Tag: Artificial Intelligence

Paris, France – Ahead of the Cannes Lions Festival which will kick off on June 17, global advertising company Publicis Groupe has taken a stance to remove exaggerated promises about artificial intelligence (AI) implementation on the advertising scene with the launch of ‘BSBot’.

With the BSBot, clients will be able to record audio or upload images and text from keynote speeches, meetings, presentations, articles and press releases about AI. Once inputted, they will receive an immediate analysis that translates AI hype and jargon to real talk, and highlights critical questions that should be asked.

For Publicis, at a time when AI buzz is still setting agendas everywhere, they are taking a stand to remove the BS from AI. From tech titans promising the creation of new worlds, and destruction of old industries, to legacy companies using AI as a catch-all solution, everyone has a prophecy to push.

The bot will be launched on Monday 17th June and made available exclusively to the Groupe’s clients. Moreover, Publicis will also host more than 30 closed-door sessions, delivering the real deal on AI for its clients: what’s real, what’s ready and what’s relevant for their industry-specific business challenges and marketing imperatives.

Arthur Sadoun, Chairman & CEO of Publicis Groupe commented: “The only thing more widespread than AI at the moment is the noise surrounding it. Cannes will only amplify it further. AI is already helping to deliver some outstanding creative work and I’m sure we’ll see more of that on the Croisette. But as an industry, we are at risk of trying to make AI everything, everywhere, all at once.”

He added, “Unlocking its full power means basing it on real data, making it ready for 1:1 marketing, and ensuring it is relevant to specific business needs by designing for outcomes, not output. Through our closed-door sessions, we will set out exactly how we can deliver that, through CoreAI, to accelerate our clients’ business and marketing transformation. But don’t tell the bot I said that.”

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – China’s ByteDance, the parent firm of the social media app TikTok, intends to invest around 10 billion ringgit (US$2.13b) to develop an artificial intelligence (AI) hub in Malaysia. As part of the agreement, ByteDance will also invest 1.5 billion ringgit to develop its data centre facilities in Malaysia’s Johor state. This is also part of the company’s several goals of expanding its IT services into Southeast Asia.

Speaking about the investment, Tengku Zafrul Aziz, Trade and Industry Minister, said, “This additional investment by ByteDance will undoubtedly help Malaysia achieve its target of growing the digital economy to 22.6% of Malaysia’s gross domestic product by 2025.” 

In line with investments to develop artificial intelligence in Malaysia, Microsoft recently invested US$2.2b to develop Malaysia as a hub for cloud computing and related technologies like generative AI. Through the investment, Malaysia is set to become a hub for cloud computing and related technologies like generative AI. It will also help Malaysia to capitalise on the significant economic and productivity opportunities presented by AI technology.

Meanwhile, TikTok also recently launched new business solutions to enable businesses to explore new ground on TikTok, such as a new suite of creative AI tools, performance and measurement solutions, and improvements to high-impact branding placements. In line with the expanded commercial solutions, TikTok also established the ‘TikTok Media Buying Certification’ program to help businesses choose the ideal partner to power their TikTok campaigns. This global accreditation allows digital marketers to demonstrate and authenticate their TikTok advertising experience while also strengthening advertisers’ networks of trustworthy TikTok partners.

Furthermore, Tiktok has established a new leadership development program called ‘TikTok Academy: Elevate’ in Southeast Asian nations such as Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Vietnam. The programme provides challenges for participants to complete, with the goal of either encapsulating the session’s theme or leveraging participants’ strengths, enhancing their understanding of the evolving marketing landscape, emerging platforms such as TikTok for advertising and marketing, and providing space for self-reflection on their career growth. 

Singapore – People in the Asia-Pacific are recognising the changes AI will bring, with almost three-quarters (73%) of people across APAC said AI will profoundly change their life in the next year three to five years. Moreover, around 66% said AI would change how they do their job in the next five years. This is according to the latest data from global market research company Ipsos.

According to the data, most people (62%) in the regions said they were excited for the products and services that use AI; interest is greatest in China (80%), Indonesia (76%), Thailand (76%) and South Korea (73%). 

However, English-speaking countries, including Australia and New Zealand, feel the need for caution with the approach to AI – just 39% of Aussies and 43% of Kiwis said they were excited for the technology. Both countries are more likely to feel trepidation about AI, with 66% of New Zealanders and 64% of Australians saying AI makes them nervous. 

