Get ready to ‘dive into’ Gen AI, says Amperity CTO Derek Slager
Derek Slager (pictured), Co-Founder and CTO of Amperity recently concluded his visit to Australia, engaging with key partners, customers and other enterprise businesses.
He reveals some of his key takeaways to Aussie innovators looking at embracing GenAI.
Gen AI, Digital Transformation and the Future of Work
According to McKinsey’s new report, Generative AI and the future of work in Australia, “Australia’s economy has proved robust through challenging times, and shifts from gen AI could unlock benefits for Australia – including higher job demand and productivity. However, this potential may only be realised if employers, governments, and educators are able to adopt the technology in a bold and thoughtful way.”
Slager believes the way to do this is to go all in. He says, “Dive in. You always want to be investing in these things before you feel like you have to. Channel your most confident self, lean in, and avoid all the excuses.”
He says Gen AI, in particular, is, in many ways, a catalyst for digital transformation. “AmpAi gives people the excuse to lean in a little bit more in their digital transformation. Some brands don’t feel that digital transformation is something they must engage in to survive here. It isn’t 100 per cent necessary to their survival at this time.
“But when they see what’s possible with this technology, it almost forces them to ask themselves a follow up question, which is, do I really want to not be doing this? This feels like a really important thing.”
“AmpAi makes it easier for them to give themselves permission to really dive in,” Slager continued. “The people who do that will be rewarded for that in the medium term because the reality is, if they don’t do it, they risk falling behind. Diving in now will be an accelerator, and if they don’t make the leap, their competition will.”
“Visiting our partners, customers and team on the ground here in Australia was very energising for me as a co-founder. I keenly remember what it was like when our whole company was only three people. So to be here and relive some of those early, scrappy days where everyone’s figuring it out was an invaluable experience,” Slager said.
“There was a real authenticity to the conversations,” he continued. “There were no masks, no pretenses – just genuine discussions about real challenges and opportunities. It really reaffirmed the core of our mission, which is to help brands turn complex customer data into business value.”
What is AmpAi?
While in Australia, Slager showcased how Amperity‘s latest release AmpAi can revolutionise data-driven decision-making and drive growth in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.
AI has been a part of Amperity’s DNA since its inception 7 years ago – to unify and build the most accurate and trusted unified customer view, with Stitch and Predict. Recently, Amperity introduced two new Gen AI capabilities, Explore and Assist, to its AmpAi suite. With these new capabilities, brands can make informed decisions based on a trusted data foundation to enhance customer engagement and power downstream AI technologies. AmpAI is set to tackle the data quality and access challenges faced by many brands with traditional CDPs.
Assist supports marketers, analysts and data operators with creating marketing workflows more quickly. The first product within Assist is Ai Assistant, which removes the barriers to creating SQL queries and fixing potential errors within those queries.
“AI Assistant saves me 7-8 hours of work per week. Instead of crafting SQL from scratch or searching for SQL to reuse, I turn to AI Assistant. It has been such a life saver!” said Hope Vlacich, Manager, Audiences & Digital Marketing Analytics at Wyndham Hotels & Resorts.
Slager’s 3 Key Takeaways for Aussie AI Innovators
From his meetings, Slager distilled three key takeaways. They are:
1. The struggle to achieve a unified data foundation isn’t unique: When I talk to a customer in the U.S. or I talk to a customer in Europe or somewhere else – they all have the same problem. They’re all struggling to have a unified data foundation. Yet, in all of these conversations, they tend to think that their problem is unique. But it’s not unique at all. They have the same problems as everybody else. This problem is ubiquitous and spans the globe.
The one exception to this rule is the role that the Australian Privacy Principles play. This is certainly impacting how Australian brands think about and approach data management and privacy.
2. There’s less pressure to digitise in Australia: Australia is a smaller market with a smaller number of players. So digital feels a little bit less essential here. It doesn’t feel like you have to digitally transform to survive – yet.
For example, one popular Aussie retailer is very well liked by consumers, but it’s been a bit tepid in its steps forward on digital. In a market like this, it has that luxury – but that’s going to change. Recognising this and the importance of a clean data foundation, it’s taking steps now to be more proactive for the future.
3. AI is top of mind: AI is on people’s minds here as much as it’s on people’s minds everywhere else. It was very clear that a lot of people are asking questions about what this means for their business and what it means for their tech stack and the world, in general. I certainly saw AI front and centre in all of my conversations.
