As a business person, you don't want a situation where your stock level either exceeds or is way less than the customer demand.The merchandising process should be optimized in such a way that the available stock meets consumer demands without excess or deficiencies. This is where inventory control comes in – it allows you to track stock levels while keeping an eye on customer demand, ensuring optimal business performance.When you're able to meet this demand optimally, you avoid chances of over or understocking, theft and damage, and so much more. As technology has evolved, it's become even easier to keep track of your stock levels amid varying customer demands.A manufacturing inventory software, for example, can allow you to manage your stock more accurately, especially because it offers real-time data that makes the process even more efficient. Regardless of your business size – whether large or small – the importance of inventory control can never be overstated. Read on to gather more insights.Reducing Overstock and Understock: Balancing Supply and DemandAs you've already read in the introduction, inventory control is a great way to avoid over or understocking. When done right, this mechanism can save a company up to 10% of inventory costs.When there's too much inventory, you can end up restricting your business' capital and miss out on opportunities for growth and expansion. Walmart, for example, lost a chance of making $3 billion worth of sales in 2014 due to stockouts that arose from insufficient inventory control measures.Inventory control has an integral part, supply chain management (SCM), which ensures a proper flow of inventory to the point where the organization or buyers consume the products. As a report by ADS suggested, 79% of companies that establish efficient SCMs often experience more-than-average revenue growth within their industrial sectors. Inventory control can help to improve your profits while enhancing customer satisfaction.If you are looking to improve the accuracy of your record levels, then inventory control is the way to go. Actually for retail businesses, inventory is only accurate for up to 63% of the time.With better control, you can always be sure that customers are receiving high-quality products – which is a plus. Zonka Feedback demonstrated that 69% of customers who find satisfactory products tend to shop more consistently.Ensuring that customers can find their needed products any time they want them can greatly add to your sustainability. Stockouts are to be avoided as research has indicated that convenience stores could lose one in 100 customers completely due to such experiences. Plus, up to 55% of customers are not willing to shop for an alternative product if their regular item is out of supply.Minimizing Waste with Precise Inventory ControlEspecially during instances where you overstock or hoard large amounts of products, a good percentage of these items might go unsold or out of date. As a result, the environment has to deal with the pressures of dumping, resource depletion, carbon emissions, and so on.If companies can handle and manage their inventory properly, it eliminates the need to construct sizable warehouses to store excess products. Mark you; these warehouses contribute to the overall carbon footprint of buildings as they consume large amounts of energy.Just recently, in early 2024, DAA Capital Partners did a write-up that showed that warehouses accounted for 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. To add on the emissions from the warehouses, you'll also have to deal with the discharges from the transport sector – moving the surplus inventory occasioned by overstocking increases the distance traveled and, thus, the carbon released.These parts of the many side effects of overstocking suggest the critical importance of implementing precise inventory control. The Just-in-Time (JIT) method, for example, ensures no excesses as goods are only received in production when needed.With ABC analysis, you can partition the inventory into three categories depending on their importance and volume. Other methods like First In, First Out (FIFO) and Last In, First Out (LIFO) streamline operations by managing the valuation of stock.Best Practices for Implementing Precise Inventory ControlFor those who are wondering about how to get started, these practices will help you to develop an effective system:*Ensure you have an organized floor plan: You can achieve this by using proper labels and signage and placing the most popular items closer to the shipping area. A labeling software can come in handy when you need to print the tags. Plus, you can consider other tools like RFID systems to help you in real-time control.*Take advantage of cycle counting: This can help you identify inaccuracies quickly since you count items in small sections rather than counting them all at once.*Implement warehouse management systems: In a world where so many factors affect customer demand, nothing beats the power of real-time tracking. Plus, with these management systems, the chances of human error are minimal.Undoubtedly, businesses that ensure their stock levels align with customer demands without compromising satisfaction have a great opportunity to improve their competitiveness. This is so because customers are always assured of finding their regular products. As more consumers are becoming environmentally conscious, precise inventory control ensures that you can improve your appeal to such shoppers.

