Gartner predicts that 2018 will bring more corproate dollars to enterprise software, by way of new AI automation and digital technology.  Growth in the sector has been apparent for some time now, and worldwide software spending is anticipated to increase by 9.5% in 2018 and 8.4% in 2019, for a total of $421 billion.  This comes as a result of enterprises shifting their budgets towards software as a service (SaaS) solutions, which is no surprise given new products, such as financial, HR, and analytic management appliations.  These services rely heavily on computers to do the work, and often

Data breaches in recent years have shown the risk that data always faces, and that risk is on the horizon of expanding.  Now, cloud storage services appear to be in the crosshairs of ransomware attacks, according to MIT research.  Cloud services often hold extensive libraries of data, often personal information, which makes them an ideal target for a hacker payday and notoriety.  Though larger cloud vendors such as Google and Amazon have anticipated this risk and have the resources to put safeguards in place, most at risk are the smaller cloud services who would be more likely to pay up.  A

Ever get frustrated with your phone's personal assitant not being able to understand you?  Or have you received a transcribed voicemail that made no sense?  Those days are numbered thanks to innovations at Microsoft - their AI's voice recognititon engine error rate has now reached an all time low of 5.1%; comparable to the error rate of humans' comprehension of speech.  Microsoft credits "neural-net based acoustic and language models" for this improvement, as well as giving its AI the ability to analyze context when deciphering speech.

KONE, a leading manufacturer of elevator and escalator systems, recently signed on with IBM to utilize its Watson IoT Platform to bring its new 24/7 Connected services to market.  The new service connects elevators, escalators, automated doors, and turnstyles to the cloud, enabling remote systems to interpret messages from the units and make proactive recommendations for service and preventative maintenance.  This helps to keep "needier" units operable, and others running smoothly.

As part of their ongoing reporting on artificial intelligence (AI) in business, ComputerWeekly recently explored how AI is expanding into call centers and customer service departments.  With bots and automated menus and messaging, nearly all of us have worked with a AI utility while trying to contact a company to solve a problem or make a request.  While AI will eventually touch all aspects of a business, its effects are most profound in customer service departments, so much so that human-based customer service may disappear in the coming years.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a technology that we're slowly becoming more exposed to as new products are developed to make everyday tasks easier.  AI actually had a bit of an interesting start - it grew from the technology used to break the German Enigma codes in World War II, however we are more familiar with its more benign uses in beating chess champions or even in our virtual phone assistants.  Enterprises have been quietly developing AI-based cybersecurity strategies that are proving to have promise in protecting systems and even are being used in counterterrorism efforts.

One of the advancing technologies in our day is the use of "smart machines" - machines that are are capable of cognitive computing, artificial intelligence, intelligent automation, machine learning, and deep learning - and these machines are poised to change the way businesses operate.  Gartner reports that almost a third of larger companies will make use of smart machine technology by 2021.

Many businesses and schools have taken advantage of the comprehensive tools available in Microsoft 365, and the introduction of Microsoft Teams to the suite expands this functionality even further.  Microsoft Teams is designed to improve communication within an enterprise by "bringing people, conversations, and content together" - including video and voice communications as well as threaded conversations organized by user-created topics and tabs.