BIMA Scotland Breakfast Briefing – AI: Beyond the Chatbot

Speakers

Join us for our snappy, informal and informative breakfast session. Hear from our fantastic panel and benefit from their diverse and individual insights on the latest in AI.

Report after report warns us that we are on the cusp of an AI revolution. Accenture are predicting that in five years, more than half of customers will select services based on AI instead of the traditional brand. Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk are taking it a step further, suggesting AI is a threat to our very existence. Most marketeers are just scratching the surface, with a focus on the humble chatbot and voice interfaces. Underpinning the user interface, genuine AI comprises of a wide and deep set of complex technologies, tools and importantly data. Here we will talk about how people are using these foundational technologies, and why they need to be in place for AI to be meaningful.

Session moderator:

Jonathan Seal, Strategy Director, Mando Agency and BIMA AI Think Tank

Panel of experts:

Chatbots the start of the social commerce (r)evolution by Garrett Dearey, Client Partner, We Are Social

How good machine teachers avoid creating AI delinquents by Matt Meckes, CTO & Co-Founder, Cohaesus

Machine Learning for Creativity and Design: how machine learning might transform the creative process by Dr Matthew Higgs, Data Scientist, The Data Lab

Exploring how marketeers should be exploiting the insights from machine learning by Vicky Brock, Entrepreneur,​ ​Founder,​ ​CEO

Zero UI: The next 5 years of conversational interfaces by Andrew Bruce, Digital Planner, Screenmedia

Speaker bio’s:

Andrew Bruce joined innovation practice Screenmedia from a background in technology startups and languages, and is now an integral part of the voice interaction and planning team. He is particularly interested in the ethics and impact of AI technologies on wider societies, and how the unique properties of languages impact the planning and design of natural language based interfaces. He works on major blue chip client projects researching, ideating, and planning conversational interfaces and is a regular public speaker on the opportunities and challenges of moving to an AI-first mindset.

Garrett Dearey is the Client Partner at We Are Social, a global conversation agency. There he oversees a number of global brands and is accountable for the agency’s growth. Growth which is dependent on ensuring the agency and clients alike are creating and sustaining social initiatives that bring people together, spark conversation and drive action. His experience is gained from both agency- and client-side. Prior to joining We Are Social, Garrett led digital for two white spirits category at Bacardi Global Brands and headed up the innovation team at FutureBrand. 

Matthew Higgs has worked in academia and industry, and as a data science consultant for 10 years. Prior to joining The Data Lab, Matthew held Post-Doctorate Research positions at the University of Glasgow and University College London (UCL), worked as Chief Data Officer at an IoT startup and AI Advisor for a creative agency, obtained a PhD in Computational Statistics and Machine Learning from UCL, and more recently founded the Glasgow AI meetup to nurture the AI & ML community in Glasgow and wider Scotland.

Matt Meckes is CTO of the founding partners of Cohaesus. Matt studied for a degree in AI a decade too early. Now we have the computing power and gargantuan datasets for AI to start living up to it’s promise, he is having fun applying it to his clients problems. Currently he has a focus in helping his clients understand and build the new human machine collaborations that will make up the workforce of the future.

Cohaesus architects, builds and improves digital products and services for forward thinking clients. We are experimentation over strategy; action over inaction; working software over documentation; testing not guessing; whiteboard not PowerPoint; stories before requirements; product more than project. All the while never forgetting our engineering DNA.

Vicky Brock ​is named by Forbes.com & Bloomberg in their Top 9 Female Tech CEOs to watch, she is the founder and former CEO of award-winning AI high-growth technology start-up, Clear Returns, which helps retailers boost profits by understanding and tackling their returns. Vicky won Innovator of the Year at the 2014 FDM everywoman in Technology Awards & led Clear Returns to be named top Tech StartUp in Europe, by the European Commission. She graduated from King’s College London, Birkbeck and MIT. She is a Director Emeritus of the Digital Analytics Association and previously worked with Google Analytics, HP and Tesco Clubcard. Named by Forbes.com & Bloomberg as one of the 9 top female tech CEOs to watch, she is also a Tech London Advocate and one of Computer Weekly’s Top 50 Women in IT. Get Market Fit, Vicky’s new company, is the vehicle​ ​for​ ​her​ ​next​ ​tech​ ​startup​ ​-​ ​currently​ ​in​ ​discovery​ ​mode!

Visit​ ​her​ ​website​ ​at​ ​​https://vickybrock.com/blog​​ ​and​ ​follow​ ​her​ ​on​ ​Twitter​ ​​@brockvicky

moderated by: Jonathan Seal – Speaker, part time science nerd, stranger to direction-sense, and grumpy-old-man of poor customer experience. Jonathan consults for global brands and speaks on digital trends and disruption, the rise of AI in marketing, more personal computing, and the evolution of digital working.

He spends time with some very clever people as part of the BIMA board on artificial intelligence, and is Strategy Director at Mando, an organisation dedicated to using digital to simplify people’s lives.