AI PCs were undoubtedly the hottest topic at Computex 2024. Various PC manufacturers showcased related solutions, and major processor players like AMD, Intel, and Arm emphasized the importance of AI PC applications.As one of the earliest companies to implement AI functions on PCs, Synaptics brought even more advanced solutions with Edge AI technologies to the event this year. Their latest innovations build upon its three technology pillars: sensing, processing, and connecting."At the demos you saw, even for things like a PC touchpad, there are techniques such as accidental contact mitigation (ACM), which uses AI algorithms," said Satish Ganesan, Synaptics' SVP & GM of Intelligent Sensing Division and Chief Strategy Officer. "Our goal is to infuse more and more AI features into PCs, smartphones, and automotive at the sensing edge where the user interacts with the device.""The other side is our processing solutions with our newly announced Astra family of processors, where we are uniquely positioned. We are building processors that go after markets wherever computer vision, voice, or any form of edge AI is required, like in smart home, industrial automation, and so on," he added. "Some of the same elements are then used in the PC space where you saw user presence detection techniques which implements vision AI algorithms to enhance overall user experience."In a demo at Computex 2024, Synaptics showed how the intelligent sensing solution with its new Edge AI chip enhances the PC user's experience. The demo focused on practical, everyday use cases in office environments. Features include Human Presence Detection (HPD), head pose tracking, and gesture control, which allow for automatic adjustments such as waking up the computer, locking it, and managing battery and privacy settings.For instance, users can mute their microphone or switch focus between monitors effortlessly using gestures. Integration of vision AI algorithms and PC cameras provides seamless interaction, ensures user privacy and security, saves power, and improves overall productivity by recognizing user identity and preferences, thus illustrating the real-world benefits of AI-enhanced PCs beyond just technological advancements.Ganesan emphasized that many talks about AI PCs from major companies at Computex 2024 focused on the computational power of processors, but "We're not going to compete with those main processors, we're not doing LLM processing or things like that, our value proposition will be in other areas, where we provide chipsets in the touchpad, fingerprint and so on. Of course, we're doing it on Astra for other markets as the main processor."Synaptics Astra was launched at Embedded World with the debut of the SL-Series, a new family of edge AI processors described as "AI-native SoCs" capable of running the Linux and Android OS. The series uses Arm Cortex-A cores, scales from 2 to 8 TOPS performance, and targets multi-modal consumer, enterprise, and industrial IoT workloads. The upcoming SR-Series MCUs with tiered inferencing were also demonstrated. Together with the SL-Series, the MCUs make context-aware computing a reality across the smart home, the factory floor, and at work.According to Synaptics, the SL-Series and SR-Series of Astra SoCs deliver a unified experience combining standards-based open software frameworks, rapid prototyping kits, full-featured AI/ML toolkits, and Synaptics' Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity solutions. The SL-Series is also supported by the Astra Machina Foundation Series development kit, which allows easy and rapid prototyping.Beyond hardware, Synaptics' solutions emphasize optimizing AI algorithms to operate efficiently at the edge, "So we can work with a smaller memory footprint and lower speed processors," Ganesan mentioned. "Right now, the take rate of AI PCs is still pretty small, but I think it is going to be pretty explosive. We focused on AI early, and the biggest thing in AI is about basically the software and the framework." Synaptics' AI software accepts commonly used input frameworks such as TensorFlow, TFLite, TLFM, ONNX, CAFFE, and PyTorch.For clients with varying levels of AI expertise, the company can provide comprehensive support, including the compiler, tools, and resources like predefined models and libraries for different use cases, such as vision and audio. "That is where we will differentiate in the market," said Ganesan. "Most companies only focus on hardware or software; we are the only ones who deliver an end-to-end solution. That would help our customers bring products to market faster because they don't need to learn from scratch. we have done all the learning for them."Advances in Docking, Enterprise Headsets, and Fingerprint SensorsBeyond the intelligent sensing technology applications for PCs' HPD functions mentioned above, Synaptics also showcased a range of other solutions at Computex 2024, including Docking Station Solutions supporting the latest DisplayPort (DP) 2.0 standard and with the ability to add virtual displays and enhanced user guides for troubleshooting. Low-latency wireless video was also shown, along with audio solutions that enable ultra-low-power Enterprise Headsets that support simultaneous audio streaming with BT Classic, BLE, DECT, and USB-connected devices.Regarding the touchpad and fingerprint solutions for PCs, the fingerprint market is shifting away from traditional palm rest placement towards