement and Removal Operations [ERO] Report". Long-story short: ICE's ability to perform interior enforcement in FY 2019 was significantly impeded by its need to respond to the massive influx of aliens encountered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at the Southwest border, and by an increase in sanctuary policies. I omitted the report's findings about so-called "alternatives to detention" (ATD). Basically, they don't work.

The section of the report relating to ATD begins by explaining what it is: "ICE's [ATD] program uses technology and case management to monitor aliens' court appearances and compliance with release conditions while their removal proceedings are pending on the non-detained immigration court docket."

The Center has previously explained the limitations of the program:

ATD is, on a daily basis, cheaper than detention, but because ATD participants are placed into the "non-detained" docket of the immigration courts (as opposed to the significantly faster hearings that aliens receive on the detained docket), those savings may be wiped out over the course of two, three, or four years on the program while aliens await the docketing and conclusion of their cases.

...

Long-term data do not conclusively establish the value of the programs in actually ensuring removal from the United States of ATD participants once they have been ordered removed. [Emphasis added.]

The report echoes the highlighted excerpt, above: "ATD is not a substitute for detention, but instead complements immigration enforcement efforts by offering increased supervision for a small subset of eligible aliens who are not currently in ICE detention."

That doesn't sound so bad at first blush, but note the introductory statement that "ATD is not a substitute for detention." That is simply a subtle reiteration of what most objective observers have known for some time. Detention ensures that an alien who is ordered removed is actually removed, without ERO having to go out and arrest the alien. ATD (which is essentially a monitoring program as the first excerpt above makes clear) does not.

In particular, ATD does little to prevent aliens from absconding, let alone to ensure that an alien shows up for removal, as the report explains when it later modifies the complementary nature of ATD: "[W]hile ATD can complement other immigration enforcement efforts when used appropriately on a vetted and monitored population of participants, the program was not designed to facilitate ERO's mission of removing aliens with final orders." (Emphasis added.)

I am not sure what "other immigration enforcement efforts" ERO is referencing here, but frankly, "removing aliens with final orders" is the ultimate one, both temporally and in order of precedence. As Barbara Jordan, then-chairwoman of the Clinton-era Commission on Immigration Reform, explained more than two decades ago: "The top priorities for detention and removal, of course, are criminal aliens. But for the system to be credible, people actually have to be deported at the end of the process." (Emphasis added.) ICE can do all the enforcement it wants, but if aliens under a final order of removal are not ultimately removed, the whole system is a sham.

And, as noted, ATD is ineffective at preventing aliens from absconding. The most damning extrinsic proof of this is found in CNN's reporting on the April 16, 2019, "Final Emergency Interim Report" from the Homeland Security Advisory Council's bipartisan CBP Families and Children Care Panel, which I referenced in my last post.

As CNN explained, the panel recommended that: "DHS ... should be given discretion to detain a close relative with a non-parent family member when this is in the best interest of the child."

The outlet then asked Karen Tandy, the chairwoman of that panel, whether "the council considered alternatives to detention, rather than changes to the law." Tandy responded that the group "'spent a lot of time on it' but found it impractical," explaining: "In common parlance, we're talking about ankle bracelets, and we found at bus station [sic], there are overflowing bins of ankle bracelets that have been cut off."

The report reinforced Tandy's findings, noting that ATD was particularly ineffective when used to monitor released family units, which constituted 64.5 percent of all aliens apprehended by the Border Patrol along the Southwest border in FY 2019.

As the report explains:

While ERO has expanded its use of ATD from approximately 23,000 participants in FY 2014 to 96,000 as of the end of FY 2019, this expansion has come with a number of challenges, including high levels of absconders among recently enrolled family units. In FY 2019, the absconder rate for family units was 26.9 percent, more than double the 12.3 percent absconder rate for non-family unit participants, demonstrating the growing challenges such enrollments create for immigration enforcement. [Emphasis added.]

In this context, the absconder rate was determined by examining "the overall number of aliens who concluded the ATD program in a given time period ('overall terminations'), and the number of those terminations which occurred due to a participant absconding." In other words, when it came to family units, more than a quarter "terminat[ed]" the ATD program by disappearing.

Given the large size of this population as a whole, that is a significant failure of the monitoring program, providing support for the CBP Families and Children Care Panel's conclusion that Congress should give DHS "discretion to detain a close relative with a non-parent family member when this is in the best interest of the child."

Of course, this Congress (and in particular the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives) has no plans to do any such thing. In fact, as my former colleague Matt Sussis noted in February, the latest government funding bill actually increases funding for ATD while restricting detention. In particular, he reported that "the bill expands the ATD programs to 100,000 participants from 82,000, including over $40 million for 'family case management' to keep tabs on aliens who don't immediately abscond (as many do), but does not include money to actually find and remove those who do abscond." One would almost think that they set up the plan to fail.

And, almost as if following up on Sussis' statements, the report makes clear:

ERO lacks sufficient resources to keep all current [ATD] participants enrolled through the pendency of their proceedings, or to locate and arrest the significant number of participants who abscond, problems which will only be exacerbated by enrolling greater numbers of participants without the addition of enforcement resources. While ERO has continued to expand the use of ATD to monitor the non-detained population in FY 2019, the program will need to be further resourced in order to appropriately monitor participants, including through the addition of officers who can locate, arrest, and remove those who fail to adhere to conditions of enrollment.

It concludes with the obvious: "Finally, while additional resources would improve the efficacy of ATD at current levels of enrollment, ERO notes that the program is not a viable solution for addressing the magnitude of cases on the non-detained docket, which surpassed 3.2 million in FY 2019."

Put another way, ATD is ineffective and underfunded, not unlike the Woody Allen joke in Annie Hall about the resort where the food is terrible and the portions are too small. Given this, the arbitrary restrictions that courts have placed on ICE detention of family units, and the limited detention space and resources that are available to ERO, it is no wonder that ICE reports there were 595,430 fugitive aliens at the end of FY 2019.

I would have been more blunt and direct than ICE was about the failures and limitations of ATD, but then the agency will have to ask Congress for additional funding and therefore must be circumspect in its analysis, lestit perturb the appropriators who hold its purse strings. Respectfully, however, it is the American people who should be disturbed by findings in the agency's report.

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ICE Report: 'Alternatives to Detention' Don't Work - Immigration Blog