Technology is rapidly evolving, and artificial intelligence (AI) has become a game-changer for businesses, big and small. AI is no longer just a luxury for large corporations. Small businesses are increasingly harnessing the power of AI to stay competitive, improve efficiency, and offer enhanced customer experiences. AI technologies, ranging from machine learning to natural language processing, are accessible tools that small businesses use to innovate, make data-driven decisions, and streamline operations. This article delves into how various small businesses across different sectors are successfully integrating AI into their daily operations.
Integrating AI in small businesses is not just a trend but a strategic move
TechcessGranted.com
1. Retail: Personalization with Bluecore
In the competitive world of e-commerce, personalization is key. Bluecore is at the forefront, offering AI-driven marketing solutions that enable small e-commerce businesses to tailor their online stores to individual customer preferences. This approach has revolutionized email campaigns and product recommendations.
2. Hospitality: The AI-Powered FlyZoo Hotel FlyZoo Hotel is redefining hospitality with its AI-powered services. From facial recognition check-ins to voice-controlled rooms and robotic room service, this small hotel chain demonstrates the potential of AI in enhancing guest experiences.
3. Healthcare: PathAI’s Diagnostic Innovations PathAI stands out in the healthcare sector by assisting pathologists in diagnosing diseases like cancer with greater accuracy. This small business’s use of AI in pathology is a significant step towards more efficient and accurate healthcare services.
4. Finance: Kabbage’s AI-Driven Lending In the financial sector, Kabbage is transforming small business lending. By using AI to analyze various data points, they provide quick and automated funding decisions, making the loan process faster and more efficient for small businesses.
5. Customer Service: Zendesk’s AI Chatbots Zendesk offers AI-powered chatbots that are a boon for small businesses. These chatbots handle customer service inquiries efficiently, reducing the need for human intervention for basic queries.
Integrating AI in small businesses is a transformative journey towards greater efficiency, enhanced customer experience, and more thoughtful decision-making. These real-world examples across various industries highlight the key benefits of AI: improved accuracy in operations, personalized customer engagement, and streamlined processes. For small businesses, AI is a tool for innovation and a strategic asset for sustainable growth and competitiveness in the digital age.
When you research the future of Smart Cities, there is so much information to digest. Different domains, infrastructures, activities, stakeholders make up a complex system that is the future. Everyone needs to pay attention to the development of the smart city and its effects on our lives, especially those historically left out of the conversation.
One aspect of the smart city that is a game-changer and can be the first stop on our journey to discovering smart city emerging technologies is the fifth generation broadband cellular network technology, better known as 5G. Its profound connectivity capability, increased bandwidth, lightning download speeds, and overall improvements from 4G has put 5G at the forefront of thought and concern.
5G undeniably has the potential to be the critical enabler of a better-connected society, but how do we ensure underserved communities are not left behind or unfairly suffer the unintended consequences of this new connected society? These are the five reasons why women and underrepresented minorities need to pay attention to 5G.
5G is essential for the implementation of the Internet of Things (IoT)
We will discuss IoT in future blog posts, but in short, according to IBM’s Jen Clark, IoT is the concept of connecting any device to the internet and other linked devices. For these devices to be synced and support each other in a seamless, efficient way, 5G is required.
Sriganesh Rao and Ramjee Prasad tell us in their article, Impact of 5G Technologies on Smart City Implementation, a city is a complex system involving many different domains, infrastructures, organizations, and activities. These need to be integrated and work together effectively for that city to become Smart. Women and underrepresented minorities are a considerable part of the system currently developing. As we continue to learn about 5G, envision where you fit into the system. How will this technology affect your community and circle of influence?
2. Change is Inevitable, but We Can Shape the Change
Cities must adopt more efficient technologies to maximize innovation and become more sustainable. We can either be part of the development and change by becoming informed and engaged or resist the inevitable. Smart cities will use technologies to improve transportation, public safety, water and sanitation, housing, and education. Being informed on the changes that are happening around us will empower us to voice and communicate how emerging technologies will affect the communities which we identify and reside.
3. Services and Applications in One Swipe
5G puts us one sqipe away from the services mentioned above. Have you ever been stuck in traffic and wondered if the traffic lights were working as efficiently as possible? Traffic management is a typical smart city project that uses 5G technology to help traffic flow and control light sensors. Emergency services will use 5G to improve response times, offer reliable communication, and ultimately advance citizens’ safety. Water and sanitation maintenance will be controlled by city systems connected by 5G to deliver adequate water supply and monitor and control waste collection and disposal. The information is accessible through interconnected mobile devices shown in Figure 2, adopted from Sriganesh Rao and Ramjee Prasad’s Impact of 5G Technologies on Smart City Implementation.