integration on the keyboard. This change offers a more streamlined and reliable integration.The touchpad sector is witnessing a significant increase in size to match larger screens, emphasizing the importance of advanced palm rejection technology. Synaptics AI-based algorithm can improve palm rejection, addressing common complaints about accidental cursor movements during typing. The algorithm enhances accuracy when distinguishing between fingers and palms, especially at the touchpad edges.Additionally, the integration of Zoom and Teams functions directly into the touchpad was introduced. This allows users to control mute and video settings without moving the cursor, thus simplifying the user experience during online meetings.This customization provides flexibility based on OEM preferences. And, the haptic force touchpad is poised to become dominant in flagship PCs, offering a larger touch area and integrating touch and force using a single chip. This technology allows clicks anywhere on the pad and provides a consistent tactile response, enhancing user experience. The development of piezo technology, combining thin piezo disks with touch sensors, promises even more precise and localized haptic feedback, potentially simulating different textures and offering advanced notification patterns.Taiwan's Pivotal RoleDue to the boom in AI PCs, this year's Computex gathered numerous top executives from major companies and garnered worldwide attention. Ganesan also acknowledged Taiwan's pivotal role in the global PC market and ecosystem, "Taiwan is a big center for PCs, almost all the PC makers and ODMs are here. We're going to see a lot of developments here focused on AI PCs and things like that. It plays a very important role in the hardware ecosystem that supplies worldwide. That is why Taiwan is one of Synaptics' biggest R&D centers."Although the local team is already significant, as the market for AI PCs and other Edge AI applications grows, Ganesan did not rule out the possibility of further expansion, with more investment and the recruitment of more local talent. Synaptics plans to enhance its support and infrastructure in Taiwan, leveraging the country's central role in both implementation and innovation.In a demo at Computex 2024, Synaptics showed how the intelligent sensing solution with its new Edge AI chip enhances the PC user's experience.

Ever since the all-knowing AI demonstrated its capability to comprehensively respond to user inquiries at the end of 2022, businesses have been trying to utilize generative AI to build smart customer service and AI assistants as a means to reduce staff workload and increase work efficiency, while also boosting customer satisfaction.Participating in the smart mobility: Gogoro division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, held on May 18-19, 2024 by DIGITIMES, the team named "How Come Fu-Gui Left," comprising Fu-Gui Wang from Bachelor's Program of Artificial Intelligence Technology and Application, Feng Chia University, as well as Si-Ya Chen, Yan-Ting Guo and Cheng-Han Lin from Department of Information Engineering and Computer Science, Feng Chia University, created "Gogoro Smart Scooter Wizard," an AI assistant built with generative AI that gives instant and complete responses to all kinds of user inquiries about Gogoro. The team stood out from a group of strong competitors and won the honorable mention award, voted unanimously by all the judges.The market has seen quite a few AI-based chatbots emerge in recent years. However, most of them only provide standardized answers to specific questions. In contrast, How Come Fu-Gui Left developed Gogoro Smart Scooter Wizard using the Anthropic Claude 3 Sonnet and Haiku models in Amazon Bedrock, a fully managed service that makes high-performing foundation models on Amazon Web Services (AWS), trained on massive data from Gogoro, allowing it to give organized and sensible responses. Users only need to input the Gogoro model to start asking any questions and get complete answers.Despite its powerful capabilities, generative AI with large language models (LLMs) may occasionally give false or misleading information. When this happens, it does not help but burdens customer service agents.To prevent this, How Come Fu-Gui Left implemented multiple measures in their AI assistant. First, it is restricted to providing answers only to Gogoro-related questions. Furthermore, to save the AI model from incorrectly identifying a Gogoro vehicle, the AI assistant searches the Gogoro knowledge base for information based only on the vehicle model entered by the user. It then sorts out relevant content and provides a user-friendly response. It will politely refuse to answer questions unrelated to Gogoro vehicles.Gogoro Smart Scooter Wizard further uses generative AI to give answers with images. Not only will this help users better understand the response, but it also optimizes the user experience and raises user satisfaction, thereby boosting Gogoro's brand awareness and trustworthiness.The team named "How Come Fu-Gui Left" won honorable mention for their AI assistant for Gogoro smart scooters

