Can AI Help to Build A Better Future with Neil Sahota, IBM Master Inventor

May 7, 2020

A vibrant and insightful discussion on how to define an impactful AI use case (framework below), how AI technology can help during COVID19, why we might be losing our voice during lockdowns, and how to overcome this. Most importantly we discussed how we as citizens and communities can take action to build a better future. Make sure to read the key points below and check out the entire recording at the end of the blog post.

Master Inventor Neil Sahota takes the stage

Our fireside guest Neil Sahota is a sought-after global expert who has worked with Global Fortune 500 companies, world government leaders, and startups around the world. He has been on panels with world-known business leaders like Gary Vaynerchuk and he creates value as a United Nations AI Expert, Master Inventor, and best-selling author.

What constitutes an impactful AI use case?

Focus on solving a problem and creating value, then ROI will follow.

In the first part of the webinar, we addressed the question of what value creation means in the context of AI.

Creating tangible results requires experimentation and breaking with old and conventional thinking habits that are deeply rooted in many organizations. AI is a disruptive technology and with all disruptive technologies, there is an exploration phase and maturity phase. It is the decision of the company to be part of it or miss the accelerating AI train.

Everyone is talking about automation while the real value lies in building innovative solutions where technology is paired with human creativity.

The magic formula for impactful AI use cases

AI is not the solution to all problems. Building products does not start with thinking about AI but finding a meaningful problem that once solved adds value for the customer or user. Many organizations fall into the trap of adding AI to their strategy without first defining the problem in detail.

According to Neil defining a use case successfully comes with two key ingredients. The right mindset of entrepreneurial thinking, stepping away from “why it won’t work” to “how to make something work”. Next, we need to dive into what are the real problems and root causes to derive a clear problem statement. Only after doing this, we can explore further through knowledge of the space, Rules/regulations, adoption challenges to identify if there is an opportunity or not. Next, the technical implementation starts to build an actual solution. If you are interested, you can find real-world use cases AI projects.

Neil’s Magic Formula

Use cases of AI for COVID19

We addressed the following use cases in the webinar:

AI-driven monitoring tools for social distancing
Cracking COVID-19 genetic signatures through Machine Learning
Looking at the effects of policies for vulnerable populations

What about domestic violence during a lockdown?

One observation during our AI project about how policies and lockdowns affect vulnerable populations was a spike in domestic violence. Below Rudradeb Mitra touches on the example of Singapore. If you are interested in other countries, check out How a Global Community Applies AI to Help Vulnerable Populations during COVID19.

Domestic Violence Singapore

Chances for organizations during COVID19

As Omdena Founder Rudradeb Mitra points out the current crisis shows who is affected the most or in other words who is most vulnerable. This can also be applied to customers, users, and even employees where organizations can use AI technology like sentiment analysis to understand which subgroups are most affected by a regulation or policy.

How can we build a better future

Lastly, we discussed how each one of us can make a difference by using his or her voice. There are no experts of the future and the only way to predict the future is to create it. What can each one of us do to create a better future is a question we all need to ask ourselves!

Here is the entire outline of the webinar:

Min 3:00: Introduction by Neil Sahota: How to build an impactful AI use case
Min 13:15: Opportunities for organizations, increase of domestic violence
Min 23:05: Fireside chat: Use cases, how to overcome AI bias, how to build solutions as communities rather than relying on governments and large organizations, etc.

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