Harnessing the 'Superpowers' of Artificial Intelligence & Chatbots - a Special Report on AI and Auto

From spell check to Amazon recommendations to chatbots, Artificial intelligence (AI) is fast becoming upbiquitous in our everyday lives. It's also being adopted by the mobilty sector. In this special report on AI and auto, we cover new uses, regulation and how the industry can integrate the likes of ChatGPT to create efficiencies and improve customer support.

The CEOs of two startups - the UK's Monolith and Sweden's Phyron - have offered up their insights.

"Machine learning is becoming an increasingly important part of our personal and business lives, either as a conscious-decision by the user or subtly through the basic tools we use on a day-to-day basis," says Richard Ahlfeld, Monolith's CEO.

Monolith's software is used by engineers to build self-learning models that can instantly predict results of complex vehicle systems. This process helps cut product development time and cost. It's utilised by top engineering teams, such as Mercedes, Rolls Royce, Honeywell, Kautex-Textron and Siemens, to develop better quality products in half the time.

"The power of AI lies in its ability to reduce the amount of physical testing time and simulations required to successfully develop products with highly complex physics throughout the design cycle. Using valuable and sometimes limited engineering test data, Monolith makes instant predictions and enables engineers to identify areas where optimisation and development are required, without the need for repetitive, time-consuming physical tests," says Ahlfeld.

Stockholm-based Phyron has developed AI-powered software that makes studio quality video ads from still images and data.  Machine Learning algorithms have been taught to recognise hundreds of thousands of vehicle attributes from every angle, so they can identify exactly what is in an image and overlay the corresponding sales information.

"The AI removes the image backgrounds and they’re placed in a neutral, on-brand, environment before being rendered into a high quality video, complete with Hollywood derived CGI special effects, soundtrack and logos - all automatically without any human involvement for hundreds or thousands of vehicles across a dealership," explains Johan Sundstrand, Phyron's CEO.

Adverts using its videos can get on average over 50% more visits and cars are sold three to five days faster, all "for less than the price of a cup of coffee per car," says Sundstrand.

Phyron 3:0, its next software release, will significantly speed up automated video production. It will utilise more engines and will offer dynamic framing to produce videos of different dimensions for multiple channels, he explains.

Enhancing Creativity And Productivity

Understandably there's anxiety that AI could take work away from humans. There have also been calls for tighter and global regulation. Even Elon Musk has warned about the dangers of AI-powered robots. However, both startup CEOs believe that AI will - in the long run - be of immense benefit to business.

"I see much more upside than potential risk of downside. Where AI might replace jobs at some point down the line, I believe this technology will not only foster greater engineering creativity but also create many more new jobs. If we’re going to have an economy that grows, we need to reinvent how we do things. We can’t keep doing things the same way and expect progress," says Ahlfeld.

"Regulating AI is a challenging, probably even impossible task as the technology is rapidly evolving and can be applied in many different ways. AI is still in its early days, regulation could harm progress and innovation in the field," notes Sundstrand.

"The aim of implementing AI technology is to reduce monotonous tasks and enhance productivity and creativity. In the areas where our AI technology is applied, we’re seeing the incredible innovations our customers are realising in new product development," says Ahlfeld.

With Monolith, engineers at Kautex-Textron are solving previously intractable vehicle acoustics challenges. At BMW Group, the team is reducing dependence on time-intensive and costly testing by optimising crash test performance earlier in the design process.

"Using AI, engineers are able to leverage their data to calibrate products for better performance, whether that's a battery, an engine, or a fuel tank. As a senior executive at one of our automotive customers said, 'It almost gives them superpowers'", he adds.

The Rise of ChatGPT 

The AI chatbot, ChatGPT. was only publicly released in November, 2022, but it's already making waves across various industries. For example, the US micro-mobility group Helbiz recently announced the incorporation of ChatGPT to enhance its customer support experience and allow its employees to quickly access information to help resolve tasks.

In a press release, Salvatore Palella, CEO of Helbiz, says: "With ChatGPT, we will be able to provide our customers with the highest level of service and support, while also reducing our operational costs.”

"Chat GPT nicely visualises through text how much more you can get out of data. Essentially, the software is taking existing data and delivering an output that the end user finds interesting or useful." explains Ahlfeld.

Sundstrand says: "ChatGPT and AI-chatbots can assist customers in finding the right vehicle that fits their needs and preferences, from initial interaction to purchase completion and post-sales service, including troubleshooting, service and maintenance among many other things."

"As AI becomes a trusted part of the product development process, we expect engineers across automotive and other industries to significantly reduce verification and validation steps that today take weeks or months. Of course, there are areas in which AI is more suited than others, but the wheelhouse for our AI software is firmly located in deeply complex engineering problems where the physics are intractable and the number of parameters are extensive," adds Ahlfeld.

An Army of AI Engineers

Finally, we asked our two CEOs to predict how the automotive industry will be using AI by the end of the decade.

"Whether it's through virtual reality or 3D visualization, digital immersive video will become an essential element in the car buying process of the future. It will enable customers to have a more realistic and engaging experience, and will be an important step in convincing them to make the purchase," predicts Sundstrand.

"AI software is transforming how automotive engineers develop complex products. By 2030 we think every engineer will be an AI engineer. On our way to this aspirational goal, we’ve defined a near-term vision that by 2026 we will empower 100,000 visionary engineers to use machine learning to cut their product development cycle in half," concludes Ahlfeld.