Meanwhile, most people across APAC (66%) said AI would change how they do their job in the next five years. Indonesia (87%), Thailand (81%) and China (80%) are the most likely to say AI will change how they do their job. At least half of Australians think AI will change their job – 16% said it was very likely to affect their work, while 34% said it was somewhat likely. 

However, more Aussies think AI will improve their job (29%) than those who think it will make it worse (20%). Just under half (46%) expect it to make the job market worse. 

Moreover, Indonesia is leading the charge in understanding AI – 86% of those surveyed said they understand it. In Australia, 63% said they had a good understanding of AI. The figure is lower than the global average of 67%. 

Hamish Munro, CEO for APEC at Ipsos, said, “People are still firmly divided over whether AI will be a friend or foe in the coming years. Across the APAC region, Asian countries are leading the charge for embracing the technology, showing both a strong understanding and excitement about the technology. English-speaking countries, including Australia and New Zealand, remain sceptical about AI, particularly its impact on their day-to-day life and employment.”

Singapore – Regional fashion and lifestyle e-commerce platform ZALORA has announced the launch of its AI-powered customer service chatbot, designed to provide seamless and personalised support to customers across Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, as well as in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

ZALORA’s new customer service AI-powered chatbot is the result of a partnership between ZALORA’s technology team and Forethought, a provider of customer-first AI experiences. 

The chatbot leverages AI that is programmed to learn and understand the intent behind customer inquiries, to provide relevant, accurate responses in a highly intuitive and visual format. For simple queries, it leverages generative AI and draws from an ever-growing comprehensive knowledge base of FAQs, while for more complex questions, it utilises natural language processing to grasp the customers’ intentions before providing useful answers. 

Moreover, the chatbot can adapt and respond to any language communicated with it, for instance, an entire conversation can be started in English and ended in Mandarin or any of the local languages seamlessly. 

In addition to delivering a seamless customer experience, the chatbot is envisioned to support and augment the capabilities of our human customer service representative. Across the e-commerce industry, millions of customer service inquiries have to be answered each year, which traditionally requires a human customer representative to address.

For ZALORA, what makes its AI-powered app to other ones in the industry is that it has a deep integration with our consumer core services. This means, once customers sign into their ZALORA shopping profiles, the chatbot can directly access and offer personalised information linked to their accounts, this includes information about the status of their orders, deliveries, and returns.

Liam Hutchinson, director of product at ZALORA Group, said, “As a fashion company at heart, we want to help our customers discover great products and brands that make them feel great and confident. ZALORA is known and loved for its industry-best customer service and we’re continuously exploring ways to improve that experience, especially in a more scalable and digital-first way.”

He added, “The innovation around generative AI and large language models (LLMs) has given us access to more capabilities and partnerships to deliver experiences to give our customers an elevated fashion shopping experience.”

Meanwhile, Sumit Jain, chief technology officer at ZALORA Group, commented, “The chatbot sits as part of our broader investments in automation & artificial intelligence under TITAN, our proprietary platform intended to lead fashion e-commerce innovation in maintaining a safe and seamless experience for customers and taking the online shopping experience to the next level.”

Australia – Global adtech Quantcast has introduced a self-service platform (SSP) to make open internet advertising more accessible to independent agencies and advertisers. This project enables businesses of all sizes to reach new audiences by providing tools and data previously only available to large ad spenders. 

The new offering from Quantcast offers a remedy for the changing environment of digital marketing, as old cookie-based advertising techniques are being phased out due to privacy concerns. With the support of the new platform, independent agencies and advertisers may transition to cookieless advertising and maintain their competitiveness and efficacy in marketing campaigns. 

The key aspects of Quantcast’s new self-serve platform include AI-driven insights, which offers users access to AI and machine learning capabilities that enable high-performance advertising. The technology also provides simplified campaign management via an easy interface, making programmatic advertising accessible to everybody and facilitating campaign setup, management, and analysis. Additionally, the platform provides comprehensive cookieless solutions, which include new and proven measurement and targeting solutions that do not rely on third-party cookies. 

The open web is where most consumers spend their time, and while many small and midsize businesses are skilled at using social media marketing platforms to reach potential customers, this launch offers the same access to it. 

