BEIJING, December 5 (TMTPOST) -- Chen Xudong, the Chairman and the General Manager of IBM Greater China, said on Saturday that generative artificial intelligence (AI) has resulted in technological transformation and a big impact on various industries during a keynote speech delivered at the T-EDGE Conference.

During his a keynote speech titled "In the AI+ Era: The Type of Artificial Intelligence That Enterprises Need," Chen pointed out customer assistance, content innovation, and knowledge-based Q&A have become more helpful to users in consumer AI, increasing personal productivity.

The 2023 T-EDGE Conference, held from December 1 to December 3 in Beijing,  with the theme of "New Horizons, New Connections" featured nearly a hundred international innovation leaders from diverse fields. They shared insights in over forty offline discussions, addressing the latest global AI revolution, industrial chain restructuring, a new wave of corporate globalization, innovation, and investment trends.

Chen argued that AI for consumers is divided into two major categories: language-related tasks and human-computer communication. These areas are undergoing significant changes. Human programming capabilities are predicted to improve tenfold over the next few years with the help of generative AI, and task efficiency will increase dramatically.

However, compared to "the tip of the iceberg" in AI for consumers, enterprise AI has broader requirements and capabilities. As of late 2023, a critical debate is going on: whether to accelerate or pause the use of generative AI? For global CEOs, this has become a big challenge. According to a survey by IBM's Institute for Business Value, CEOs are under pressure to accelerate AI adoption from a variety of sources, including boards of directors and investors. As leaders of their organizations, CEOs have their own judgments and considerations. Their most pressing requirement is to use AI to increase core production.

However, translating technology into productivity is rarely easy, and there is frequently a huge gap between ideas and reality. Based on the Gartner analysis, poor data quality costs firms an average of $12.9 million annually. According to IBM, 30% of organizations suffer due to insufficiently automated business operations; global economic losses from data breach incidents average $4.45 million; and more than 50% of CEOs see sustainability as their organization's most challenging task.

As a 112-year-old worldwide technical leader, IBM has spearheaded developments in AI, automation, and hybrid cloud solutions, all of which have aided corporate growth. Chen stated in the speech that IBM leveraged decades of knowledge in the AI industry to suit consumer demands. IBM released the enterprise-level AI Watson in 2011, supporting 40,000 global enterprise customers. Last May, IBM introduced Watsonx, an enterprise-level AI and data platform that not only helps businesses use large models and generative AI but also addresses three major challenges in enterprise-level AI applications: finding the required data, establishing appropriate models, and managing system operations.

IBM's Watsonx Granite model series includes a big model with 20 billion parameters for code creation and a small model with 13 billion parameters for dialogue, Q&A, and simple instructions and responses. These models can apply generative AI to a variety of business contexts. For example, the code generation model has learnt 115 programming languages from 1.5 trillion tokens, allowing engineers to generate code more rapidly and precisely using natural language prompts. It enables local deployment, ensures data compliance and security, and assists clients in dealing with potential intellectual property issues linked with the use of this paradigm.

Chen stressed that while AI becomes a critical driving force in China's technology development and industrial upgrading, the path to enterprise-level AI is complex and needs overcoming technological, talent, and cultural barriers. IBM intends to use its industry experience and technical skills to co-create with Chinese clients and partners, assisting enterprises in meeting these challenges.

Chen said that IBM is dedicated to promoting the use of AI applications as the most effective partner for businesses. IBM is ready to welcome clients who are interested in the "Watsonx Strategic Workshop" and future "Watsonx Pilot Projects."