Radical Business Transformation of AI (Part 1)

Summary

In this episode of 'Asher Essential,' Microsoft Corporate Vice Presidents discuss the impact of generative AI on business transformation through radical product innovation. They explore how AI's ability to reason and adapt to new information is revolutionizing R&D, enabling rapid innovation in industries like cosmetics and reinsurance. The conversation highlights the potential of generative AI to enhance existing products and accelerate the creation of new ones, emphasizing its role as a powerful tool for companies to stay ahead in a competitive market.

Takeaways

• 🌟 Generative AI (Gen AI) represents a new wave of business transformation, focusing on reasoning and planning as core principles, which reflects how humans work but at computer scale.
• 🚀 Previous business transformations were about minimizing and scaling down technology, such as from mainframes to PCs and then to smartphones.
• 🛠 The shift with Gen AI is the ability to continuously learn and apply that learning without the need for traditional coding, allowing for more dynamic and adaptive systems.
• 💡 Gen AI can reason over various forms of human knowledge, including data, literature, and multimedia, to uncover patterns and insights that were previously inaccessible.
• 🔍 It enables rapid experimentation and innovation by integrating historical data and learnings, allowing for the creation of new products and services at the speed of consumer trends.
• 🛑 The technology can be applied to both the creation of entirely new products and the reinvention of existing ones, making them more robust and adaptable to changing conditions.
• 🔑 Gen AI acts as a teaching engine, adapting past learnings to current work, and as a process evolution engine, allowing for the reconsideration of previously discarded ideas.
• 🌐 It supports the radical product innovation cycle by providing access to a vast amount of data and the ability to iterate quickly with AI partners on new designs and ideas.
• 📈 The potential of Gen AI is particularly significant in industries like cosmetics and reinsurance, where it can enable companies to innovate rapidly and stay ahead of market demands.
• 🌐 The technology can also help address demographic challenges, such as maintaining productivity levels in societies with fewer available workers, by enhancing the speed and creativity of the existing workforce.
• 🔄 Gen AI is not about replacing human creativity but about partnering with it, offering more perspectives and scenarios to explore during the innovation process.

Q & A

What is the main focus of the discussion in this episode of the Asher Essential show?

The main focus is on discussing generative AI (Gen AI) and business transformation, particularly how radical product innovation and R&D are driving these changes.

How does Jacob describe the evolution of business transformation waves?

Jacob describes the evolution as a process of minimizing technology from large systems like mainframes to smaller devices like PCs and then to phones, with each wave involving core innovation and building upon the previous one.

What is the key difference that Jacob sees in Gen AI compared to previous AI technologies?

The key difference is that Gen AI systems can learn and continuously apply that learning, breaking it back into the system, unlike previous AI where code had to be written to perform specific tasks.

What does BJ emphasize as the main change in the work of researchers and product innovators due to Gen AI?

BJ emphasizes that the main change is the ability to reason without writing code, which accelerates the process of taking customer feedback and incorporating it back into product innovation rapidly.

Can you provide an example of radical product innovation as discussed by BJ?

One example is a cosmetics company that innovates by not only making products that enhance appearance but also have wellness claims, doing so with a relatively small team and at the speed of consumer trends.

How does BJ describe the capabilities of generative AI in supporting product innovation?

BJ describes generative AI as having three capabilities: reasoning over any information to find patterns, acting as a teaching engine to adapt past learnings into current work, and serving as a process evolution engine to revisit and build upon discarded ideas.

What is the significance of Gen AI in the context of rapid experimentation and innovation?

Gen AI allows for faster and safer experimentation by iterating ideas with AI, which can access vast amounts of data and partner with humans to create new designs more efficiently.

How does BJ view the role of Gen AI in the future of product innovation, especially considering demographic changes?

BJ sees Gen AI as a powerful tool to maintain or increase productivity levels in the face of demographic changes, enabling fewer humans to do their jobs faster, better, and more creatively.

What is the potential of Gen AI in enhancing existing products, according to the discussion?

Gen AI can add thousands of new parameters to existing models, making them more robust and capable of adapting to changing situations, thus enhancing existing products significantly.

How does the conversation suggest that companies can capitalize on Gen AI even before it's perfect?

The conversation suggests that companies can use Gen AI to reinterpret signals, understand deeper insights, and reinvent existing products, capitalizing on its capabilities to improve and innovate even as the technology continues to evolve.