Speaking about the launch, Konrad Feldman, CEO of Quantcast, said, “Today’s legacy DSPs are too complex, too time-consuming, and too dependent on third- party cookies. Our goal is to empower businesses of all sizes to effectively reach their audiences, bringing the simplicity and efficiency of the walled gardens to the expansive and diverse open internet. There is a huge opportunity for marketers to improve their advertising performance and drive meaningful results.” 

Meanwhile, Clare Rogers, business director at This is Flow, stated, “Thanks to Quantcast, we’ve been able to efficiently target our key audience segments, resulting in higher engagement and conversion rates. Their innovative approach to advertising without third-party cookies has given us a competitive edge. We’re extremely satisfied with the performance and results, and so are our clients.”

Singapore – Grab and OpenAI has announced a partnership, as both companies will design and deliver enhanced experiences for Grab users, partners and employees using state-of-the-art AI capabilities. This marks the first time a partnership like this has happened in Southeast Asia.

This partnership uniquely combines the development of AI tools for Grab users and partners with an initial pilot deployment of ChatGPT Enterprise for Grab employees. Moreover, Grab will access OpenAI’s technical and strategic expertise to partner on solutions tailored to the specific needs of users in Southeast Asia.

In terms of accessibility, Grab will leverage the use of state-of-the-art text and voice capabilities to make Grab’s services more accessible to all users, particularly the visually impaired or elderly who may otherwise find it challenging to navigate the on-screen app interface.

Moreover, Grab will explore using AI technology to build customer support chatbots that can better understand user problems and help resolve them faster.

Lastly, Grab will seek to leverage OpenAI’s vision capabilities to enhance its map-making efforts through greater automation and higher-quality data extraction from visual images. This means GrabMaps can be updated even faster, delivering a better experience to consumers and driver-partners.

Philipp Kandal, chief product officer at Grab said, “We’ve been a pioneer of AI adoption in the region, and believe that generative AI has a lot of potential to further transform the way we solve problems for our partners and users. We’re excited to work with OpenAI as a partner to help accelerate the exploration and use of this technology within Grab. Our goal with any new technology has always been to use it to solve real problems, at scale. Equipped with the latest tools, we look forward to building novel and delightful experiences for our customers while improving the way that every Grabber works.”

In addition to developing advanced AI solutions for its users and partners, Grab also intends to deploy ChatGPT Enterprise among select employees through an initial pilot, complementing existing efforts to drive wider use of AI tools across its employee base to boost productivity. 

Meanwhile, Brad Lightcap, chief operating officer at OpenAI commented, “We’re excited to work with Grab and together explore how advanced AI can benefit Grab users, partners, and employees across Southeast Asia.”

This partnership follows a slew of partnerships OpenAI had including with the Financial Times, Reddit, and News Corp.

Singapore – Salesforce, together with IMDA, has announced the launch of the Data + AI Boost SME Program. This initiative aims to provide 5,000 small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) in Singapore, at all stages of digital maturity, with the tools and expertise they need to utilise the transformative potential of artificial intelligence (AI) by unlocking the value of their data.

Businesses and employees will receive help implementing digital technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), gaining an advantage, and providing personnel with the training they need to make the most of these technological advancements. Salesforce and IMDA are working together to make this initiative available to 5,000 Singaporean SMEs. 

Salesforce’s new Data+AI Boost SME Program intends to assist SMEs in utilising their valuable but frequently underutilised data assets, which are generally dispersed across numerous systems such as customer relationship management (CRM) systems, data lakes, and legacy systems. This effort aims to establish a strong data foundation for AI. 

As part of the Data+AI Boost program, SMEs can receive one-on-one consultations to help them evaluate their needs and business obstacles. It also provides Trailhead, Salesforce’s online learning platform, with access to information and learning resources. With the aid of these materials, SMEs will be able to fully utilise their data assets, comprehend the moral applications of AI and data, and make responsible use of technology. 

The usefulness of AI depends on the quality and integration of the underlying data, even though it presents SMEs with a huge chance to improve operational efficiency, customer service, and income. According to 61% of Singaporean workers surveyed by Salesforce’s AI Trust Quotient, lacking data makes it harder for people to trust AI. This indicates that data is essential for fostering confidence in AI. 70% of employees who don’t trust AI said it doesn’t have enough data to be helpful. 

Singapore’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) may expand and compete by leveraging AI and valuable, integrated data to better identify and address market trends, consumer preferences, and areas for improvement. SMEs can make use of the tools and expertise offered by this program to scale their businesses more quickly and achieve faster growth. 

