Platforms are environments, computing or otherwise, that connect different groups and derive benefits from others participating in the platform. The underlying concept covers companies from Google to Facebook to video game platform Steam to Taser (more on that later).
“’Platform Strategy’ is one of our few courses where participants can spend an hour debating on what they are learning about is,” MIT Sloan Professor Catherine Tucker tells students in her executive education course on platform strategy. “Don’t get hung up on definitions. Being a platform or not is more of a range than a set point.” Read More
Tag Archives: AI First
Andrew Ng at Amazon re:MARS 2019
Fireside Chat with Andrew Ng
Where A.I.’s Next Big Breakthrough May Come From: Eye on A.I.
A pioneer in artificial intelligence says conventional companies can still distinguish themselves in A.I. despite worries that tech giants like Google and Amazon have already won.
Andrew Ng, a prominent Silicon Valley executive and investor who previously led some of the biggest A.I. projects at Google and its Chinese rival Baidu, says the next wave of A.I. will be in industries in which the tech giants aren’t firmly rooted. Think manufacturing, agriculture, and healthcare. Read More
Turn digital transformation from a project into a capability
Technology changes quickly, but organizations change much more slowly,” says MIT Sloan Professor George Westerman, whose recent research focuses on the leadership challenge posed by digital transformation.
“The relentless march of technology is very good for companies that sell technology, and for the analysts, journalists, and consultants who sell technology advice to managers,” writes Westerman in a recent article for MIT Sloan Management Review. “But it’s not always so good for the managers themselves.”
He claims that while computing power grows exponentially (Moore’s Law), organizations do not, making digital transformation more of a leadership challenge than a technical one. Read More
Stop Experimenting With Machine Learning And Start Actually Using It
It turns out there’s a fatal flaw in most companies’ approach to machine learning, the analytical tool of the future: 87% of projects do not get past the experiment phase and so never make it into production.
Why do so many companies, presumably on the basis of rational decisions, limit themselves simply to exploring the potential of machine learning, and even after undertaking large investments, hiring data scientists and investing resources, time and money, fail to take things to the next level?
Quite simply, an inbuilt experimental mindset. Read More
The Overplayed, Turbohyped, and Underwhelming World of Artificial Intelligence
Move over, smart beta and risk parity: Today’s buzzword is AI. It’s difficult to find a manager that does not claim to be using artificial intelligence to improve its investment process. However, significant obstacles can impede a manager’s adoption of AI — obstacles that threaten to transform not only a manager’s investment processes, but its entire business. Thus many managers’ claims of adoption tend to be more aspirational than genuine. The evidence for these claims typically comes down to one of three things:
The inclusion of a new, nontraditional data set (typically some type of web scraping) into existing traditional, non-AI investment processes; the hiring of a “computer scientist” or “data scientist”; or the simple misappropriation of the term “machine learning” to include traditional quantitative processes
Such hand waving presents asset allocators with a challenge: separating the counterfeit from the authentic. Read More
Should you build or buy AI?
a16z Podcast: Beyond Software, to Talent and Culture
with Marc Andreessen (@pmarca), Ben Horowitz (@bhorowitz), and Tyler Cowen (@tylercowen)
Continuing our 10-year anniversary series since the founding of Andreessen Horowitz (aka “a16z”), we’re resurfacing some of our previous episodes featuring Andreessen Horowitz founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. Read More
The Digital Culture Challenge: Closing the Employee-Leadership Gap
Culture—a roadblock or a catalyst for digital transformation
Ian Rogers, Chief Digital Officer at LVMH – “The big moment for an organization is when they have embraced the fact that digital transformation isn’t a technical issue, but a cultural change.”
The Chief Digital Officer of a global consumer products company says: “Culture change is a prerequisite of digital transformation. “
Unfortunately, it’s a pre-requisite that is beyond the grasp of many companies as they look to drive innovation and change through smart technologies and data. For most, cultural issues continue to block digital transformation and it’s a problem that’s worsening. In 2011, a majority of respondents (55%) said that culture was the number one hurdle to digital transformation1 but in our latest research, this figure has actually risen to 62% . Read More
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