In the face of rapidly evolving cyber threats, apart from new AI tools for cybersecurity, data-driven analysis and prediction of potential cyberattack targets and methods will help mitigate the impact of cybersecurity incidents.Trend Micro provided the challenge for the cybersecurity division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, held on May 18-19, 2024 by DIGITIMES, asking the participating teams to use cyber threat data and generative AI to strengthen corporate cybersecurity. Trend Micro also provided resources and data for the teams to use.The team named "Aspiring to Ensure Cybersecurity", comprising Jun-Sheng Shi from the Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering, National Ilan University, and Wei-Chi Luo from the Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering, National Taiwan Normal University, harnessed the power of generative AI to build an automated analyzer and chatbot that provides cyber threat intelligence summary, prediction on potential cyberattacks and data extraction from NoSQL databases. The team stood out from a group of strong competitors and won the honorable mention award, voted unanimously by all the judges.With today's growingly diverse forms of cyber threats, the team thinks if cybersecurity teams can leverage automation tools to sort through cyber threat data of the past, present, and future and thereby predict cyberattacks, not only will they be able to stay ahead of global cybersecurity trends but they will also work much more efficiently. Individual and corporate users are subject to cyber threats and need such tools to help ensure cybersecurity.Aspiring to Ensure Cybersecurity designed their automation tool to meet the needs of both professional and general users. This thinking drove them to use a chatbot to provide automated service that enables users to make the right decision as quickly as possible in response to a cybersecurity incident. As part of their efforts to protect critical data, corporate and individual users generally have some sort of cybersecurity mechanism in place. However, not everyone is capable of understanding the jargon from their cybersecurity tools.The automation tool developed by Aspiring to Ensure Cybersecurity provides the intelligence summary that Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) teams need. More importantly, it helps general users quickly decipher cybersecurity terms and take appropriate actions in response to all types of cyber threats, thereby minimizing potential impact.The team expressed great interest in the cybersecurity industry and appreciated the chance to learn generative AI and Large Language Models (LLMs) knowledge through the Amazon Web Services (AWS) workshops. The team members both have plans to obtain cybersecurity, AI, and ML certifications and aspire to a career in the cybersecurity industry.The team named "Aspiring to Ensure Cybersecurity" won honorable mention for their AI-powered cybersecurity analyzer and chatbot

Taiwan is a food lover's paradise, internationally recognized for its gourmet cuisine. This also means the food service industry in Taiwan is incredibly competitiveWhether restaurants can survive and thrive for long depends on their ability to attract customers. Wowprime provided the challenge for the innovative food service division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, held on May 18-19, 2024 by DIGITIMES, challenging the participating teams to utilize generative AI to create innovative interactive applications that drive customers to restaurants.Wowprime also provided resources and data for the teams to use. The team named "Hoping to Meet the Turtle," comprising Yu-Xuan Liu from the graduate program of the Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering at National Cheng Kung University, as well as Wei-Xu Chen and Yan-Ting Lin from IBM, used generative AI coupled with game-based marketing to increase customer loyalty and draw new customers to restaurants. The team stood out from the competitors in the Wowprime - innovative food service division and won the honorable mention award, voted unanimously by all the judges.People in Taiwan enjoy good food. This is the key growth driver for the country's food service industry.A restaurant's ability to attract more customers is critical to its long-term operation. Hoping to Meet the Turtle used the Anthropic Claude 3 Sonnet model in Amazon Bedrock, a fully managed service that makes high-performing foundation models on Amazon Web Services (AWS), to analyze restaurant data provided by Wowprime and found the group of customers aged between 26 and 45 is the largest.According to Business Wire, the global gaming market value is set to reach US$40 billion in 2024 and the 26-45 age segment is also the most dominant. Because of this, the team came up with the idea of incorporating game-based marketing in their solution.Games evoke positive emotions, pique great interest, encourage interactions at a low cost, and build brand identity so game-based promotion is ideal for restaurants with a limited marketing budget. Apart from designing games catering to Millennials, the team also used location-based push notifications and Online Merge Offline (OMO) approaches to create winning marketing funnel strategies that enable continuing customer interactions and increase customer stickiness. For future enhancements, the team proposes add-on features including special holiday promotions, social media posts, and customized menus.In response to the award, Hoping to Meet the Turtle noted that game-based marketing has wide-ranging applications. Backed by powerful generative AI and suitable data for training, game-based marketing can be used in all kinds of scenarios wherein businesses need to reach out to customers. Going forward, the team will stay committed to related technology research and find more application scenarios.The team named "Hoping to Meet the Turtle Team" won an honorable mention award for their AI-driven game-based marketing solution to boost restaurant

