Technology often follows a familiar progression. First, it’s used by a small core of scientists, then the user base expands to engineers who can navigate technical nuance and jargon until finally it’s made user-friendly enough that almost anyone can use it.
How No-Code Platforms Can Bring AI to Small and Midsize Businesses
Just as the clickable icons of Windows replaced obscure DOS commands, new “no-code” platforms are replacing programming languages with simple drag and drop interfaces. This means that tech that was previously too labor intensive and expensive for smaller companies, such as AI, is now increasingly within reach — it’s just a question of finding the right project. Companies should look for three things in a no-code platform: it needs a simple interface that makes it easy to get data into the model training process; it needs to automate model selection and training, tasks that would normally be performed by data scientists; and it needs to be simple and easy to deploy with existing processes. Finding the right one for a particular company may require some trial and error. The good news is that the best platforms are open, which means that users can take the platforms for test drives on relevant tasks and see how they perform.