Artificial Intelligence (AI), also known as Machine Intelligence, is intelligence demonstrated by machines by mimicking the way a person thinks in its way of learning and problem solving. The idea first came from the study of mechanical or formal reasoning by philosophers and mathematicians in antiquity. The first AI was invented in 1943 by McCulloch and Pitts, a formal Turing-Complete artificial neurons. The field of AI research was born at a workshop at Dartmouth College, Hampshire, United States in 1956.

AI is considered to be one of the biggest advancement in the modern world of technology. It is shaping the future in such an influential way that will enable technologies to perform tasks autonomously, without the needs of humans to monitor activities every step of the way. The near future of AI is that technologies are not about human elimination, but rather the elimination of manual and repetitive tasks through intelligent software robots. It is highly believed that machines will do the jobs that humans don’t want to more efficiently and effectively, normally known as the “mundane jobs”.

The rises of so-called smart machines are steadily growing to become a significant industry. Enterprises have already started to drive significant investments towards AI through application. It is being exploited in various aspects of nowadays business such as healthcare diagnostics, automatic trading, business processing, advertising and the list goes on and on. Two basic examples of AI are self-driving cars and the application named “Siri” which acts as a personal assistant in Smartphones.

Impact on the financial sector

AI has already started to shape the financial sector into a more technological era. First of all, it helps to reduce cost and save time. For example, banks are already using AI to streamline their formerly manual processes for tracking date, thus reducing cost and saving time. These manual processes may be more costly and time consuming if performed by human bankers.

AI can further help to boost the revenue of a company. Nowadays, banks or other institutions required to provide instant online advices are implementing chatbots, usually known as the “virtual assistants”. These chatbots use predictive analytics and cognitive technologies to personalize customer support and access a client`s financial portfolio and historical trades in order to automate and offer the best advices and support to the customer.

This means that customers are in turn served more efficiently, quickly and queries are even solved with a level of certainty. The old equation of business development remains, that is through client satisfaction is more revenue generated.

In addition, those intelligent machines even possess good analytic skills and they even make good use of algorithms. AI can therefore help investors to make investment decisions by analyzing their past spending pattern and determining a spending graph. With the possibility of such a deep analysis, it can further determine the risk appetite of an investor. It can provide information on market trends that best suit the demands of the investor and offer advices based on previous investment decisions made. It can also assist an investor in to predicting future patterns in the market and thus determine the next best trade that suits the appetite of the investor.

Furthermore, it is believed and even experienced by some major firms around the globe that AI can bring a more secure financial environment in the way that it helps in detection and management of frauds. For example, firms have already started to make use of image recognition software to analyze legal documents and clauses in lesser time that a human worker would have.

In order to assess the risks associated with a particular customer, some banks have already started to make use of AI which has the capability to go through thousands of personal financial records and analyze loan repayment habits, the number of loans currently active, the number of existing credit cards and so on.

Also, it can help investment firms into efficient portfolio management of its clients, determining their risk tolerance and combining machine calculations and human insight to provide options that are much more efficient. This can help investment firms to better keep in touch with the needs of their clients and even identify any unusual transaction, for example in the case of money laundering.

Mauritius at the forefront

With the major touch that AI is bringing to the entire world, Mauritius does not want to lag behind. The Prime Minister, Honourable Pravind Jugnauth, even announced in the budget 2018/19 that Mauritius envisage to have a council known as “Mauritius Artificial Intelligence Council” soon in the nearby future. The aim of that council will be to develop the sector of AI in Mauritius and will comprise of representatives from both the public and private sectors as well as international experts.

The minister of Technology, Communication and Innovation in Mauritius, Mr. Yogida Sawmynaden, recently informed that the strategical plan on AI and the blockchain should be ready by the end of the year 2018. He highly believes that AI will reshape the Agricultural sector and will also enormously help in road traffic decongestion, example through the installation of road sensor cameras. Mr. Sawmynaden is even benefitting from the help of an essential expert in the field of AI, Dr. Satyam Priyadarshy.

Mauritius hosted the World Artificial Intelligence Show and World Blockchain Summit from 28 to 30 November 2018, at Intercontinental Resort, Balaclava. The aim of this event was to identify opportunities for the deployment of AI in the various key sectors in the Mauritius economy and also to attract investors in the field of AI and Blockchain. It is worth noting that this event featured humanoid robot, Sophia, developed by Hong Kong-based company Hanson Robotics, and named the United Nations Development Programme`s first ever non-human Innovation Champion.

With all the steps being taken and that are anticipated to be taken by the Government, it is crystal clear that Mauritius is looking forward to the development and implementation of AI that will hopefully redefine the technological and the real world in Mauritius.

Impact on society

It is worth saying that AI has come under scrutiny among the public. Some people have embraced its wide implementation for a better future while some are still debating on this subject. The biggest fear of the naysayers is that machines will become so highly developed that humans will not be able to keep up, thus leading to a possible rise in unemployment. This may be considered as a myth as the inventors of those machines are humans themselves and human support will always be required.

Another negative thought is the possibility of machines to hack into people`s privacy and even be weaponized, which is regarded as a possible violation of human rights. It is further argued that a major implementation of AI can be a mere possible threat to human life, such as in the case of self-driving cars.

It is further believed that AI may bring significant costs in relation to repairs and maintenance of the machines. Most importantly, it is worth noting that human beings are emotional intellectual but thinking machines might lack creative mind. However, the positive minds or should we say the lovers of AI believe that its implementation can be very beneficial in the way that machines do not require sleep or breaks and are thus able to function without stopping. It is further believed that intelligent machines can be used into carrying out repetitive and time-consuming tasks efficiently. This is because human beings normally gets bored carrying out the same tasks on a daily basis thus affecting the quality of the work delivered.

Another advantage to consider with regards to AI is that intelligent robots can be used for space exploration or to reach the Earth`s nadirs, such as digging for fuels and mining purposes. Also, as compared to human workers, robots, lacking emotions, can think logically and take the right decisions.

Bearing in mind that AI can ease the world enormously, it should be well evaluated before being employed for human convenience or in the greed to play God, man may destroy himself.