“One of the most exciting companies in the space.”
– Jason Stoughton, Pulse of AI
The Pulse of AI podcast highlights hot AI start-ups and “the smartest people in the world,” according to host Jason Stoughton – especially when it comes to successfully deploying and leveraging data and AI in the enterprise.
Primer CEO Sean Gourley was featured in a two-part interview covering a wide range of topics, including “why now” for NLP technologies, Primer’s emerging leadership in this fast-growing market, and the implications for organizations adopting NLP.
They also discussed the role AI can play in combating disinformation – AI’s limitations and its potential. In fact, disinformation is such a complex and existential issue that it became the focus of Gourley’s second interview, Understanding, Identifying, and Combating AI Powered Disinformation.
In the first episode, Conversation with Sean Gourley, Founder and CEO of Primer, Stoughton kicked off the discussion saying, “NLP is and always has been one of the most exciting areas within the field of AI.” He added, “Business leaders are just now beginning to see the potential that NLP represents… as companies like Primer begin to release powerful yet easy-to-use tools that bring NLP out of the research department and into the hands of business leaders.” Stoughton continued, “Primer recently released a new product line called Primer Engines, which are pre-trained engines that can be layered over your data, allowing you to do the types of things that just a few years ago were plot lines in Hollywood movies. And just as importantly, or maybe even more so, they are designed so that even non-technical business users can easily use them. What used to take months and a significant amount of investment in terms of people and money can now be done in a day. Literally. All of this makes his company, in my opinion, one of the most exciting players in the space.”
From there, Stoughton and Gourley discussed a broad range of topics, including:
- Gourley’s inspiration for starting Primer
- The purpose of NLP, why it’s one of the most difficult challenges in computer science, and recent advancements
- Why forward-looking organizations are assessing what NLP means for their business operations
- How pre-trained Primer Engines – that are interoperable, scalable, customizable, and easy to use – are accelerating new ways of interacting with the world’s most valuable information and creating new kinds of intelligence
“The organizations that will be most successful are going to be the ones that appreciate the strengths of machines and the strengths of humans – and combine them into the best business processes.”
Sean Gourley
“With these new intelligence capabilities spurred by NLP, how would you design your business systems to take full advantage? The organizations that will be most successful are going to be the ones that appreciate the strengths of machines and the strengths of humans – and combine them into the best business processes. Organizations that take that step first will have the most experience getting their heads around what the technology can do. They are going to create the best processes and, ultimately, will be the ones that win,” said Gourley.
Noting Primer’s successful growth trajectory, Stoughton asked Gourley how Primer is effective in attracting world-class talent. “For us, the pitch is very simple,” Gourley explained. “If you want to work in the world of bleeding-edge technology, building machines that can read and write at super scale and with human-level precision, this is the best place in the world to do that.”
“Machines are going to get increasingly sophisticated at reading and writing. Everything that involves text within your organization is going to change in the next five years.”
Sean Gourley
And Gourley’s final words: “Machines are going to get increasingly sophisticated at reading and writing. Everything that involves text within your organization is going to change in the next five years,” said Gourley. “Natural language processing is going to change the way you interact with information. You can get cost savings immediately. So it’s a good time to start thinking about what NLP might do for you today. Get started before it’s too late.”
Listen to the full interview here: The Pulse of AI: Conversation with Sean Gourley, Founder and CEO of Primer (Episode 100). The second interview on disinformation – “one of the most significant challenges facing our country today,” according to Stoughton – is available here: The Pulse of AI: Understanding and Combating AI Powered Disinformation (Episode 101).