Synopsys Users Group (SNUG) Taiwan 2024 demonstrated the state-of-the-art EDA innovations and Artificial intelligence (AI) driven solutions for the chip design community.With the theme of "Our Technology, Your Innovation," this annual event took place on June 19, 2024, and showed how Synopsys uses its advanced technology to help customers forge success with innovation. Joachim Kunkel, Synopsys General Manager of Solutions Group, delivered a keynote titled "Powering Innovation in the Era of Pervasive Intelligence."Kunkel said, "AI technology has brought unprecedented new opportunities to the industry. All of this will drive an explosion of intelligent systems and smart applications. But this is also pushing the limits of computing and energy resources. Synopsys' solutions will support customers to cope with these challenges."The Pervasive Intelligence era is comingSynopsys highlights three key paradigms driving the era of Pervasive Intelligence. That is the rapid advancement of AI, silicon proliferation, and software-defined systems.These days, more electronic products are now driven by sophisticated software. The rapid acceleration of AI technology is empowered and embedded in various smart devices and systems.A huge number of AI chips will be required to achieve these benefits. These efforts will increase the proliferation of silicon, which is powering AI acceleration, bringing it to multiple applications controlled by sophisticated software. This will lead to the burst of Software-Defined Systems.Together, these three paradigms are shaping the new era of pervasive intelligence, where AI and smart technologies are seamlessly integrated into our daily lives. Whether it is PCs, smartphones, autonomous driving cars, or industrial automation systems and robots, behind these systems are the technological foundations of AI chips and integrated software that will help us find better ways of doing things to achieve better outcomes. All these efforts support the exponential growth of the semiconductor industry.However, three key challenges immediately arise including silicon complexity, productivity, and software-defined system capabilities. To respond to these challenges, Synopsys provides solutions ranging from New AI-driven EDA tools, IP offerings and Systems Design Solutions.AI across the entire EDA flow from Synopsys.ai to Synopsys.ai CopilotSolving the silicon complexity challenge, the engineering team is dealing with projects such as trillion transistor counts in a single chip. Considering performance, Power Performance and Area (PPA) improvements, Synopsys provides the AI-driven EDA suite Synopsys.ai for a chip design spanning implementation, verification, testing, and simulation to manufacturing processes.These autonomous AI-driven full-stack EDA suite launched in 2020 and has achieved hundreds of successful tape-outs that supported customers' gaining project goals. In 2022, Synopsys also implemented a set of AI-driven data analytics solutions that allow insightful analysis of the vast amount of data collected on the customer side and released the Synopsys.da product line.In addition, with the introduction of Synopsys.ai Copilot, Synopsys is harnessing the power of generative AI to help design teams with new levels of productivity. Integrated into the full Synopsys EDA stack, Synopsys.ai Copilot allows design engineering teams to be more flexible in the use of customized data sets and facilitates internal deployment of physical isolation to meet data security requirements.The integration of generative AI capabilities is just the latest step in the journey to drive greater productivity for solving silicon complexity challenges. These AI-assisted tools will continue to evolve, and new tools will bring continuous design creativity.Synopsys Expands Silicon IP Portfolio to help customers to drive productivityIn addition to providing full stack of AI-driven EDA solutions, Synopsys further reduces customers' chip design burden through the offering of silicon intellectual property (IP). Synopsys is a leading provider of silicon-proven semiconductor IP solutions for SoC designs and partners with customers and collaborators to enhance their next-generation designs, incorporating new features to reduce the complexity of large-scale chip design.It is worth mentioning that Synopsys continues to expand its IP product portfolio with a design team of 2,000 engineers. After 2020, the offerings further expand to use subsystems as an extension of IP products to help customers' AI chip projects enhance the standard architecture for their next-generation designs, incorporating new features now available with the latest specifications, which will further shorten the design process.As part of its efforts to drive mainstream adoption of multi-die design, Synopsys has successfully demonstrated the first silicon-proven UCIe-connected and a result of collaboration between Synopsys and its foundry partners. UCIe's high-speed data transmission features will continue to assist in the design of multi-die systems in the future.This is an important foundation for High-Performance Computing (HPC) and AI