Tag: AI for business

  • Are you all in on AI or approaching it more moderately? The perils of not strategizing your AI roll out

    Are you all in on AI or approaching it more moderately? The perils of not strategizing your AI roll out

    AI (Artificial Intelligence) continues to proliferate modern workspaces, with some companies leaning heavily into AI investments including up to replacing human workers with an AI equivalent for roles such as customer service.

    One company, Klarna, is facing some pushback from investors for just such a strategy. Last year, Klarna which is known for it’s “buy now, pay later” financing for consumer purchasing, replaced 700 workers in favor of an AI solution for customer support. Now, their valuation has plummeted from a high of $45.6 billion in 2021 to $6.7 billion in 2025.

    At the heart of it is customer complaints of lower customer service satisfaction which has caused the company to pivot on their “AI First” strategy with their CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski stating recently “Really investing in the quality of the human support is the way of the future for us.”

    What does this mean for medium and small businesses looking at their own strategizing when it comes to artificial intelligence? Testing the waters and applying it in moderation to start is key to a successful AI roll out.

    While it may seem tempting to just go all in, especially if savings are on the table in terms of labor costs, the current iterations of artificial intelligence are not ready to be deployed without human oversight and intervention in our opinion. Rather than expecting AI to take over and replace human activities, it’s best to look at how you can use AI as a tool to do more.

    Here are three ways we recommend using AI to get the most out of your workday:

    1. Automating Repetitive Tasks
      AI can handle time-consuming activities like data entry, scheduling, and basic customer queries. This frees up employees to focus on higher-value, strategic work that requires human judgment and creativity.
    2. Enhancing Decision-Making
      AI-powered analytics tools can process vast amounts of data quickly and provide actionable insights. This helps employees make faster, more informed decisions without spending hours combing through spreadsheets or reports.
    3. Personalizing Training and Support
      AI can tailor learning experiences to each employee’s role and pace, recommending relevant skills development or providing just-in-time answers through intelligent chatbots. This boosts engagement and accelerates on-the-job learning

    If developing an AI strategy for your business is a priority for you in 2025, Valley Techlogic can help. We make it a priority to stay at the forefront of emerging technologies and help our clients access continuous improvements in the tech space to meet their goals. Reach out today for a consultation.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, leading provider of trouble free IT services for businesses in California including Merced, Fresno, Stockton & More. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on X at https://x.com/valleytechlogic and LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/valley-techlogic-inc/.

  • China enters the AI race with the release of DeepSeek, prompting conversations about what happens when AI tools take data from each other (rather than just the general public)

    China enters the AI race with the release of DeepSeek, prompting conversations about what happens when AI tools take data from each other (rather than just the general public)

    The race for domination continues to heat up at China’s AI model “DeepSeek” enters the fray, just days after newly inaugurated President Trump announced his plans to invest 500 billion in AI infrastructure during the course of his term.

    Established as a startup under the same umbrella as the quantitive hedge fund High-Flyer, which is primarily owned by AI enthusiast Liang WenFeng (who built his fortune during the 2007-2008 financial crisis), little has been verified about how DeepSeek came to be.

    That has not stopped endless speculation since it’s launch was announced, including how much of it is modeled after existing AI models such OpenAI’s ubiquitous model, ChatGPT.

    Also being questioned is how the chips it was trained on were sourced, chip restrictions were placed in on China in 2019 which continued under President Biden specifically to curtail China’s ability to access infrastructure used in the advancement of AI technology. This restriction not only covered the chips themselves, but the technology used to manufacture them.

    According to Liang, he sourced the the 10,000 Nvidia A100 GPUs prior to the federally imposed ban.

    At present time the founders of DeepSeek are indicating that their goal is to continue the research and advancement of AI infrastructure with their model and not seek commercialization. To back these claims, you can currently download the first series of their model for free open source whether you’re a researcher or a commercial user.

