IBM has formed a partnership with Topcoder, a global software development community of designers and developers, to harness the power of Watson to create the next generation of artificial intelligence apps, APIs, and solutions. This partnership also benefits businesses that gain access to an increased talent pool of developers through the Topcoder Marketplace with experience in cognitive computing and Watson.
"This project with Hilton and WayBlazer represents an important shift in human-machine interaction, enabled by the embodiment of Watson's cognitive computing," said Rob High, IBM fellow and vice president and chief technology officer of IBM Watson. "Watson helps Connie understand and respond naturally to the needs and interests of Hilton's guests -- which is an experience that's particularly powerful in a hospitality setting, where it can lead to deeper guest engagement."
IBM Watson, Cognitive Computing Speech APIs
"WayBlazer is excited to bring Watson's cognitive computing capabilities directly to the traveler as a way to improve the in-destination experience," said Felix Laboy, CEO of WayBlazer. "We believe providing personalized and relevant insights and recommendations, specifically through a new form factor such as a robot, can transform brand engagement and loyalty at the Hilton."
IBM Watson: Pioneering a New Era of ComputingIBM is actively applying Watson's cognitive capabilities to companies across industries, including hospitality and consumer packaged goods, as part of IBM's ongoing efforts to serve a broader audience of users across various form factors such as robotics, desktop, tablets, mobile, and other Internet of Things devices. Toward this end IBM has announced a global strategic alliance with SoftBank Robotics to meet the expanding needs of enterprise clients. Watson represents a new era in computing called cognitive computing, where systems understand the world the way humans do: through senses, learning, and experience. Watson continuously learns, gaining in value and knowledge over time, from previous interactions. With the help of Watson, organizations are leveraging cognitive computing to transform industries, help professionals do their jobs better, and solve important challenges. To advance Watson, IBM has three dedicated business units: Watson, established for the development of cloud-delivered cognitive computing technologies that represent the commercialization of "artificial intelligence" or "AI" across a variety of industries; Watson Health, dedicated to improving the ability of doctors, researchers and insurers and other related health organizations to surface new insights from data to and deliver personalized healthcare; and Watson IoT, focused on making sense of data embedded in for more than 9 billion connected devices operating in the world today, which generate 2.5 quintillion bytes of new data daily. For more information on IBM Watson, visit: ibm.com/Watson and ibm.com/press/Watson
About WayBlazerWayBlazer is the world's first cognitive travel recommendation engine. WayBlazer surfaces the perfect hotel for each traveler by using IBM Watson and proprietary cognitive computing technology. This technology analyzes cues and triggers from the traveler's search to personalize hotel results for each individual traveler. Beyond finding the best hotels, WayBlazer's cognitive technology dynamically merchandises recommendations, media, insights, and local area knowledge in the context of each individual and their trip profile. The combination of the best hotel and personalized content increases traveler engagement online and improves conversion rates. WayBlazer delivers this technology to companies merchandising hotels and to travel-related companies in search of revenue steams from hotel bookings with an easy-to-use API. The privately held company is based in Austin, Texas and is led by seasoned travel and technology entrepreneurs, including the Founder of Travelocity/Founding Chairman of Kayak.com, the former GM of IBM Watson, and former President of Sabre Hospitality. For more information, please visit www.wayblazer.com.
IBM has created the Multi-Purpose Eldercare Robot Assistant (IBM MERA) in collaboration with Rice University, designed to help assist the elderly and their caregivers and investigate how cognitive computing can transform healthcare. This Watson-enabled application is a first-of-its-kind venture and a prescient endeavor given that, according to the United Nations, the number of people age 60 years or older is projected to grow by 56% worldwide by 2030.
At a time when old-school giants like Hewlett-Packard, Dell, and EMC are struggling to cope with the decline of the PC and the rise of cloud computing, IBM is betting big on the future of its cognitive computing group, better known as Watson, and relying more heavily than ever on partnerships with developers to bring its futuristic technologies to market.
Late last month, IBM released new and enhanced Watson cognitive services across four areas: language, vision, speech, and data insights. They're meant to reduce the time required to combine Watson APIs and data sets, as well as to embed Watson APIs in mobile devices, cloud services, and connected systems.
Whether you call it a supercomputer, a cognitive computing system, or simply a question answering matching system -- IBM Watson is perhaps the most well-known example of artificial intelligence in use today.
While AI and cognitive computing are not synonymous, AI is one of the building blocks for cognitive computing. Cognitive computing also employs machine learning, deep learning, neural networks, natural language processing, robotics, expert systems, speech and object recognition and robotics.
Cognitive computing is used in healthcare to help physicians make the best decisions about how to treat patients. In retail and finance, they capture customer data and use that to make personal recommendations on products to customers. In logistics, cognitive computing helps with warehouse automation and management.
Not surprisingly, AWS Machine Learning offers a veritable storefull of cognitive computing services, including translation, NLP, automated image and video analysis, Amazon SageMaker, to build and deploy machine learning models; and Amazon Lex, which is conversational AI for chatbots, according to its website. The website offers videos and tutorials explaining each service.
Speech recognition software is a cognitive service that aims to replicate a human action. Just like human beings can recognize uttered speech, remember what is said, and respond appropriately, speech recognition technology endows machines with similar capabilities. In 2021, the global speech and voice recognition market was worth approximately $8.3 billion as per research by MarketsandMarkets (published in August 2021). This will reach $22 billion by 2026 due to major advancements in AI systems.
Overview: Picovoice is a developer-first AI platform founded in 2018. It can add speech recognition abilities to any application and drive voice-based activation for IoT devices. Importantly, it promises ultra-fast speech recognition that works with zero latency and is compatible with all computing environments.
IBM announced a series of new Watson Internet of Things (IoT) offerings, capabilities, and ecosystem partners that are designed to extend the power of cognitive computing to the billions of connected devices, sensors, and systems that make up the Internet of Things.
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