Yesterday, IBM Watson announced the launch a set of new pre-trained AI tools for offering Connected Manufacturing. This offering includes a method and approach to help clients accelerate their IoT transformation, from strategy, implementation and security to managed services and ongoing operations.
This new approach will help IBM’s client to connect all their manufacturing equipment, sensors, and systems for business improvement across OEE, quality, lead times and productivity.
What is this new AI Watson enabled IoT approach all about?
This new IoT offering by IBM focuses on industries that are heavily IoT dependent–industrial equipment, automotive (smart vehicles) and buildings (smart spaces). The IBM’s AI Watson solution, when combined with its Industrial IoT platform empowers, provides ‘things’ with the data they need to understand the physical world as everything becomes connected. This helps customers to take advantage of the vast amounts of data generated by IoT.
Kareem Yusuf, GM, IBM Watson IoT says, “We decided to release this largest-ever AI toolset pre-trained for industries and professions to help businesses re-imagine how they work. A key business advantage lies in tapping into organizational insights, historical customer data, internal reporting, past transactions, and client interactions. These elements are too often underutilized.”
Rob Enderle, Principal Analyst at tech analyst firm The Enderle Group said, “Training is where AI deployments get hung up. Much of the initial work with developed AI is to create this training, which then, through machine learning, can be passed on to new systems, significantly lowering the deployment cost and time to value. This is a critical phase to maturing the platform and getting it closer to its operational and sales potential.”
With the heavy lifting completed during the training period, Watson is ready to start producing targeted, industry-specific insights right away.
Enderle further added, “Getting the system to this phase is anything but trivial. Once there, machine learning can allow the replication of an unlimited number of systems,”.
Areas where IBM is pre-training Watson for industries and functions
Agriculture
AI-powered visual recognition capabilities let growers decide where to spray pesticides, determine the severity of damage from pests and diseases, and forecast water usage. Farmers also gain insights from temperature and moisture levels, as well as crop distress.
Human Resources
IBM Watson Talent lets recruiters analyze the backgrounds of top-performing employees to find candidates for new positions. In fact, AI could help reduce bias in hiring decisions, according to IBM. Psychologists helped IBM produce an AI scoring system, which lets recruiters quickly sort through candidates.
Marketing
IBM Watson Assistant for Marketing is a component of Watson Campaign Automation SaaS. The assistant allows companies to evaluate their marketing campaigns, engage in more direct conversations with customers, and create a personalized customer experience.
Manufacturing
The Watson toolset for the manufacturing industry will provide visual and acoustic inspection capabilities. AI technology will also allow manufacturers to predict when equipment failures might occur, as well as energy waste and product quality issues. AI will let manufacturers gain insights and deal with workforce attrition, skills gaps, and rising raw material costs.
The pre-training is also taking place in the advertising, commercial and transportation space
To know more about this in detail, visit IBM’s official website.
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