Scaling the ladder: IBM leverages Watson tools and open source to bridge AI gaps

When it comes to artificial intelligence, IBM Corp. is increasingly finding itself having to fill gaps. There are skills gaps for data scientists who build training models, organizational gaps where companies struggle over how AI should be built and implemented in the enterprise, and credibility gaps as adoption has grown, but many people are still uncertain about its potential or nervous about it taking away jobs. Yet perhaps the most-significant gap that exists today is the knowledge fundamental to the technology’s future success: What exactly is AI? This has led the head of IBM’s Watson AI technology group to take the unusual step of unpacking the “black box,” a system or device that performs a function without widespread knowledge around how it actually works inside.