SugarCRM Hires a Robot to Help it Figure Out if 2017 is the Year of Artificial Intelligence
SugarCRM has hired a robot to help it answer the most pressing question in the CRM industry: “Is this the year of artificial intelligence or not?”
Over the past year, SugarCRM has fallen on both sides of the argument in press interviews, contributed articles and company blog posts. Enter SB17, (SugarBot17) which will work with the company’s leadership, industry analysts and a secret cabal of world-renowned science-fiction writers to help determine if AI is real or not. SB17 was previously employed by Epicom, a SugarCRM Elite Partner, that developed the robot as a Slack integration tool that retrieves information from Sugar. SB17 has since made claims to now be alive like its predecessor, Number 5. These claims have subsequently been validated by third-party experts.
“We are thrilled to add SB17 to the SugarCRM team,” said Larry Augustin, CEO of SugarCRM. “Artificial intelligence is all the rage right now, but I’m planning to rely on the remarkable intuition and intelligence of this robot to help us determine if there is something to this hype.”
On the one hand, the handful of companies that are truly capable of developing AI finally have large enough datasets to go along with enough computing power and resources to push AI-related technologies into the mainstream. However, in spite of the promise of the technology, the argument can be made that users will determine if AI truly takes hold in the CRM space. People still like talking to other people, and they are better at it than any intelligent digital assistant is (despite vehement claims to the contrary by SB17).
SB17 will start at SugarCRM on April 1 and report to SugarCRM Chief Product Officer Rich Green. Though, in an interview, SB17 stated that Rich Green would be reporting to him.