The new Salesforce initiative was unveiled at Asia Tech x Enterprise 2024 in collaboration with IMDA. This program is a component of the partner commitments that support the Ministry of Communications and Information’s Digital Enterprise Blueprint (DEB).

The DEB aims to empower Singaporean enterprises and their workers in the next phase of their digital transformation efforts by focusing on four areas: empowering enterprises to be smarter by adopting AI-enabled solutions, enabling enterprises to scale faster through integrated digital solutions, equipping enterprises to be safer through improved cyber resilience, and upskilling workers to fully leverage digital capabilities.

SMEs identify developing technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) as one of the top business trends impacting their operations, according to the Singapore Business Federation’s National Business Survey 2023/2024. Increasing revenue was also stated as their main objective for the coming year. 

Speaking about the launch, Leong Der Yao, assistant chief executive, Sectoral Transformation Group, IMDA, said, “Aligned with Singapore Digital Enterprise Blueprint, IMDA is excited to partner with Salesforce to enable our SMEs to stay ahead of the curve. The Data + AI Boost SME program by Salesforce will help strengthen AI adoption for the broad base of SMEs by firstly providing them with the know-how to unlock the full potential of their data assets as well as providing access to resources to understand the ethical use of data and AI. We look forward to the support of industry partners to enable SMEs to leverage technology to be more competitive and scale faster in today’s fast moving digital economy.” 

Meanwhile, Sujith Abraham, senior vice president and general manager for Salesforce ASEAN, stated, “SMEs are the bedrock of the Singapore economy, and need access to AI and its foundational building blocks to support their growth and competitiveness in the future. Setting up the right data foundations will put them in the best possible position to embrace AI. After all, AI tools are only as good as the data those tools are accessing and acting upon. The immediate challenge for SMEs is to ensure that their data sets are interconnected in a way that is valuable.” 

He added, “Through the Data + AI Boost SME Program, Salesforce is making AI more accessible for SMEs to compete and succeed in today’s economy.” 

Singapore – Experience management company Qualtrics has announced that travel retailer Flight Centre is now utilising their AI program to enhance customer experience and agent productivity through a new ability to analyse and respond to every piece of structured and unstructured customer feedback being shared with the company.

While traditional customer experience programs focus on structured feedback, such as satisfaction and post-sale surveys, Flight Centre is gaining a more complete view of its customers with the integration of Qualtrics.

Using purpose-built, AI-powered, advanced conversational analytics and natural language processing capabilities, Flight Centre can listen to and analyse customer feedback from a range of structured and unstructured channels – such as emails, chat, messaging, social and online reviews, traditional surveys and more – and understand the emotion, intent, preference, and effort behind every engagement.

The customer experience-specific insights enable Flight Centre to custom-craft and deliver tailored experiences addressing customers’ unmet needs and points of friction, creating opportunities to enhance the customer experience in the moments and channels that matter.

Notably, Flight Centre is one of the first organisations in Asia Pacific to go-live with Qualtrics’ AI-powered conversational analytics and natural language processing technologies.

Talking about this integration, Andrew Stark, global managing director at Flight Centre, said, “Flight Centre is able to deeply understand and respond to their needs better than ever before with Qualtrics. With these new capabilities we’re able to uncover even more actionable, specific insights that can help us deliver greater services, experiences, and products for our millions of customers.”

Meanwhile, Brad Anderson, president of product, UX, and engineering at Qualtrics, commented, “Using Qualtrics AI, organisations like Flight Centre are pioneering an impactful new age for experience management by deepening their ability to understand and meaningfully respond to their customers, which is driving greater outcomes for customers alongside bottom-line business impact.”

The new era of contextual advertising is not just focused on becoming more privacy-centric following the impending phaseout of third-party cookies but rather it is also focused on driving efficiency for businesses and offering new ways to engage with its consumer base through multiple channels and varied advertising stipulations.

As part of the What’s NEXT Interview series, MARKETECH APAC spoke with Marc Zander, global chief client officer at Teads, to learn more about the new strategies and insights in the new era of digital advertising. The company’s cloud-based omnichannel platform enables brands to implement programmatic advertising campaigns across the global ecosystem of quality digital media.

