The vital role of partnerships in scaling artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is an incredibly powerful business tool, but few organizations are able to fully utilize it. This is especially true for those trying to go it alone.
An effective way to overcome this challenge is to find friendly partners who can help carry the burden. That means other companies and organizations that have the skills you lack or specialize in the support infrastructure you need, whether in engineering, logistics, marketing or sales.
This is especially essential when it comes to AI. It is certainly becoming easier for businesses to start exploring and benefiting from AI. But fully integrating it into an enterprise across all viable use cases remains expensive, time-consuming, and often dependent on the availability of highly skilled specialists.
Companies rely on trusted networks of consultants, suppliers and resellers to create these partnership ecosystems. Partnerships working in the context of AI will be particularly important for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) which generate the majority of GDP and account for 90% of global business activity. Ultimately, it will likely be these companies that determine whether AI achieves its intended goals. 4.4 trillion dollars potential.
Challenges of AI adoption
In my experience, the number one reason a company struggles to realize its AI ambitions is simply a lack of skills. Much has been written about the shortage of AI professionals, such as machine learning engineers, data scientists, and experienced project managers in the field.
After that, there are often also issues around the data itself. This may mean difficulty obtaining data, but today it more likely means difficulty cleaning or preparing data, managing data quality, or understanding and complying with privacy and security regulations. security.
Additionally, there are challenges related to organizational culture. There may be resistance from employees, fearing that AI will eventually replace them. And management may be reluctant to cede aspects of decision-making that are often considered part of leadership.
So many problems that prevent companies from benefiting from the progress that AI can bring every day. These problems may seem extremely difficult for businesses alone to solve, but can often be overcome with an effective partnership strategy. Let’s take a look at how some companies do just that:
Effective partnerships
Kate Woolley, IBM’s general manager of ecosystems, sees its ecosystem of partnerships, which includes technology and systems integrators as well as consultants and software providers, all playing a role in filling skills gaps in the organization, creating robust data strategies or guiding organizational change.
Part of his strategy is to bring together the best. I told him about a recent partnership agreement between IBM and SAP, which includes integrating WatsonX directly into the home page of SAP’s cloud service, SAP Start. This allows users to take advantage of WatsonX’s natural language capabilities when launching and using SAP’s suite of cloud applications.
Woolley told me this “provides a much better user experience for SAP users and brings more value to our customers.”
In a partnership, it is often the case that the value of one partner is its unique ability to meet the needs of the other’s customers.
For example, Google recently announced the closure of the whiteboard tool Jamboard integrated into Google Workspace since 2016. By its own right, Jamboard was used quite well. However, it hasn’t proven as popular as other whiteboard tools like FigJam, LucidSpark, and Miro, which are also integrated into Workspace due to partnership agreements with Google.
All of these apps meet the requirements of Workspace customers while keeping them within the Google ecosystem. So it makes sense that Google would stop trying to compete with them for users and just provide them with the infrastructure they need to scale.
Microsoft and Wolters Kluwer have partnered to develop an AI tool that surfaces relevant legal information, streamlining the workflow of legal professionals and showcasing the transformative power of business-to-business collaboration in innovation in AI material. David Jones, Senior Program Manager of Microsoft’s Modern Work Customer Co-Innovation team for this engagement said“We thought that if we could leverage Wolters Kluwer’s extensive knowledge to determine the legal context of the document an attorney is working on, we could proactively surface useful information that would speed up the attorney’s workflow and would help him produce better quality work.”
Another recently launched The IBM partnership – this time with NASA – aims to democratize access to geospatial data collected by the space agency’s satellites. This partnership includes the creation of the first open source AI base model based on NASA data, and was built to facilitate tasks such as monitoring deforestation, detecting greenhouse gas emissions and forecasting crop yields.
Evolve with partners
The partnership offers organizations the opportunity to develop their collaborative processes. This creates opportunities for companies to share best practices and learn from each other. It also exposes each partner’s services to the other’s audience, acting as an endorsement and creating opportunities for shared advertising and marketing outreach from both companies.
When executed effectively, this allows both partners to leverage each other’s reputation and credibility to communicate their trustworthiness to the public and potential future customers.
This strategy is reflected in partnerships like that between Coca-Cola and Spotify. The soft drink maker brought value to its customers by providing the technology behind Coca-Cola Music, while Spotify benefited from Coke’s global marketing reach.
American Express created value and increased loyalty by offering exclusive benefits to its members through a partnership with AirB’n’B, which increased its visibility among an affluent consumer segment of Amex cardholders.
But perhaps the biggest benefit many companies gain from partnering is the ability to share resources and knowledge. Leveraging a partner’s specialized skills is often done to improve functionality and user experience.
The future of partnerships?
As technology evolves, it makes sense that the nature of partnerships will evolve as well. As AI use cases continue to emerge, I am sure more organizations will explore the benefits of partnering with others who share compatible visions and values .
A concept that will become increasingly common will be that of a center of excellence. These can be seen as hubs that join multi-partner networks and act as a central repository where lessons can be shared and opportunities explored. IBM was quick to associate this trend with the rise of generative AI. Launched this year, its center of excellence for generative AI is designed as an access point to a network of more than 1,000 experts in emerging technologies. Already, more than 100 of its clients have taken advantage of these opportunities, with results that include AI-generated spoken word feedback in Masters courses and applications in chemical engineering and customer relations.
Another example of an organization leading the way in leveraging partnership dynamics comes from ChatGPT creator OpenAI. The company has been very active in partnering with third-party app and service providers, including Expedia, Shutterstock, and Coursera. Clearly, OpenAI has created streamlined processes around partnering with companies that can use their technology to improve their service, in recognition of the key role it plays in evolving their user base.
I believe that a direct and open approach to creating partnership ecosystems will become the standard model as more organizations become familiar with the requirements of AI. If managed well, it will play a key role in developing the next generation of IT innovation.