Artificial intelligence must make the world a better place

The big topic this year at one of the world’s largest digital conferences, SXSW in Austin, Texas, was the use and development of artificial intelligence. The main conclusion of many of the presentations I attended was that we as a world community face a lot of global challenges that we can solve with the use of artificial intelligence, smarter technology and Big Data.

Af Martin Brems, Strategisk rådgiver og stifter, Brems & Co., 18. august 2017

There was a lot of talk about self-driving cars, and i.a. Mercedes presented at SXSW their visions. Their starting point was that self-driving cars and trucks are going to make a big positive difference for our entire society. Eg. self-driving trucks could drive out with goods at night instead of during the day, thus relieving the daily traffic on the roads. At the same time, artificial intelligence and massive amounts of data, via satellites, can avert traffic accidents – both just before they happen – but also long before they happen. Simply know that technology learns – faster and better – to recognize patterns in traffic. With self-driving cars, you will also be able to save 50 min in the long run. every day as a citizen.

Another example was Penn Medicine Hospital in Pennsylvania. They work to be able to predict cases of heart failure in all their patients on whom they have medical records. Together with a team of researchers and data analysts, they have been able to predict 20% more people at risk of heart failure. This means that they have been able to prevent in the past and have saved people.

A third example was the company FarmLogs, which helps farmers get the most out of their land. FarmLogs pointed out that there will be over 9 billion. people in the world in 2050 and that we as a society will have problems being able to feed so many people in 2050 with the way we run our agriculture today. Via the use of artificial intelligence and e.g. drones, soil measurements, humidity measurements and a lot of other data sources, then they can optimize the conditions for farmers significantly. Think about what a difference it could make for the 3rd countries and their farming.

From our own duck pond, we have Sensohive in Odense, which develops intelligent sensors that can make climate and temperature measurements, e.g. for horticulture, stables, grain and feed stores and the like.

Today, we have only seen the tip of the iceberg in the use of artificial intelligence and Big Data.

“The winning companies and brands of the future will be the ones who manage to take a starting point in solving a specific societal problem and think it into their business model. Not just because you can, but because in the long run it will be necessary for our planet.”

Therefore, my best advice to businesses is: Think about how your business can use artificial intelligence and Big Data to make the world a better place by solving some of our global challenges, big and small.