To begin with, Zander shared that while artificial intelligence has been at the core of the latest trends in digital marketing and advertising, there has a been a shift from predictive to generative AI in the industry, noting that Teads’ proprietary contextual advertising runs on predictive AI and has been in effect for a significant period of time.

“From a Teads perspective, we’re in a great position because we use AI in everything we do and have been doing that for the last 10 years. And we use it very much from a predictive perspective to make sure that we maximise the effectiveness and efficiency of our client’s advertising budget,” he said.

Zander also added, “We’re moving very much from predictive AI to generative AI and looking again to see how we can create multiple variations in ad context to provide the best possible solutions.”

He also notes how Teads is using AI for creative optimisation, as well as measurement and prediction tools in its system, making AI an integral part of their offerings for their clients.

Part of the change that he also observed in the industry is the shift in media consumption, specifically moving away from linear TV to connected TV (CTV). Such shift has made Teads fully embrace this shift, resulting in them building a quality brand safe for clients that ensures a fraud-free ecosystem for brands online.

Meanwhile, when asked about his perspective on the move to cookieless advertising, Zander mentioned that this is more of a good news for Teads, as its services is centred around contextual advertising. This means that with them having access to data from their partner publishers, they are able to get much more quality and quantity of data that doesn’t infringe any consumer privacy.

“We’ve been essentially cookie-free for the last three years, and we’ve been working over the last two years to prove to our clients and our advertisers that we can deliver at least the same, if not better results, in a cookieless world. Whilst a lot of advertisers may think “what do we do in a cookieless world”, Teads is already cookieless by default, and over 75% of everything that we do is cookieless,” he explained.

In terms of advice for brands to future-proof their digital advertising strategies, Zander offers three particular actionable advice for marketers to follow. They include having a strategic look on the media supplies being put in the system, deciding on who you want to work with and leverage what they can do, practise responsible advertising, as well as reducing carbon footprint.

“From our perspective, a phrase that I use a lot is “we’re only just starting to scratch off the surface of our potential”, and so we are working with more and more partners, [and] we’re really excited because we’ve grown very quickly,” he said.

Zander also advised, “We live in a world now where the best marketers are breaking down the silos between creative, media, data and insight. Whilst it’s a more complicated ecosystem, it also has tons more potential than it had in the past.”

For more of Zander’s insights on the future of digital advertising in 2024 and beyond, check out the full video interview on our official YouTube channel or check out the podcast version at our official Spotify page.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Ravi Shankar Mallavarapu, most recently with Carsome, has been recently appointed as the chief marketing officer of AirAsia MOVE, airasia’s travel and lifestyle app–and formerly known as airasia Digital.

In an exclusive conversation with MARKETECH APAC, Ravi said, “I am entrusted with shaping and implementing our comprehensive branding and marketing strategy. This strategy is designed to enhance brand recognition and become a top-of-mind travel companion for ASEAN travelers, aligning with our business objectives.”

He also noted his particular interest in adopting AI strategies to AirAsia MOVE’s marketing strategies, stating, “I am particularly keen on leveraging AI in our marketing strategies. This includes leveraging AI across multiple marketing functions to increase productivity; prioritising the adoption of AI will help us stay competitive and relevant in the rapidly evolving travel market. The other priority is to build a community of creators who are loyal to the brand and keep generating content for us.”

Prior to this new role, Ravi was recently the chief marketing officer at Carsome for over two years, where he handled the brand’s marketing, digital, social media, public relations, growth, market research and customer experience. He also worked closely with Derek Tan, chief brand officer at Carsome, on brand, creative, production and sponsorships.

It is also worth mentioning that this marks Ravi’s return to the airasia ecosystem. He was with AirAsia for five years, where he had served various leadership roles that included group head of digital marketing and chief growth officer.

“My tenure as CMO at Carsome taught me how difficult it is to build a brand and that it is not just a marketing responsibility. I’m looking forward to working with the fantastic team [at AirAsia MOVE] and working on the vast amounts of data,” he stated.

When asked about challenges and opportunities related to AI-integrated marketing strategies, Ravi said that adapting strategies in Gen AI presents both opportunities and challenges, and it depends on how fast the industry leverages and implements them in daily work.

“In 2024 and beyond, I foresee a continued emphasis on personalised travel experiences. At AirAsia MOVE, aligning with these trends involves adopting more sustainable practices in our operations and marketing and utilising technology to tailor unique travel experiences that meet evolving consumer expectations,” he concluded.