    It should also be noted that DeepSeek has an updated data set as compared to ChatGPT, which is currently capped to data from 2023, what this means is its most recent data is from 2023 and before and anything that occurred in 2024 and beyond would not be available so if you were to example ask ChatGPT “Who won the 2024 Presidential Election?” it may not give you a correct answer.

    There have also been claims that DeepSeek is much cheaper to train, although training costs for existing AI models are largely inflated. These costs are based on the cost of cloud computing rental prices, which have a wide range of variance.

    AI training costs vary wildly depending on a range of factors.

    AI and cloud computing are both worthy investments for businesses looking to strategically position themselves for technology growth in 2025 and beyond, and Valley Techlogic is at the forefront of utilizing these technologies.

    Whether it be initializing AI tools like Microsoft’s Co-Pilot in your business or migrating more of your operations to the cloud to reduce overhead spending on physical hardware, we’ve got you covered. Reach out today for a consultation and learn how you can catapult your business forward with technology advancements through Valley Techlogic.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, leading provider of trouble free IT services for businesses in California including Merced, Fresno, Stockton & More. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on X at https://x.com/valleytechlogic and LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/valley-techlogic-inc/.

  • AI updates for 2024 and what they mean for you, including the addition of multimodal for Google Gemini & ChatGPT and Amazon’s new AI Alexa service

    AI updates for 2024 and what they mean for you, including the addition of multimodal for Google Gemini & ChatGPT and Amazon’s new AI Alexa service

    AI (Artificial Intelligence) continues to try and proliferate the space in which we live, from innovations aimed at simplifying our work activities and increasing productivity, to enhancements to our devices that will make using AI in our homes more accessible. It’s impossible to ignore that Google, Amazon and other major players in the tech space want to make AI part of our daily lives.

    But what does this really mean for you and are the advancements coming to AI in 2024 really going to be useful for the average person? In today’s article we’d like to look at some of the AI announcements that have made major headlines and break down what they mean for you.

    Multimodal AI: First of all, what is multimodal AI? Traditionally at the moment you input one type of content request into AI models, such as a text prompt asking for an image or written text, and it provides you with an answer based on the prompt that covers whichever content you requested (IE written OR visual).

    With multimodal AI you won’t be limited to one form of output, instead you can enter a prompt that requests a mix of medias, such as a report that includes text AND images that align with the report.

    Multimodal AI will pull from several different data inputs to give you a more complete pictures without the need to enter separate prompts for different types of media. Also, because all of this is being processed at the same time you will likely see more cohesive results. Both ChatGPT and Google Gemini have begun to offer a multimodal AI experience and we expect the technology behind this type of AI will continue to improve in the coming months.

    AI comes to Amazon’s Alexa: Amazon made the announcement that a subscription based Alexa service will be rolling out sometime this year and will provide a better user experience, with more intuitive answers to questions and a conversational approach to requests to keep up with the current trends (search queries have become more conversational overall and it’s largely attributed to AI).

    Pricing has yet to be announced but Amazon has stated it will not be included with Amazon Prime. Amazon will use it’s own large language model, Titan, to power the upgrade.

    AI for Marketing?: The Google Marketing Live 2024 event was this week and unsurprisingly AI the feature focus for the tech giant. With enhancements announced to immerse consumers in AI powered ads and an “AI readiness tool” that will be available sometime this year.

    Highlights included the ability to take a static “hero asset” and turn it into a video with a realistic 3D animated background, the ability to use AI to recreate and retool existing ad creatives, and enhancements to search that allow consumers to buy a product they find as a solution to a search query directly from the same browser window.

    Generative AI lets you continuously improve your AI experience: Finally, increased improvements to generative AI, which is AI that learns the patterns and structure of your input, will make using AI to create cohesive content for your business even easier. From allowing your employees to seek out answers to questions without an exhaustive web search to aiding in crafting articulate responses to your clients and more. With generative AI your voice is an additional component to your AI experience. Microsoft, Google, LinkedIn and ChatGPT continue to include enhancements to the generative AI experience. You can even add a background prompt to give additional context to your AI program of choice (such as information about your business or yourself) so the responses you receive are uniquely tailored to you.

