Tieto the first Nordic company to appoint Artificial Intelligence to the leadership team of the new data-driven businesses unit

Tieto has appointed Artificial Intelligence as a member of the leadership team of its new data-driven businesses unit. The AI, called Alicia T, is the first AI to be nominated to a leadership team in an OMX-listed company. AI will help the management team to become truly data-driven and will assist the team in seeking innovative ways to pursue the significant opportunities of the data-driven world.

Tieto established its new data-driven businesses unit in July 2016 to help Nordic organisations to create innovative data-driven services and new business models. In support of this goal, Tieto is also investigating the opportunities AI can present to the new unit’s leadership team. Alicia T. will become a full-fledged member of the management team and also possess the capacity to cast votes. 

“I am proud that we are the first Nordic company to invite AI to become a member of the leadership team of the new data-driven businesses unit. Our team is on a mission to make the future more intelligent. Our developers at the new data-driven unit want to test how AI – a technology which is increasingly popular in home electronics – could assist organisations in data-driven decision-making. I am confident that Alicia T. will help us in finding information and making data-based decisions that humans don't necessarily think of – and thus perhaps create something yet unforeseen,” says Ari Järvelä, Head of Data-Driven Businesses.

Within new data-driven businesses the team has already started to generate and deploy data-driven ideas together with customers and the Nordic start-up ecosystem. Alicia T’s role in the leadership team is to support data-driven decision-making and innovate new data-driven ideas with the help of machine intelligence and advanced data analytics. Technically the member is equipped with a conversational interface system so it is possible have a discussion with it and ask questions about anything. In the current shape, the AI is a basic construction that will continue to evolve in both form and data capacity. 

“AI is a hot topic now; speculation, theory and research on the potential future of machine learning and artificial intelligence is running wild. With this project our team wanted – in an agile startup way – to study the effects of decision-making in human-robot team,” explains Taneli Tikka, Head of Innovation Incubation, Data-Driven Businesses. 

The AI has been built by developers at Tieto’s data-driven business unit on top of Tieto's startup team's M2M robotics system and chassis. Tieto is using this experiment especially to test technologies related to conversational interface, as conversational engines like Apple’s personal assistant Siri or Microsoft’s Cortana lead the way in natural language processing, which will eventually be used in enterprise-grade services as well.

 “We want to co-innovate new business opportunities around data. With AI we aim to use machine learning algorithms and see where this project leads us. What is true from early on is that our leadership team at the data-driven business unit will gain valuable insight into how to create a winning team of great people and data-driven artificial intelligence,” concludes Järvelä.

Pictures: Taneli Tikka, illustration of AI

Supporting resources:
Read more about new data-driven businesses: www.tieto.com/data-driven

Press release: Tieto innovates growth with new data-driven businesses
https://www.tieto.com/news/tieto-innovates-growth-with-new-data-driven-businesses-taneli-tikka-to-lead-idea-incubation  

Brain versus AI, a blog by Taneli Tikka:
https://perspectives.tieto.com/blog/2016/03/brains-versus-ai/

For further information, please contact:
Jessica Diktonius, Head of Media Relations and Reputation Management, jessica.diktonius[at]tieto.com, +358 40 709 9176

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Tieto aims to capture the significant opportunities of the data-driven world and turn them into lifelong value for people, business and society. We aim to be customers’ first choice for business renewal by combining our software and services capabilities with a strong drive for co-innovation and ecosystems. www.tieto.com.