Technology has become a key differentiator between success and failure. The deployment of next-gen technologies can help the businesses excel their limits and achieve beyond expectations. Decision Intelligence is one such technology that can make business outcomes even more satisfactory. Decision Intelligence is an interesting technology because it addresses many of the problems faced by businesses when it comes to deploying AI and generating value from their investment. Peak is one of the fastest growing company enabling customers to apply AI to the commercial decision making process. Rajeev Ranjan, Editor, Digital Terminal talked to Atul Sharma, Co-Founder and CTO, Peak. Mr. Atul shared crucial information about impact of Decision Intelligence technology and its growing demand in India. Read below the excerpts:
Rajeev: How do you see the growth of the Decision Intelligence market in India? What are the key changes that you have observed in the last year?
Atul: Decision Intelligence (DI) is the commercial application of AI to the decision making process. It’s a new way of thinking about AI for business. DI turns the traditional approach to data and AI projects on its head. Instead of starting with the data and working out what outcome can be achieved, Decision Intelligence starts with a commercial objective and works back to deliver an outcome that needs to be achieved.
Gartner recognised Decision Intelligence as one of 12 top strategic tech trends of 2022, but globally it is still a very new field. Peak operates in the UK, US and India, and we see some marked differences in the Indian market. Appetite and ambition to adopt Artificial Intelligence among Indian companies is incredibly high, but typically we’re a couple of years behind the US market – a lot of enterprises there have already invested heavily in AI, while in India we’re just starting to explore it.
Yet, most businesses that have invested in AI globally are still struggling to implement it. Decision Intelligence is an interesting technology because it addresses many of the problems facing businesses today when it comes to deploying AI and generating value from their investment. So, for Indian businesses that are now starting their AI journey and can do that with Decision Intelligence, it’s a really exciting time. Since DI can be implemented relatively quickly and is designed to deliver against a business need, there’s every possibility Indian businesses that adopt it now could catch up to or even eclipse those that have been focusing on outdated applications of AI.
Rajeev: Please brief about Peak. How are you making the decision making process fast and seamless?
Atul: Peak is a platform for building Decision Intelligence applications, it enables customers to apply AI to the commercial decision making process.
Peak has three core products – Dock, Factory, and Work – these can be leveraged by businesses at every stage of their AI journey and allow them to:
With features to support both technical and commercial users, Peak makes Decision Intelligence applications widely accessible to everyone within a business, simplifying and accelerating the adoption of AI.
Rajeev: Which larger clientele do you have currently? How are you planning to boost your customer base by the end of 2022?
Atul: Peak is used by leading brands including Nike, ASOS, PepsiCo, KFC and Sika. We are growing our Indian customer base significantly this year and building out a commercial team to support that growth, they will be based in our newest Clubhouse in Mumbai.
Rajeev: How do you look at the role of AI in business growth? How will this technology power businesses in years to come?
Atul: Decision Intelligence is the biggest tech movement for a generation, it will change the way we work in much the same way that electricity and the internet did.
Generally speaking CTO teams view their AI strategy one of two ways at the moment. Either, they look at it as supportive of the wider business strategy, i.e., something that can be used to track and deliver on targets. Or, they view it as a competitive advantage.
This second group is by far the smallest, but as AI matures and becomes better understood, they will lead the way. These are businesses who understand that the insight in their data gives them a massive advantage, and they’ll take a more focused approach to their AI strategy and projects.
As these businesses start outperforming the market, we’ll see even more changes at a business level. IT and Tech teams will move from a support role into a core role, as it becomes obvious how valuable AI is to the business.
Rajeev: What are your plans to drive the growth in 2022? Please tell us about your revenue targets for this year.
Atul: We closed a $75m Series C round in August of last year, which was led by SoftBank. We’re investing heavily in research and development, building out the applications available on the platform. In 2022, we will concentrate our R&D efforts to build more AI applications in Customer, Demand and Supply Intelligence. These new applications will be fast to implement and more scalable compared to previous versions.
Our mission is to put Decision Intelligence in the hands of every business and we’re expanding in India, opening up a new Clubhouse in Mumbai, our third in India after Jaipur and Pune. We’re also opening a Clubhouse in New York, our first in the US.
It’s an exciting time for us at Peak, we’re growing fast – both at home and abroad!