It was no surprise to see AI (Artificial Intelligence) stand-out as a theme at the recent Qlik Data Revolution tour in London. After all, it’s the key trend in data analytics and business intelligence (BI). But if your business isn’t in the fields of technology and software, AI can seem like a daunting concept. So here’s our view on how you can get more AI in your BI and reap the benefits.

So what is AI and why does it matter so much when it comes to Business Intelligence?

Well for us, Accenture have come up with the best way of thinking about artificial intelligence. In its ‘AI-ExplAIned: A Guide for Executives’ it focuses on the framework of capabilities of AI rather than the technology itself. It outlines the capabilities of AI as:

Sense - Just as our senses help us experience the world around us, AI uses sense to process images, sounds, speech and text.

Comprehend - Learning your times tables at school, would’ve become easier once you could recognise patterns in the numbers. AI also comprehends data by recognising patterns.

Act - It then uses that comprehension to link to an action.

Learn -  Finally, it will learn from the results of those actions to optimise its future performance, in the same way as humans learn (or not!) from our mistakes.

Qlik's take on AI

That final point about learning is key to how Qlik thinks about AI. It focuses on AI being less about ‘Artificial Intelligence’ and more about ‘Augmented Intelligence’. That’s because when machine learning is combined with human intuition it can have a greater impact.

Qlik delivers this Augmented Intelligence through Insight Advisor. The benefit to your business is that Insight Advisor will auto-generate and suggest the best analytics and insights for you to explore based on your specific data and the search terms you use. This results in more insight for less effort, which saves you time and brain power. 

Its Insight Bot then helps you take AI to the next level. You can have a conversation with the Insight Bot and ask questions of your data in human language. It will deliver results, suggest other content based on your questions and predict future data trends. 

If you still want more. Qlik has moved on a step by joining forces with DataRobot. This gives you the power to build your own machine-learning models with absolutely no need for coding. Essentially it helps you find the best predictive model for your data.

And that’s why AI is having such an impact on BI and data analytics, because as well as helping you to gain deeper insight from your data, it can also help you move towards...

Predictive analytics - to see what could be coming round the corner.

Prescriptive analytics - to help you take action to address it.

That’s power to you, and will help you make informed decisions quickly. AI in BI is here to stay, but it's entirely up you how you want to use it.

Your business intelligence partner

If you want to take your business intelligence to the next level, we can help you find the best solution. We’ll spend time understanding your needs and work with you to project manage, develop and deliver the right business intelligence solution for you. We’ll be your business intelligence partner to help you get more value from your data without the hefty consultancy price tag.

Give us a call or email us, we’re always happy to have a chat.