Log in     Support     Status

Recap: STL Startup Week Roundtable Discussion on AI

by | Nov 12, 2020

If you missed the Artificial Intelligence Roundtable discussion at STL Startup Week, we’ve got you covered. The dynamic discussion featured city and industry leaders, David Karandish, Co-Founder and CEO of Capacity; Christopher Kontes, COO of Balto; and Ali Al Jabry, CEO of Kwema. Jonathan Allen, CEO of EQ, moderated the discussion. 

Demo synopsis. 

David started off the discussion and explained how Capacity handles internal and external inquiries. Capacity can answer more than 84% of all inquiries without human involvement. “When you have a customer or team member with a burning question, you need to make sure the answer coming out the other end is one they can feel confident about.” With Capacity, you know exactly where the answer comes from and you can provide feedback on the answer by simply clicking a thumbs up or thumbs down button. For example, if you ask “What are the guidelines for an FHA loan” you should get a totally different answer than if you ask “What are the guidelines for a VA loan.” Even though the questions are very similar, the answers will pull from different sources because of our advanced NLP.

Chris revealed how Balto uses data and speech in a similar way to provide real-time guidance for contact centers. By analyzing thousands of calls, Balto has found that the faster a call center representative talks, the fewer deals they close.  Balto’s technology can detect when contact center employees are talking too fast or too much, and prompts the employee to slow down or let the potential customer talk.

Ali described how Kwema works inside and outside the workplace by anonymously connecting and sharing real-time information via Bluetooth beacons with a smartphone GPS. Companies currently use Kwema for seamless contact tracing at their workplace, respecting GDPR and HIPAA Laws.

A deep dive into AI.

As the discussion carried on, David explained how UX is as important as the AI itself. When Capacity implemented autocomplete, match rates went up and so did customer satisfaction. Capacity also asks clarifying questions to make sure users get the answer they are looking for. 

Jonathan asked “What jobs will AI create?” Chris said he believes AI will take some jobs, but AI will alternatively create higher-skilled and more interesting jobs. David agreed with Chris and said he thinks AI will create more jobs for software engineers, dev ops, data trainers and app connectors. Ali shared his thoughts that eventually drones will fly without pilots to detect emergencies. Once emergencies are detected, humans will be alerted to come to the scene. Everyone agreed that AI will make all jobs more efficient.

The conversation ended on an optimistic note. Everyone agreed that St. Louis has the opportunity to be automated vs. automated out. We are aiming to be the most AI-friendly city in the USA. And, while software automates, employees will have the opportunity to focus on human connections and higher level work.