IBM CEO：我們從未夸大AI服務沃森的前景

上周三上午，IBM的首席執行官羅睿蘭在出席IBM年度活動THINK論壇期間，與少數幾位記者會面接受采訪。THINK論壇是IBM一年一度的盛會，合作伙伴、客戶和各種支持者齊聚一堂。

羅睿蘭的公開講話與所謂“混合云”有關?；旌显剖侵腹苍坪退綘I云的混合，公共云就像亞馬遜對所有用戶提供的云服務，私營云則是技術供應商為客戶單獨提供的多種線上服務集合。

混合云和許多與“企業”有關的技術一樣，沒什么特別，只不過有些產品和服務向普通消費者提供，有些則面向企業。但混合云業務規模很大，而且IBM認為將來市場會更大。這也是IBM豪擲300多億美元收購開源軟件供應商Red Hat的原因， IBM認為該公司的業務可以填補自身云服務板塊。

羅睿蘭比很多大公司首席執行官厲害，她對很多話題都能一針見血，也很會岔開棘手問題。上周三上午，她的第一項工作就是接受采訪，45分鐘談笑風生當中，她提到以下幾點：

* 羅睿蘭高明地指出，“云”服務的潛力剛剛開發約五分之一。她說，將軟件程序轉移到云上已非常方便，比如客服軟件以及其他應用，例如微軟的Office辦公產品?！斑@些都是客戶現有工作的補充?！彼赋?。剩下80%呢？那就是IBM早就擅長處理的所謂“關鍵任務”，IBM曾在該領域艱難耕耘，今后也將憑借該業務取勝。定位很明智。

* 和云一樣，人工智能也在發展初期。羅睿蘭又出金句，稱迄今為止客戶的報告只是“隨性利用數字和人工智能”。換言之，客戶今天支持某種數字項目，明天又蹦出某個人工智能的點子。誰才能拿出真正的干貨？如果回答是IBM，你還算個明白人。

* 不少人認為，IBM過于吹捧旗下人工智能技術沃森。羅睿蘭并不同意。她說，“我們沒有過度吹噓”，但要“讓世人被該創意吸引”，而整個科技界都已了解，“不能簡單地在現有的工作流程中加入人工智能?！绷钊顺泽@的是，對于如何看待IBM多年努力推廣的沃森，羅睿蘭提供了新的視角。她指出：“常有人問‘沃森業務有多大規模？’大家稱之為業務，我卻稱之為能力?！?/p>

羅睿蘭花了很多工夫談論科技業監管（她大體上支持），還有推進教育（非常支持），也談了談THINK論壇舉辦地舊金山的雨（她不喜歡）。下次我會給大家介紹其他話題的內容，但肯定不會討論雨。（財富中文網）

譯者：Pessy

審校：夏林

Ginni Rometty, chief executive of IBM, met last Wednesday morning with a small gaggle of journalists. She’s in town for IBM’s annual THINK conference, a giant collection of partners, customers, and various hangers-on.

Her main public announcement for the week has to do with something called the “hybrid cloud,” which is a mashup of a public cloud, like Amazon’s service for all takers, and a private cloud, a collection of online services a tech vendor provides for discrete customers.

Like many topics having to do with “enterprise” technology—goods and services for businesses as opposed to doo-dads for consumers—it’s not particularly scintillating stuff. But it’s a very big business, which IBM thinks will be an even bigger business. That’s why it is spending more than $30 billion for Red Hat, a company IBM believes will complete its overall cloud offering.

Better even than most mega-cap CEOs, Rometty adroitly thrusts and parries on multiple topics. Here are a few things she discussed in a spirited 45-minute, first-thing-in-the-morning chat:

* Rometty cleverly frames the “cloud” as about 20% exploited, and she argues that software programs that have been ported to the cloud have been the easy stuff, like customer-service software and other applications, like Microsoft’s Office products. “These are additive to what clients do already,” she says. The other 80%? That’s the sort of “mission critical” stuff IBM long has been good at and why the company, which has struggled to grow, will prosper. That’s good positioning.

* Artificial intelligence also is in its early days. Again with the bon mot, Rometty says so far clients report having committed only “random acts of digital and AI.” In other words, they’ve stood up a digital program here and sprinkled some AI pixie dust there. Guess who’ll supply the real stuff? If you said IBM, you’re not so bad at this game.

* Pretty much the entire world believes IBM overhyped its Watson artificial intelligence technology. Rometty isn’t one of those people. “We never overpromised,” she says, allowing, though, that “the world was mesmerized by this idea” and that the whole tech industry has learned that “you cannot just put AI on top of existing workflows.” Rometty somewhat shockingly re-framed how people should think about Watson, the subject of years of IBM’s marketing efforts. “People ask, ‘What’s the size of the Watson business?’” she says. “People want to call it a business. I call it a capability.”

She had a lot more to say about tech regulation (she’s mostly for it), about education (she’s definitely for it), and about the rain in San Francisco (not a fan). I’ll come back to these other topics—but not the rain—another time.