As IDC predicts 20% YOY growth in Gulf countriesβ AI adoption from 2021-2026, experts and customers share strategies at ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Business Transformation Tour in Dubai
DUBAI, UAEΒ β 14 June, 2023 – To thrive in the face of challenges such as supply chain constraints, critical skills shortages, and slowing global economic growth, regional businesses will need to adopt cloud platforms that enable them to leverage AI, data and automation solutions, according to experts speaking yesterday at the Dubai ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Business Transformation Tour organized by global technology company Β (NYSE: ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄) in partnership with Intel.
Held at the Museum of the Future under the theme βNavigating the Winds of Change in a Digital-First Worldβ, the event demonstrated how embedding automation, data and AI capabilities into technology brings increased resilience, proactive as opposed to reactive strategic decision-making, and a more cohesive workforce, as well as better customer service thanks to Natural Language Processing.
Contextualizing current and predicted IT trends in the region, guest speaker Harish Dunakhe, Senior Research Director (Software & Cloud) at International Data Corporation (IDC), said βThe confluence of AI, data, and automation β with cloud being its foundational platform β is driving current digital Initiatives in the market. In fact, automation and analytics solutions are seeing an accelerated adoption on cloud-based deployments as against on-premises.β
According to Dunakhe, AI adoption is expected to grow by more than 20% year on year between 2021 and 2026 in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Gulf. Furthermore, IDCβs research reveals that Big Data and analytics will grow by more than 20% between 2021 and 2026 on public cloud deployments.Β Dunakhe highlighted that these technologies can contribute to creating digital innovation initiatives that help business leaders build resilient organizations able to withstand the headwinds of global slowdown, currency fluctuations, and geopolitical situations that impact the Gulf region.
Irfan Khan, President of ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ HANA Database & Analytics at ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄, also commented on technologyβs role in building resilience. βBusiness leaders today are under greater pressure than ever before, with many predicting a significant slowdown in global economic activity. Through showcasing solutions such as ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Business Technology Platform (ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ BTP) and S/4HANA at todayβs event, we want to demonstrate the important role that technology can play in addressing these challenges.β
Khan added, βTo enable business resiliency while also encouraging innovation to spur growth and take advantage of new opportunities, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ is leading the charge establishing an ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ business data fabric to harmonize all critical enterprise data and also embedding AI technologies in all its solutions and partnering with other leaders in AI to ensure we remain ahead of the curve.β
Democratizing AI in business
Among the host of recently announced AI partnerships is ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄βs new Datasphere solution, built on ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ BTP. ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ is working strategically with industry-leading data and AI companies β Collibra NV, Confluent Inc, Databricks Inc and DataRobot Inc β to enrich ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Datasphere and empower organizations to create a unified data architecture that securely combines ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ software data and non-ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ data. ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Datasphere is the next generation of ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Data Warehouse Cloud and enables data professionals to integrate and deliver scalable access to mission-critical business data β with business context and logic preserved β across their organizationβs data landscape.
Similarly, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ announced its partnership withΒ IBM WatsonΒ last month to provide customers with new AI-driven insights and automation to help accelerate innovation and create more efficient and effective user experiences. In addition, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ is incorporatingΒ Microsoftβs Azure OpenAI ServiceΒ in solutions such as ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ SuccessFactors to access powerful language models that analyze and generate natural language.
Commenting on the significance of embedding AI into existing ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ solutions, rather than developing individual AI-powered products, guest speaker Pavlos Panagiotidis, Global VP of AI and Hyperautomation at ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄, pointed out that this is a way of democratizing access to the power of AI for business. He adds this is important given the shortage of skills in the IT sector, and particularly in AI technology skills.
According to Panagiotidis, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ is at the leading edge of research and development, combining AI with ERP, big data and related technologies and has already embedded AI functionality across its SaaS solutions, including S/4HANA Cloud, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Fieldglass, ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ Concur, SuccessFactors and the ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ CX stack of solutions. βBy embedding AI and creating AI-powered modules to extend existing ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ landscapes in ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ BTP β such as Conversational AI and Intelligent Robotic Process Automation β ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ is helping smaller and medium-sized businesses to compete,β he says.
Panagiotidis adds that ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ and its partners are focusing on developing responsible AI solutions that benefit businesses and individuals. βThere are multiple ethical considerations we keep in mind when embedding AI solutions, such as controlling use of customer data, counteracting bias in algorithms, and demonstrating transparency in the way interpretations and conclusions are reached. If AI is handled responsibly, it has great potential to improve the lives of employees and the performance of businesses. For example, repetitive and manual processes can be carried out by algorithms, leaving employees free to work on more complex, creative and value-added tasks.β
Echoing the IDCβs findings on the rise in cloud adoption, Panagiotidis concluded, βThe growth of AI goes hand in hand with the global transition to cloud, and it is changing ΒιΆΉΤ΄΄ services for the better. Companies that delay implementing cloud deployments of their business processes will also be missing out on the power of AI. The potential benefits of AI technology are almost infinite in the world of commerce and industry.β
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