AI Can Help Companies (And Not In The Way You Think)

When I think of AI and companies, I first think of how AI can be used to analyze data itself. But now, AI can help companies FIND new sources of data for analytics.

In the past, data and analytics have been separate entities that needed to be manually combined to have value. You would have to know what data was important or relevant and then you would have to find it. Because of this, many data analysts couldn't find data due to a lack of knowledge of a wider context. AI is now able to find the correct data, and connect it to provide context for analytics. And not only that, the analytical process is becoming extremely automated.

This holds a great deal of meaning for companies looking to expand their data analytics and make it more efficient. With emerging AI technology helping do this, the possibilities are infinite.

And it's not just in analytics that AI technology is emerging. Think of the company Stitch Fix. If you've ever received a package from them, chances are they're a perfect match for you. And it's not a human sitting in a warehouse matching you to clothes. In fact, it's AI.

The founder of Stitch Fix went through many iterations to get the company to where it is right now, but one thing was constant: the doubts. How can a computer be able to fashionably dress a human when fashion was so so subjective? How would a computer have enough knowledge and intelligence to figure out what to give someone to wear? And how would that computer realize that there's a market gap in the market and design a piece of clothing to fill that market gap?

The AI that Stitch Fix had answered all of those questions. Stitch Fix took the mentality of not replacing humans with technology but instead augmenting human talent with AI. This meant that humans were still employed as stylists basically managing the AI and ensuring that it suggested something that a real person would enjoy. And, the AI realized that there was customer demand for a certain style of woman's bell-sleeved tops and this allowed Stitch Fix to expand its product mix and expand its operations from not only styling people and suggesting clothes, but understanding people and designing clothes.

It is an interesting business model of which you can see cousins of in companies such as Netflix and it is interesting to see where this might go in the future!