Salesforce and IBM put their AI brains together

IBM and Salesforce have unveiled a new global agreement that will see big blue wire its Watson artificial intelligence APIs into the Salesforce platform to power new predictive analytics services for customers.

The partnership will combine Watson and the vast databases backing its decisions, with Salesforce’s own Einstein technology to produce a new range of predictive services targeted at the weather, healthcare, financial services and retail sectors.

Customers will be able to combine their own Salesforce data with the kinds of weather, economic, and geographic information already ingested by Watson to run complex queries and personalise their services accordingly.

For example “by combining local shopping patterns, weather and retail industry data from Watson with customer-specific shopping data and preferences from Salesforce Einstein, a retailer will be able to automatically send highly personalised and localised email campaigns to shoppers," the companies said in a statement.

IBM subsidiary Bluewolf will also set up a new practice integrating joint environments at customer organisations.

“Within a few years, every major decision—personal or business—will be made with the help of AI and cognitive technologies,” said IBM boss Ginni Rometty.

“This year we expect Watson will touch one billion people—through everything from oncology and retail to tax preparation and cars.”