Figure 2 illustrates integration of various services and departments of a city, enabling data sharing amongst each other as required to provide a holistic view and control of the entire city’s functioning, making the city smart.
As systems and services we use everyday migrate to a cloud structure it is vital we are able to use the tools to better our lives. We can save money, and time by having tools work for us not against us.
4. Education– The Great Equalizer (1+4) = 5G
The last service mentioned is education. It is an essential dimension that shapes a functional society. Pay special attention to the changes 5G brings to education. All should have access to educational opportunities. Distance to education institutions is obsolete as 5G enables high-speed remote access to classrooms. COVID-19 has given us a glimpse of the virtual capabilities of education. It has also shown us the negative impact the lack of internet access can have on underserved communities. We do not want the same skewed unintentional consequences as smart city infrastructure affirms a move towards a more remote learning environment.
5. 5G is the Future
If 2020 has taught us anything, it is that we all have the power to make a positive change for ourselves and those mistreated. With smart city development, we have an opportunity to write our future. The fifth-generation broadband cellular network of that future will not surprise us. We will utilize the emerging technologies associated with 5G and demand it is used for social good. Smart cities will be inclusive and benefit us all if the teams developing them are diverse, aware, and analyze the unintended consequences of their technologies.
“As the world urbanizes, sustainable development and economic growth depend increasingly on the successful management of urban growth. With the right technology — and the know-how to govern it — cities can lead the way in solving problems in energy, transportation, healthcare, education and natural disaster response, while making their communities more inclusive, resilient and sustainable.” -The Global Smart Cities Alliance
Continue the conversation with your circle of influence. Always remember, technology for social good and access for all ensures a better tomorrow.
If you would like to read more about the articles and organizations mentioned in this post, please use the links below.
Technology’s power can solve marginalized communities’ problems, but it presently favors certain groups and impinges on others. How can the technology industry effectively support all communities? What are the motivations for and challenges of public interest technology? A look at the history of race and technology can help answer some of these questions.
Bruce Sinclair is a Senior Fellow at the Dibner Institute at MIT. In his collection of essays published in his work Technology and the African-American Experience Needs and Opportunities, he looks at two subjects, race and technology. Although, they shaped American history, we seldom discuss them as related subjects.
Integrating the Histories of Race and Technology is the introductory essay of Sinclair’s work. It’s words enlighten us that “there are reasons why the past we seek to reveal has been so long denied, and racial prejudice dominated all of them,” a statement that still holds immense truth in other subjects of American history. As I read, it was clear that history will repeat itself if we are not intentionally amending wrongs.
ILLICIT INVENTIVENESS
Technical competence is not related to race, but historical, societal norms showed a different narrative. Benjamin Banneker, an astronomer, and almanac maker, who corresponded with Thomas Jefferson, is rarely mentioned in history books. He is one example of how “Racism may have colored all our history, but it whitened the national narrative.” Sinclair also suggests that “Just as it took new approaches to put women back into the story of America, so we now seek the means to write blacks back into the history of American Technology.” One day, we will all recognize names like Mr. Banneker and celebrate the black inventors that emerged when inventiveness in people of color was considered illicit.
FORWARD PROGRESS
Today we have an opportunity to halt a repeat of an unacknowledged, exclusionary past. Our utilization of technology in history is different yet similar to today, from a Black family using the automobile to escape the Jim Crow south to protestors in 2020 using smartphones to record unlawful arrests during a racial pandemic. Everyone should have access and the opportunity to engaged with emerging technologies.
As Sinclair points out, “Technology may be socially constructed, but the players are not all on the same footing,” but being more involved and vocal about what technologies are deployed and how they affect different communities changes the narrative. Let us revoke the unevenly distributed benefits and consequences of past technologies, insist on an inclusive technological future, and be equitable players in an ever-changing enterprise.
Reading essays like Sinclair’s evokes feelings that quickly turn into action. Tears streamed down my face uncontrollably, a salty reminder of hundreds of years of inequalities consistently elided. COVID-19’s economic and healthcare disparities, the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and countless others, and systemic racial injustice, all reflect the need for change. This generation has whole-heartedly accepted the challenge and pressed forward with action. We all are important pieces of the puzzle.
This blog is just a glimpse of history. I desire to encourage people to look back then press forward into exploring today’s technology. Each Race and Technology blog will explore the Technology and the African-American Experience Needs and Opportunities essays and answer our own questions about race and technology. How can technology be used to better your individual life? What tool can you imagine that would help your community? I encourage you to operate, optimize, and even develop technology that advances social good.
Please use the link below to Bruce Sinclair’s Technology and the African-American Experience Needs and Opportunities for further reading. Also, tune in to Techcess Granted’s Race and Technology Blog as we explore the essays.
