Artificial Intelligence: practical uses and applications for companies and SMEs

Artificial Intelligence is a technology that is already very present in our daily lives and in the day-to-day of companies. At the I Conference on Artificial Intelligence Alcoy 2020, organized by Digital District, the Alcoy City Council and the UPV on September 10 and 11, we were able to learn the main practical uses of AI and how it is being applied by SMEs and large companies. A technology that, in addition, will be a fundamental pillar of economic growth in the short term, as recalled by the Minister of Science and Innovation, Pedro Duque, who took part in the conference via online: “Technologies such as AI are one of the main factors of growth, and its global economic impact is estimated at 14 trillion euros by 2030 “.

These are the main applications of Artificial Intelligence that were analyzed in the two sessions of theIA Conference:

Intelligent buildings

From Siemens, Esther Carrascal, Business Development & Sales for Data Center Vertical Market, analyzed the great strides AI is making in the field of smart buildings. Safer, more sustainable and efficient spaces thanks to a technology that will soon apply predictive maintenance to buildings and will be able to foresee possible breakdowns and breakages and recommend preventive actions. Siemens also presented some technological innovations that the company is already applying, such as Siveillance Video, an intelligent IP video management platform that allows the entire system to be managed with a single screen; and White Space Cooling Optimization (WSCO), an AI-based tool that guarantees the correct dynamic cooling for the data room with a machine learning model that analyzes and optimizes the temperature distribution, achieving greater energy efficiency.

Chatbots

The general director of 1 Million Bot, Celia Sánchez and Lasse Rouhiainen, -consultant and international expert in artificial intelligence-, discussed the need to initiate a technological transformation in Spanish companies as a great challenge after the covid-19. Rouhiainen indicated that SMEs can start with a more basic digitization process before they can use technologies such as AI. Both delved into the role of chatbots through several real examples of virtual assistants put in place to collect information related to COVID-19. The case of Ecuador is stunning, because the chatbot they applied to resolve citizen service questions about the coronavirus made it possible to identify the need to implement a food program. 15% of the questions that were made to the virtual assistant were related to problems with the search for food.

Chatbots have also been applied successfully to respond to powers of attorney, such as a product recommender to identify the product that best meets the needs of a specific customer.

IA in Google

How does Google apply artificial intelligence and how does it benefit us users? Lirios Conca, Country Operations Manager of Google Spain, explained that, thanks to AI, we can extract the text of an invoice and generate an accounting system based on photos, or convert the calls into texts and group them by type of complaint. The applications of AI are also seen in tools that we use daily, such as Google Images: by entering a search word, related images appear thanks to machine learning, which classifies images without having tagged them before.

One of the most recent applications is Art Transfer, that allows you to transform an image into a specific canvas with different artistic patterns.

Security in mayor sports events

Artificial Intelligence has become an essential tool for security in large events, especially sports events, where hundreds of thousands of people gather. Carmen Ruiz, Commercial Director of Large Events at ATOS, gave the example of the Olympic Games, a world event in which AI facilitates the control of accreditations and accesses, as well as all the general security operations. An important application in the ‘covid’ scenario is to be able to detect if the capacity of a stadium is full or to make a count of people in each venue. Among the innovations that we will see in security at the Tokyo Olympics, facial recognition stands out. Furthermore, AI plays a fundamental role in the field of cybersecurity.

Artificial Intelligence and cars

In the field of Automobiles, Miguel Ángel Casas Prósper, founder and manager of StepsBridge Consulting, explained that AI will bring us cars that are more connected, autonomous and closely linked to a new form of mobility. But AI is not only applied to vehicles as such: it has also been a revolution in other processes in the automotive sector, since it allows an incredible capacity for productive improvements, from sensors, cameras and radars, to the analysis of the social networks, traffic management and mobility.

AI applied to Health

Ana Jiménez, R&D Engineer at Quibim, highlighted the added value that Artificial Intelligence brings to the field of Health, especially image analysis. This technology allows better detection of diseases since medical diagnoses can be carried out by automating processes. This advantage is already being applied for the detection of covid-19: “Imaging techniques can be complemented for emergency patients or if there is limited access to PCR. Computed tomography is the most sensitive imaging technique now.”

Artificial Intelligence in the companies

Pablo Barrachina, partner at SumamoOs and Daniela Salazar, Director of Marketing and Communication, explained some of the uses of AI focused on the client through sentiment and image analysis, such as segmentation, content recommendation or online customer service.

In the logistics sector, AI has brought about a revolution for predictive maintenance and energy efficiency in industrial processes. Javier Olive, CEO of Tyris.ai, analyzed some of the real applications that are already working, such as the prediction of production, optimization of the supply chain and the prevention of so-called ‘production stoppages’ and all those failures that pose an extremely serious problem.

In the technological services for companies sector, Diego Torres, co-founder of BIForecast, emphasized that SMEs can also access this technology to optimize different areas such as logistics or marketing, and even to have a forecast of the energy consumption of the company and increase savings. An example of the use of this technology is found in the case of a publishing group, which saved 5,600 euros per month by applying sales volume predictions for each sales point of the company.

Regarding Machine Learning, among the possibilities offered by AI is the on-line recommender for improving Productivity. Manuel Luna Molina, Analytics and Big Data consultant at Inycom, explained that of a company dedicated to the construction, maintenance and management of pellet manufacturing plants, which thanks to the processing of all the data it handles, can preventively identify the possible stoppages due to failures in the different processes of this industry.

Another tool that AI offers in the field of technological services to companies is the system known as Digital Twin. It is a virtual representation of a process to monitor, simulate processes and optimize production procedures, as explained by Raúl Hussein, director of Advanced Data Analysis Services at the ITI Institute of Information Technology.

Augmented Reality is also one of the tools based on this technology that can best help companies and the Industry. Mauro Cardona, director of Systems, Security and Standardization at Ubesol, and Jordi Linares, director of the Vertexlit research group, detailed that augmented reality allows interpreting and analyzing information from the environment and giving the best content to the user.