Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in Industry

Just as the dust started to settle in the aftermath of Google’s stunning victory for artificial intelligence in the game of Go, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University kicked it up once more by defeating humans in poker. In so challenging the human metier, these and other breakthroughs in speech, reasoning, and vision startle as much as they impress. Taken together, they suggest a new normal of rapid and sustained progress.

In time, the excitement of research segues to its application, setting once-elegant abstractions against commercial realities. To date, a growing number of businesses centered on AI are in the process of stress-testing society, challenging its basic assumptions about labor and the economy. In a recent report, McKinsey projects that about half of today’s work could be automated by 2055. While similar studies may disagree on specifics, precision in this case matters less than the accuracy of their consensus: automation will fundamentally reshape work and, by extension, industry.

The adoption of AI is, in a word, uneven. The choppy history of other major technology shifts, from the steam engine to IT, would suggest as much. The broader sweep of AI and its economic, social, and political influence will face growing scrutiny from scholars and policymakers alike. This report hopes to add to this discussion through interviews with the entrepreneurs and executives on the front lines of AI, machine learning, ...