chips that require large amounts of data transmission and processing capabilities. Synopsys helps customers to stay competitive in a market where new standard developments are already being adopted.The development of 2.5D, 3D, and even 3.5D multi-die heterogeneous integrated chips will continue to evolve. Moreover, a broad IP portfolio, an end-to-end, AI-driven EDA platform, and the most advanced multi-die solutions will boost the development and enable the march to trillions of transistors IC innovation.Digital twins of electronic devices enhance software-defined systems prototypingWith software-defined systems, taking the example of the modern car with its 500 million lines of code, in which operations and enablement of new features are primarily managed through software, verification, and validation of these systems are dominating the cost of product development. For these products, digital twins enable a dramatic reduction in cost and design risks.In response to the design requirements of software-defined systems, software simulation, and verification have become important requirements. For faster, higher capacity emulation and prototyping, Synopsys provides system-level design and simulation tools to verify the real software execution to ensure the correct operation and use of software-defined systems.The HAPS-100 12 virtual prototyping solution is targeting high-capacity FPGA-based prototyping with a mix of fixed and flexible interconnects and a rack-friendly design, particularly useful for prototyping big designs that require many FPGAs, such as multi-die systems and large SoCs.Meanwhile, the ZeBu EP2 hardware simulation system is the latest version in the Synopsys ZeBu EP family of unified emulation and prototyping systems with the fastest emulation and prototyping platform for AI workloads, making it ideal for software bring-up, hardware validation, and power performance analysis. Both systems can help customers reduce design risks and provide automotive engineering teams with digital twin applications of vehicle electronic systems to facilitate automotive software and ensure that increasingly complex semiconductor designs and high-function software systems can be integrated and operated smoothly as expected.Kunkel pointed out that AI-driven EDA tools are developing rapidly to assist engineers in solving problems. By automating tedious repetitive tasks and optimizing design process flow, AI can free up the mental bandwidth of design engineers for the creative work that drives growth.His advice to engineers is: By continually analyzing data and learning optimal approaches through AI-driven EDA solutions, engineers still need to go back to the role of a designer to focus on design and creative work that drives innovation and growth. Learning more about application areas and system architectures will help engineers understand how to design things and make your work more fun.

In alignment with the global ESG initiative, businesses are increasingly paying attention to energy management.However, without specific expertise, most people have difficulty keeping abreast of energy efficiency issues. Fortunately, generative AI can help. Advantech provided the challenge for the smart energy management division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, held on May 18-19, 2024 by DIGITIMES, challenging the participating teams to utilize generative AI to revolutionize user experience of smart energy management.Advantech also provided resources and data for the teams to use. The team named "Playing a Part in AI", comprising De-Ru Yu and Si-Yu Tsai from 8 Interactive and Ting-Ni Wu from CTBC Securities, created AI Agent, a virtual expert guiding energy conservation meetings.The team aimed to help managers new to energy conservation tackle challenges as they lack the experience to ask the right questions, sort through the data, and perform analyses. The team stood out from a group of strong competitors and won the honorable mention award, voted unanimously by all the judges.Generative AI has demonstrated its strong capabilities in a multitude of application scenarios. Businesses are now striving to harness the power of generative AI.To enable one-key data analysis and efficient energy management, Playing a Part in AI developed a solution that uses generative AI to look up data and prepare a presentation before a meeting, provide strategy suggestions and insights after the meeting, and regularly track records and personalized reports. It can help managers unfamiliar with energy conservation quickly grasp key points in a meeting.Playing a Part in AI built its energy conservation meeting AI Agent using the Anthropic Claude 3 Sonnet model in Amazon Web Services (AWS) Amazon Bedrock, a fully managed service that makes high-performing foundation models on Amazon Web Services (AWS), coupled with AWS Lambda, a serverless compute service, and Amazon DynamoDB, a fast NoSQL key-value database service.Before a meeting, managers only need to input the meeting topic, and the AI Agent will analyze a great amount of data and generate charts to help managers identify the key points. After the meeting, managers can use their mobile phones to upload data to the platform for the generative AI engine to sort, analyze, and archive. For regular tracking purposes, the AI Agent can send notifications with customized reports and charts according to user settings to help managers stay on top of project status.The Playing a Part in AI team members come from various backgrounds encompassing engineering, marketing, and business planning. The team attributed their success to the comprehensive training they received at the AWS generative AI workshops. It brought them on the same page and allowed them to communicate without barriers so that they could complete the project and win the award.The team named "Playing a Part in AI" won honorable mention for their AI Agent, a virtual expert for energy conservation meetings

