Ever wondered what does the couple AI-IoT look like? Here’s what Shanika Perera thinks:

"Combining AI and IoT is like making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Even though it is not the healthiest thing in the world to eat, it is damn delicious 😍 AI + IoT is just like that."  

via Pixabay

What Is AI?

AI also known as Artificial Intelligence is when a system can execute a set of tasks and even learn and interact with data in a way that seems intelligent. Think of it as a smart creature being able to complete a set of complex tasks using reflective processes similar to those of humans.

via Pixabay

AI is highly demanded because it makes life easier for companies regardless of the industry. Here’s how it does it--

• Banking

AI is used in the banking industry to automate complex data management tasks and to spot fraudulent transactions. A palpable example of how banks use AI is the use of chatbots to facilitate and improve their customer experience. 

• Retail

Retail companies resort to AI to personalize the customer experience and improve engagement in Business-To-Customer interactions. AI bridges the gap between the virtual and the physical sales channels.

• Healthcare

AI is used to predict diseases at an early stage. Doctors and caregivers use data from wearable devices, such as smartwatches, to oversee early-stage diseases and better monitor their patients.

Hanson Robotics has even taken AI further by fabricating a human-like robot called Sophia. Sophia can process emotional data and even make express emotions through a broad range of facial expressions. 

Football Star Ronaldo meets Sophia

What Is IoT?

Say, your watch has a device that enables you to know everything from your blood pressure to your body temperature on your smartphone. This literally means that your watch is a connected device and is part of the network of physical devices connected to the internet. This network is called the Internet Of Things.

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Like AI, IoT is also highly demanded. IoT is vastly used in industries like--

• Agriculture

IoT is used in agriculture to monitor the crop field using sensors. It is also used to automate irrigation, lighting, temperature, and humidity in the field. 

• Healthcare

One great illustration of the use of IoT in healthcare is the Kinect HoloLens Assisted Rehabilitation Experience (KHARE) platform developed by Microsoft. The platform enables real-time data feeds that help practitioners to create holistic and custom physical therapy for the patient regardless of their geographical position.

When AI Meets IoT

When you combine IoT and AI, you don’t really get a jelly sandwich with peanut butter -- but another science called  Artificial Intelligence Of Things (AIoT). So, simply put, AIoT is when connected devices can analyze data and make logical decisions without the assistance of a human.

These devices can collate data, analyze, and use them to generate better-optimized systems that are highly performant. 

AIoT Creating Wonders In Several Industries

AIoT is just operating magic everywhere it is used. From the retail industry to the smart home, here is how AIoT is changing the game--

Food

As the world population booms, the demand for food is set to be a challenge in the coming years. This demand can’t be met unless the rate of food spoilage and loss gets lower. This becomes a challenge as it requires an accurate mastery of the weather, temperature, etc. 

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The advent of AIoT has made things easier. AI is now used to collate data that help make better decisions on when and how to set the conditioning of a particular volume of grain, beans or rice. But, instead of applying remediation after spoilage happened, which is generally too late, IoT provides predictive information so that the conditioning can be applied at the right moment. It goes without saying that the cost and effect of intervention are very optimized.

On the other hand, companies use AIoT to control pests in their ocean shipment and prevent them from being rejected. IoT is used to detect pest presence on food shipment and AI is parallelly used to apply fumigation in real-time. 

Smart Retail

via Shutterstock

Back in the stone age, the decision-making process in the retail industry was mostly tied to the managers’ experience. Here’s to a new era old traditional methods don’t work anymore. Customers’ behavior is constantly morphing and to stay on the track, retail companies have to predict those and offer better customer experience.

Remember these days when you have to linger for hours on stores looking for a given product? Well, with AIoT, retails can now set a camera system that uses face recognition to determine customer’s gender, age, product preference, popular merchandise, and the flow of customers for a given time period. This way, the smart retail system can place the products in the ideal places using the collated data. 

Office Buildings

via Pixabay

Office building is also at the intersection of AI and IoT. Several companies are now using the AIoT to build a system that can monitor indoor temperature and lighting as well as the presence of their personnel.  

Hence, smart office buildings can feature access control systems empowered by facial recognition technology. Employees are no more required to sign their names on attendance lists and they can easily access the office when the camera detects their facial features. Life becomes easier for HRs as they can now easily gather attendance records to be used as reference data. 

Recap’

Individually taken, AI is as powerful as IoT, but when both meet, you get a super powerful system capable of things beyond your imagination. AIoT is now used in industries like retails, autonomous cars, agriculture, etc. This is just not an exhaustive list of what AIoT can do these days -- but should be enough for you to have a better understanding of what AIoT is and how it works. 

Tech is affecting every industry and it’s always good to know where we stand. Contact me today to discuss how I can help your company better interact with customers using tech tools.