FUTURIST KEYNOTE SPEAKER: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE’S IMPACT

Futurist keynote speaker and consultant Martin Ford is the author of recent book, Rule of the Robots: How Artificial Intelligence will Transform Everything. We asked him: How is AI going to change the world – and what do businesses leaders need to know about it? You may be surprised at his insights. As he puts it:

“Artificial intelligence, and especially deep learning technology, are poised to transform virtually every sector of the economy, and that will be especially true of the financial industry. In fact the main argument in my book, Rule of the Robots: How Artificial Intelligence will Transform Everything, is that AI will eventually become so ubiquitous that it will evolve into a utility not unlike electricity–a resource that can be easily and inexpensively deployed to solve almost any problem.

AI will increasingly be utilized in the consumer and finance industries in areas like processing loan applications, and it will do this with improved accuracy speed together with lower overhead costs. Deep learning algorithms will be able to sift through massive amounts of data and arrive at insights that would be impossible for any human being. This should allow any decisions to be both more accurate and more fair. However, a crucial consideration for high stakes [decisions] like loan applications is to ensure that the algorithms deployed are not in any way biased with regard to considerations such as race or gender. This is a problem that has already been demonstrated in a number of areas–including algorithms used to screen resumes or to make recommendations in the criminal justice system–and it is of critical importance to carefully audit any algorithms for fairness and possible before they’re deployed.

Going forward, the importance of AI to organizations across the economy will only grow. Those organizations that fail to adopt the technology and leverage it to the fullest extent possible are certain to fall behind and eventually become irrelevant. In contrast, those organizations that act now and begin to develop an AI strategy have an opportunity to enjoy a significant first-mover advantage. Recent analyses from McKinsey and PwC estimate that AI will add as much at $13 trillion to the global economy by 2030. This likely explains why there are massive investments pouring into AI — both internal to corporations and in the VC space.”