    Looking to improve your business with AI strategies or take advantage of AI advancements in cyber security including enhanced monitoring, threat detection and real time solutions? Valley Techlogic remains at the fore front of new technologies, and we can assist you in navigating AI solutions for your business. Learn more today.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, leading provider of trouble free IT services for businesses in California including Merced, Fresno, Stockton & More. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on Twitter at https://x.com/valleytechlogic and LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/valley-techlogic-inc/.

  • 5 emerging cyber threats to worry about in 2024

    5 emerging cyber threats to worry about in 2024

    We’re all familiar with the usual suspects when it comes to cyber threats, viruses, trojan horses, phishing attacks, malware and ransomware. We’ve covered these threats in great detail (here’s just a few articles on these topics: 10 scary cybersecurity statistics business owners need to know,  Zero trust or zero effort, how does your businesses security stack measure up?, Can you spot the phishing clues? And 10 tips to avoid falling for a phishing scam). Even if you’re not a technical inclined person you probably have some awareness of how to avoid these threats, such as being careful with suspicious emails and attachments or not downloading files from unknown sources.

    What about emerging cyber security threats? These are threats that are not well known and in fact may use improvements in technology such as AI (artificial intelligence) to their advantage for nefarious gain.

    Bad actors are continuously looking for new ways to subjugate your devices and gain access to your systems and data to exploit it for their own gain, and unfortunately in 2024 we don’t believe things will be any different.

    Knowledge is power, so by being aware of these emerging threats you can learn to avoid them or learn what protections you need to put in place to prevent yourself and your business from becoming a victim.

    Here are five emerging threats that we believe will grow in popularity in 2024:

    1. Supply Chain Attacks: Cyber criminals have learned targeting vulnerable systems that supply the things we need day to day (for example the Colonial Pipeline attack that occurred in 2021) can result in lucrative payouts as the vendor(s) scramble to get things back up and running again. We’re expecting these types of attacks to continue to increase in 2024.bio
    2. Biometric Data Threats: As more biometric data is used to confirm your identity for accessing your accounts or making payments, more regulations need to be put in place to protect that data. Facial recognition and fingerprint scans can often give someone access to your personal devices (such as a cellphone) and those devices can be the keys to the kingdom when it comes to accessing your accounts. Attacks in 2024 may escalate not just to the theft of data but also physical theft in unison on high value targets (think CEOs, Presidents and other C-Suite users).
    3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) Manipulation: As more and more people explore using AI in their business or to provide solutions to common problems, there will be more and more bad actors trying to exploit it. We’ll see increased attacks using AI including data manipulation (feeding AI erroneous results so that users are receiving incorrect information) and attacks on systems using AI or powered by AI.
    4. 5G Network Vulnerabilities: As 4G continues to be phased out and 5G becomes more common place we’ll see increased attacks aimed at these networks, especially as more and more businesses in rural locations utilize 5G as a solution to spotty or absent cable or fiber options in their area. As the nature of 5G is aimed at providing a geographically robust internet solution to companies like these it’s important to make sure your security settings are beyond reproach to inhibit attacks on your network from the outside.
    5. Advanced Ransomware & Phishing Attacks: Ransomware and phishing attacks are not new, but they continue to grow more sophisticated as as-a-service models continue to roll out, this allows attackers that may not have a firm grasp of technology or even English to send out widespread attack emails that are indistinguishable from emails you may get from reputable services you use for a relatively small monetary fee. Also, because many of these attacks originate outside the US you may have no recourse if your business is successfully hit by one.

    These are just five emerging threats but there are many threats out there making it all the more crucial you have a cyber security solution behind your business that’s staying ahead of these threats and more.

