AI, blockchain, Internet of Things to be used in larger projects: IBM

Tech firm International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) has said that artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain and Internet of Things will be deployed across larger projects, now that their pilot stage is over.

"Last year, we saw banks and other partners do a lot of pilots and experiments in areas like AI, blockchain, and the Internet of Things. However, most of these experiments are now complete and we will be seeing these technologies being adopted in larger production-ready projects" Prashant Pradhan, South Asia and India chief technology officer, was quoted as saying by The Economic Times (ET).

"What a lot of our legacy clients are recognising is the fact that while they always had the advantage of having a lot of customer data, newer digital companies have done a much better job of anchoring the whole business on insights from that data. Hence, you will see a lot of AI workloads with what you do with enterprise data." he added.

Pradhan also said that some sectors and areas such as inventory management, telecom, retail, and services are ready to adopt these new technologies, with healthcare catching up. 

According to the ET report, the tech firm in January had started a blockchain project with 15 Indian insurance companies to help them access information on KYC (know your customer), claims history, medical history and others. The insurance companies included HDFC Life, SBI Life Insurance, and Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Co. Ltd. IBM is also running a blockchain-based trade finance platform catering to India and South Asia.

"Education and law are also high potential areas for AI applications but they are much harder on the institutional engagement. Skills is another space where there is a lot of unstructured data in the form of résumés and job descriptions" Pradhan was quoted as saying.

The Indian government’s policy think tank Niti Aayog is also considering deploying blockchain in education, health and agriculture, several media reports said. The top government think tank is looking for proof of concept of the new technology in key sectors, a senior government official told The Economic Times on the condition of anonymity. 

IBM has also been focusing on helping enterprises move from native apps to cloud apps. Seema Kumar, country leader for developer ecosystems and startups at IBM India and South Asia, said the company's strategy was to rope in startups and developers to lead the change from bottom-up.