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The Latest Microsoft AI Power Play
Microsoft is releasing free online courses for artificial intelligence. This is its attempt at remaining relevant in the AI space, so you might as well take advantage.
- On April 2, 2019, Microsoft and OpenClassrooms announced a partnership. Together, they are providing masters-level artificial intelligence development courses.
- Back in early March, Microsoft unveiled a free AI strategy online course. The Microsoft AI Business School is focused on strategy, risk mitigation, and culture.
- These programs supplement its existing AI School (which is also free) and the Microsoft Professional Program for Artificial Intelligence (which can be audited for free).
Our Take
Microsoft appears to be struggling in the artificial intelligence space. It’s losing the virtual assistant space (even replacing Cortana with Alexa in Skype). Microsoft doesn’t have access to the same amount of data as Google. Amazon’s AWS has greater adoption than Azure, suggesting that more AI computational workload is happening in Amazon’s Data Centers than in Microsoft’s.
The above resources show a more strategic play by Microsoft: it is taking control over the AI education space. Its logic is that the more people it can train on AI and on Microsoft’s AI offerings, then the greater future market share it will have on AI tools and AI-enabling infrastructure.
You should be selfish and acquire some free AI skills. It helps Microsoft, but it will also help your paycheck– the Robert Half Technology 2019 Salary Guide shows that artificial intelligence and machine learning are sought after skills.
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