    The threats mentioned above are crimes of opportunity and it’s very easy to be caught in the wide net that’s being cast by those with ill intentions. Valley Techlogic has been at the forefront of providing all encompassing security solutions to our customers. If you would like to learn more about protection your business from cyber security attacks in 2024 schedule a consultation with our experts today. Also for a limited time when you hear us out, you can also take advantage of our Black Friday offer.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, an IT service provider in Atwater, CA. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on Twitter at https://x.com/valleytechlogic.

  • AI explained and 4 simple ways to use it in your business

    AI explained and 4 simple ways to use it in your business

    AI or Artificial Intelligence has been all over the news as online tools have emerged that can do a variety of impressive things in the creative space such as copywriting, writing code, creating videos and images and much more.

    On a more technical level, AI is being used in medical applications for assisting doctors during surgeries or identifying suspicious tissue or masses in diagnostic images. The car you drive may be using AI through GPS to help you navigate a safer or more efficient route or for specific vehicles, autonomous driving. Advances in robotics grow via AI input each day, from minute applications such as cleaning robots to complex sensors that take in data and react to it in real time to make equipment used by a wide variety of sectors much safer or more efficient.

    Even on your mobile device and computer, AI input is found in abundance. The spam filter in your email? Powered by AI. Face recognition on your phone? That’s also AI.

    Our prompt was “Red haired girl sitting at desk with computer and cat.”

    We’ve found AI tends to have a negative association to it as well however, with some worried it may allow their employer to replace them for a computerized facsimile, some worried about the implications when it comes to privacy and autonomy and others worried on a grander scale what it will mean for humanity if AI ever reaches the level of being truly sentient.

    We would like to put some of these fears to bed, in a nutshell AI is exactly what we as a society make of it. When it comes to the creative pieces that have emerged from AI it’s a mistake to believe that those creations were spawned solely via technological input.

    In reality AI conjures up images, songs, and video by compiling the vast resource that is available to it via the internet. It takes human creations and fragments them to recreate them into something that matches your text prompt. The stylistic choice, the colors, the layout – all of this is garnered from human ingenuity that is then reiterated for your viewing consumption,via machine learning.

    The impressive part of AI is not the end product it provides to you, it is its ability to take so much information and compile it into something even remotely coherent. Even this is not something that’s spawned from the ether but is instead the net result of many decades of talented engineers with one goal in mind – to make many jobs simpler and safer to do.

    AI will not replace human ingenuity; it will do as any tool is designed to do – help us do more.

    Now that we have hopefully put some of your fears about AI to bed, you may be wondering how you can use AI in your business? Well, we have a few suggestions.

    1. Images. As we showcased above, AI is excellent for creating graphics that match your text input and can add a little bit of context or pizzaz to your designs or documents. Top Recommendation: AI
    2. Social Media Posts. If you own a business, you should ideally be posting to your social media platforms every weekday if possible (or at least three times a week). However, managing to squeeze content creation into your day to day can feel like a major chore. That’s where our top recommendation comes in, Canva allows you to create social media posts quickly and easily resize them for whichever platform you’re on (so you can make one post go further). Top Recommendation: Canva
    3. Editing: Just take a great group photo at work but realize there’s something really distracting in the background? Or maybe the colors are off, or it’s a little blurry? All highly fixable via Adobe Express, and you don’t need to be a graphic design expert. Best of all, it’s free. Top Recommendation: Adobe Express
    4. Text Prompts: While we don’t recommend leaving all of your content writing to AI, it can be a useful tool to help you get started or to help you reword a paragraph to be more persuasive or engaging. Top Recommendation: AnyWord

    Of course, it would be remiss of us if we didn’t mention you can get the best of human ingenuity and technological prowess by partnering with a technology service provider like Valley Techlogic. We pride ourselves on being at the forefront of technological innovation, and that includes advancements in AI.

    If you would like to learn more about how we can help you navigate this space and utilize automation and AI in your business today, you can schedule a consultation with us here.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, an IT service provider in Atwater, CA. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on Twitter at https://x.com/valleytechlogic.