Google – Keeping Tabs on the AI Leader

Google – Keeping Tabs on the AI Leader

AI is a scale game. Massive amounts of data and a large number of data scientists are required to build and train machine learning models and neural networks that underpin products such as Google Assistant and many others we’ve grown accustomed to. Google has never been great at selling to the enterprise. If it ever solves this riddle – watch out – because Google is capable of disrupting incumbents across industries.

One example that is ripe for disruption is insurance, specifically the technology provider side known as “InsurTech”. Verisk – an insurtech incumbent – could potentially see parts of its business get disrupted by Google AI. Take for example flood forecasting. This is an area that Google AI deems important and launched a pilot last year in the Patna region. If it chooses, Google could most certainly package this service for insurers and go head-to-head with Verisk / ISO’s flood solutions.

To give you a sense of processing power and what may come, a few days ago Google AI’s “Quantum” effort processed a calculation that proved the randomness of numbers generated by a random number generator in all of 3 minutes and 20 seconds. This calculation would take the fastest supercomputer (Summit) approximately 10,000 years (originally reported by The Verge).

When one contemplates the resources and focus required to generate this type of output, it is difficult to imagine any company that has only begun to develop its AI capability effectively competing with Google.


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