Amid global warming, the COVID-19 pandemic, and armed conflicts around the world, energy prices have been soaring and everyone is searching for ways to reduce energy consumption and costs.Hitachi Air Conditioning assigned the problem for the innovative energy conservation division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, held on May 18-19, 2024 by DIGITIMES. They challenged the participating teams to utilize generative AI to develop smart interactive applications for air conditioning systems that enhance user experience.Hitachi Air Conditioning also provided resources and data for the teams to use. The team named "Hao I Coding," comprising Zi-Zun Fang, Ying-Rong Lin, Yun-Hao Chang and Ruo-Yu Wu from the graduate program of the Department of Information Management at the National Central University as well as An-Chi Wang from Institute of Information Management, Department of Industrial and Information Management, National Cheng Kung University, built a solution that uses smartphones to keep an eye on electricity usage and leverages generative AI for electricity usage analyses. The team stood out from the competitors in the Hitachi Air Conditioning- innovative energy conservation division and won the honorable mention award, voted unanimously by all the judges.Coping with rising electricity prices, households are taking measures to reduce power consumption. After in-depth research, Hao I Coding found three major challenges hindering households' energy conservation efforts - inaccurate responses from chatbots, lack of air conditioning settings, and no way of knowing the electricity usage of traditional home appliances.To help address these challenges, the team decided to start by connecting smartphones with air conditioning systems to collect complete operation data and detect system malfunctions as soon as they occur. Based on that foundation, the team used generative AI to analyze air condition systems' electricity usage to help users find a perfect energy conservation balance, thereby resolving the two challenges - lack of air conditioning settings and no way of knowing the electricity usage of traditional home appliances.Although there are many generative AI solutions with Large Language Models (LLMs), they have difficulty providing correct responses to energy conservation questions without appropriate training using domain-specific data. Because of this, Hao I Coding conducted complete testing and decided to use the Anthropic Claude 3 Sonnet model in AWS Amazon Bedrock, a fully managed service that makes high-performing foundation models on Amazon Web Services (AWS) coupled with energy conservation big data, Hitachi Air Conditioning user manuals, and power-consuming appliance lists for training. They were able to build a chatbot that provides information-laden, logical and practical advice.Hao I Coding noted that the AWS workshop was a very valuable part of the hackathon as they did not have any opportunity to learn about generative AI and LLM before.The team named "Hao I Coding Team" won honorable mention for their smartphone-based AI solution for electricity usage analysis

Walter Liu has been hired by American Express for the recently created role of Head of the Asia Region.In this capacity, he is in charge of managing AmEx's issuance operations in the markets of Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. He oversees the Company's proprietary business and acts as the Managing Director of their operations in the market.Liu has over 20 years of experience with American Express and is a seasoned business leader and risk management expert. He is in an excellent position to manage the region as AmEx pursues its goal of controlling and catering to the premium segment in Asia because of his background in creating and managing high-performing teams and his comprehensive knowledge of the Asian market.Liu's appointment marks a huge step in AmEx's expansion plans, and it is expected to boost its presence and adaptability in the market. With his deep understanding of the Asian market dynamics, Liu is poised to lead AmEx's efforts in expanding its footprint across key Asian economies.One of the key areas of focus under his leadership will be the enhancement of AmEx's digital and online services. As more consumers and businesses in Asia embrace digital payments, AmEx aims to provide cutting-edge solutions that cater to the evolving needs of its customers.The evolving needs of AmEx customers mean that the plastic card is becoming popular for a variety of uses. From shopping to online gaming and gambling, AmEx is leading the way in Asia.When it comes to online gaming and gambling, the AmEx payment options are endless, with a huge variety of gambling sites now accepting AmEx. As Techopedia author and casino expert Sergio Zammit notes, AmEx is popular because players get points in return for every payment. Beyond that, AmEx is also setting itself