Look at any tech or industry conference for the coming year and you can see AI is at the top of the agenda. From travel to health, from human resources to customer services, everyone is focused on using bots and AI to improve how they do business. We take a look at some of the key issues these conferences and every company should be addressing.

How can we use technological superpowers like AI to serve our travelers better?

gnore the hyperbole in the title, but that’s what attendees of the upcoming Eye for Travel conference in Amsterdam will be asking themselves. This track from the conference is hosted by Dutch airline KLM and highlights their need to balance the speed and efficiency of bots and machines with human creativity and empathy.

The flyer was one of the first to introduce a bot in the form of BlueBot, and using insight from it and other parts of the customer journey from personalized Digital Marketing to AI-supported social media services are just part of the effort to improve customer service.

Near-neighbour industry, transport and supply’s chain has a huge number of conferences around the world, Scope’s Supply Chain Summit in Atlanta will focus on the digital revolution. Looking at how AI, blockchain, automation and robotics, and IoT technology will transform every aspect of the supply chain in the next few years. For business, the focus will be on the successful selection and adoption of these technologies, with experts will discuss best practices for implementation and fruitful case studies of their digital transformation.

The Deep Learning Summit

AI and related summits are popping up all around the world. Taking a wider look at technology, January sees the Deep Learning Summit taking place in San Francisco. Asking questions like how do you manage transformation in your organisation with implementing machine learning? This is the heart of tech discussing how businesses can use AI, bots and other technologies.

Uber will be discussing the rise of conversation agents and how to evaluate them. Google will look at how machine learning and natural language processing can be applied to Google Ads. And they are just some of the subjects going under the analytic knife from some of the biggest and brightest brains in tech.

When it comes specifically to chatbots, Arun Chaganty of Eloquent Labs will look at how to expand and improve on bots in the talk, Chatbots: The (Long) Tail Wags the Dog, discussing how “In general, customers expect chatbots to handle a large quantity of very specific tasks, and each task requires custom, time consuming, hard coded API integrations. That’s not scalable. In this talk, I’ll go over the novel AI and UX techniques that Eloquent Labs uses to tackle this problem, and how we’re using our approach to make chatbots work in customer facing environments.”

The Consumer Side of the AI Coin

January’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas always sees big brands trying to cram the latest tech into their products. If you want a talking fridge or a microwave with a touchscreen, you can find it there.

Among the masses of smart home technology, connected services and devices, and endles Amazon Echo clones, CES plays home to several major keynotes. In 2019, LG Electronics President and CTO Dr. I.P. Park discusses how AI is the company’s main growth engine, focusing on self-evolving products, a seamless connected user experience and open platforms.

Dr. Park is recognized for his achievements in leading R&D to spur innovation through AI, cloud computing, IoT and user experience related to connected cars, mobile devices, smart TVs and audio systems. Basically, a man worth listening too when it comes to our digital future.

Taking a more nuanced tone, IBM’s Ginni Rometty will be talking about trust and transparency when it comes to companies handling data and generating insights, using IBM Watson AI technology to make everything smarter and improve how people live and work.

A Focus on Asia

Much growth and advances in chatbots comes from Asia where MIT’s EMTech Asia conference in Singapore sees east and western minds meeting to plot the future. With a dash of biomedics, robotics and plenty of AI, the event is more of a meet and greet for business leaders, but highlights rising stars with the ‘Innovators Under 35 Asia Pacific’ for 2019 list showing how AI, quantum computing and machine learning can change the world.

In Beijing, the 2019 Artificial Intelligence Conference and Mobile World Congress Shanghai are just two events that see China’s star rising when it comes to all things technology. Expect bots and virtual assistants to be a key part of these events as tech firms and consumers look to understand how the technology fits into our lives.

MWC’s themes for 2019 include artificial intelligence, digital trust, digital wellness as what these devices do becomes more important than the memory or megapixel count in the latest slightly-better phone.

Whatever industry you are in, you’ll find AI and bots being discussed at any event you go to. Even if you only read the summaries, they provide a key indicator of the importance of bots when it comes to any business aiming to succeed in the near future.