Companies are using AI as a tool for innovation: Accenture

Rise in digitalisation across industries has led to increasing number of companies transitioning from experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI) in pockets to embedding and scaling it across their organisations. Bharat Petroleum (BPCL), India’s leading oil marketing company, for instance, has re-imagined its extensive sales and distribution network using data, AI and cloud technologies to increase operational efficiency and service quality for its customers across India. Accenture, which has helped build BPCL’s ‘IRIS’ digital platform has enabled integration of real-time data from across BPCL’s countrywide network to provide a consolidated view of its extensive operations.

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Apart from oil and gas, more industries such as banking, life sciences, telecom and media, consumer goods, retail, energy and e-commerce are adopting AI in a significant manner. According to Roy, the benefits range from productivity gains and cost reduction to strategic goals, such as developing entirely new products and services, deepening customer engagement and becoming more sustainable and resilient. He said that AI is increasingly turning into a lever for growth and innovation, and not just efficiencies.

“Most enterprises now understand the high growth and innovation that AI can drive for them. We help our clients do so across strategies, processes, technology and culture in a responsible way, bringing together cloud as the enabler, data as the driver, and AI as the differentiator. Ultimately, this enables them to make smarter decisions, and with a greater degree of confidence,” he said.

With the increased demand for automation, India is also shaping up as a talent hub for AAI to service clients globally. Accenture has a team of specialists in data science, data engineering, machine learning operations, data visualisation, storytelling who have industry and functional domain expertise. The company is also upskilling and reskilling them on an ongoing basis to keep up with the changing solutions requirement of its clients, Roy said.

“India is a hub of innovation for Accenture globally, and an important talent location with more than 300,000 people. For Accenture Applied Intelligence, there’s a lot of critical work underway that’s being led by our India team and our people here have the opportunity to work on a wide range of exciting projects and help shape how AI solve real world problems,” he said. .