apart by offering players:Safety and security: AmEx is known for its strong security features. This makes it a trustworthy choice for online transactions. Users appreciate the added layer of protection that comes with using a credit card with a strong fraud prevention system.Convenience: Many online casinos and betting sites have started accepting AmEx because of its popularity and ease of use. Players can quickly and securely deposit funds into their gambling accounts, allowing for a hassle-free gaming experience at online casinos and crypto betting sites.Beyond online gaming and gambling, AmEx is also widely used for online shopping across Asia. Let's explore why AmEx, in particular, is becoming one of the most popular plastic cards for shopping in the region:Partnerships with Retailers: AmEx has established partnerships with major online retailers, offering exclusive deals and discounts to cardholders. This has encouraged more consumers to use their cards for online purchases.Growing E-commerce Market: The e-commerce market in Asia is growing, with countries like China, Japan, South Korea, and India leading the charge. AmEx's presence in this market is growing as more consumers turn to online shopping for convenience and variety.Cross-border Shopping: AmEx is favored for cross-border transactions because of its reliability and acceptance at international online stores. Asian consumers often use AmEx when purchasing goods from overseas, leveraging the card's global acceptance.Under Liu's direction, AmEx is starting this new chapter in a position to take advantage of the expanding potential in the Asian market. AmEx is poised to solidify its position as the area's top financial services provider by emphasizing digital transformation and customer-centric solutions.American Express names its new head of the Asian region and plans to grow in the online and digital sectors

The finance sector is one of the key areas where AI is put to use to drive innovations.FinTechSpace provided the challenge for the AI finance division of the AI Wave: Taiwan Generative AI Applications Hackathon, challenging the participating teams to utilize generative AI to develop innovative fintech solutions. The teams named "Happy Oh Oh" and "I Want to Travel Abroad" stood out from the competition and won the gold and silver awards.Happy Oh Oh drives green finance with generative AIYi-Ling Li, Xiang-Yi Ke, Hong-Chang Lin, Jia He, and Shao-Wei Chu from the Interdisciplinary Program of Management and Technology at National Tsing Hua University formed Happy Oh Oh. They used generative AI combined with green finance to solve financial difficulties for farmers and drive the low-carbon agriculture transition.Leveraging AWS Partyrock to build a generative AI application platform without coding, the team built three systems. They include an evaluation system that assesses farmers' credit risk and expected return, a check system that tracks farmers' project progress, and a settlement system that calculates carbon credits and issues payments.The way it works is that the bank grants a green loan to the farmer to cover upfront investment costs and the farmer earns carbon credits which can be used to pay off the loan. After the load period ends, the farmer can sell the carbon credits at the purchase price and the bank can trade the carbon credits in exchange for profit and SG responsibility fulfillment.With the solution, farmers can get extra income from selling carbon credits. Corporations can buy carbon credits as a way to reduce spending.Banks can make a profit while making a social influence. Governments can use the opportunity to build a carbon trading and offsetting system. Benefiting multiple parties, the solution integrates generative AI with green finance to improve farmers' financial well-being and drive low-carbon agriculture transition.I Want to Travel Abroad uses generative AI for fraud preventionMeng-Ru Chuang from AVA Angels and Hsiao-Hung Huang from Taiwan Association for Blockchain Ecosystem Innovation formed I Want to Travel Abroad. The team used generative AI to develop an innovative solution that fights increasing financial scams on social media.The team built a chatbot on the foundation of AWS PartyRock. Using an automated process, their solution gathers past performances of stock market gurus, analyzes the content, finds suspicious investment advice using big data algorithms, sorts the findings into personalized investment portfolios, performs fact checks, and offers the information to users via a friendly interface. The solution was aimed at using generative AI to help users identify suspicious investment advice and prevent them from falling victim to financial fraud.The rapidly rising popularity of social media on top of people's increasing need to invest their money provides a breeding ground for financial scams. The solution from I Want to Travel Abroad uses generative AI to collect different perspectives and convey them via a chatbot.It perfectly fits what users need and thus has great market potential. Future developments of the solution include collaborations with brokerage firms to provide their clients with tailor-made AI investment advice to create more revenue streams.The teams named "Happy Oh Oh" won the gold award for their innovative generative AI fintech solutionThe teams named "I Want to Travel Abroad" secured the silver award with their creative AI-driven fintech innovation