Artificial Intelligence Portal for Job Opportunities

Published May-28-18

Breakthrough:
An artificial intelligence solution to promote job opportunities to people with no or low skills.

Company:
BFM-Edge Business School, Malaysia

The Story:

The nature of innovation has been changing in recent years, characterized by a greater openness. Companies of all sizes are encouraging internal departments to collaborate with each other as well as engaging external smarts through a variety of open innovation approaches.

Hackathons have been a favorite geek pastime for many years but are now a part of the corporate mainstream. These competitive events are particularly popular with software developers and startups and in the main are organized to solve a problem or develop a new product or service.

The rise of artificial intelligence in this era of big data has led to a flurry of hackathon activities to exploit a technology that is poised to disrupt many industries including banking, telecommunications and healthcare. AI has a wide array of applications in today's data-driven world including improving the lives of people in need.

AI for Good Causes

The A.I. For Good Hackathon organized by BFM-Edge Business School in Malaysia was focused on finding uses for AI that can benefit others. This open innovation event was held in 2017 and attracted a global audience of solvers to develop and build artificial intelligence-enabled smart city applications to make life easier for disabled persons, the homeless and the poor. Anyone could take part and participants formed teams of four that had to include at least one IT developer.

During a six-week period, solvers participated in workshops conducted by IBM, a Design Thinking workshop and fieldwork. The climax was a 36-hour hackathon in which teams developed and built applications powered by IBM’s Bluemix Cloud and used IBM’s Watson API service.

AI for Job Seekers

The overall winners were a team from the mobile and technology agency Ansible. They developed a job portal that lists temporary and short-term jobs for those with minimal or no skills and encompasses an online section with a chatbot. For their creative endeavors, the team received a check for 6,000 RM (Malaysian Ringgits) which works out at approximately USD $1,500.

"The team worked tirelessly over the span of a month to craft out their ideas and meet the brief," commented Manu Menon, the Managing Director of Ansible. "They combined their love for technology and their understanding of the problems plaguing the homeless, to come up with an executable solution powered by AI."

The Rise of AI

From self-driving cars and airline simulators to toys, games and financial trading, artificial intelligence applications continue to grow and develop. There is a lot of excitement about AI and just how it is going to change some of the things we do. It's clear that the potential is huge and not just for businesses or everyday activities but also for how it can help solve some of the biggest challenges that humanity faces.

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