Blog

Singer Belchior has a song called “Velha Roupa Colorida” where he says in the chorus: “the past is clothes that no longer fit”.

That line was certainly written to reflect its time, but it’s a perfect way to explain to companies today that looking in the rearview mirror won’t help any business.

You need to turn on your radar for new technologies, because it’s in the present that we find the tools capable of saving companies and improving the quality of products and services.

Three of them have had a major impact on discussions about the future of corporations: Machine Learning, IoT, and Blockchain. Each one can help boost businesses through innovative—and sometimes simple—solutions, as long as internal teams dedicate time to studying them.

In this post, we’ll go through the basic concepts behind Machine Learning, IoT, and Blockchain so you can understand which of them (or which combination) can improve—or even save—the future of your company.

If Belchior’s song is an inspiration, get ready: it’s time to refresh the wardrobe.

Machine Learning

Machine Learning draws heavily on Artificial Intelligence concepts to explain how machines learn—what methods computer programs can use to analyze data and even make decisions autonomously.

With Machine Learning, software can find information of interest to a company within a gigantic pile of data (such as Big Data) with a very small margin of error—without the need for humans to explicitly specify what the machine must search for, because it has learned the variables of how to do it.

How? Through pattern recognition based on training data, where the company indicates what is relevant and leaves the search for the needed information to the machine.

The more knowledge it acquires, the more strategic it can become for the company that uses it.

IoT

You’ve probably heard this concept by its Portuguese name: Internet das Coisas—Internet of Things.

We’ve talked a lot about this here on the blog when we discussed wearables—accessories we wear that contain software and provide data—such as Apple Watch or Oculus Rift.

Everything indicates that IoT will lead major technological changes in the coming years, and the world is moving toward a reality where much of our daily lives will be shared with machines that monitor us: from apps that manage energy autonomy at home to self‑driving cars that will share the roads with us.

And, as usual, all of that already exists.

Blockchain

Bitcoin is a virtual, encrypted currency that doesn’t respond to any government regulation or bank. Even so, it’s surprising that it has become one of the most used payment methods in recent years—and has reached dramatic levels of appreciation compared to the currencies we already know.

The technology behind Bitcoin is Blockchain, which is essentially a distributed, shared chain of records split into many small pieces. Its main purpose is to create a global index in a given market.

Because it works as a public, universal ledger, Blockchain can transform a huge amount of information into a clear line of transactions, helping avoid issues like inflated negotiations and corruption. Its darker side is that some transactions can be hard to trace, which may allow certain illegal buying and selling without oversight from a regulatory body.

Even so, it’s likely that this technology could eventually replace paper-based notary processes, since it carries enough data to validate and authenticate the exchange of money and titles online. And through Blockchain, more people can securely access Bitcoin and start using it as a means of exchange.

So—have you heard about these technologies? Or better: does your company plan to use any of them? It’s important to remember that none of these options are “future tech.” They’re already being used right now to improve products and services for many companies.

That’s why you should see Machine Learning, IoT, and Blockchain as technologies of the present. They can save your company from decline caused by being stuck in the past.