Choir Digital CEO on how he’s dealing with the “scary” AI rhetoric
Anthony Ferrier chief executive at the newly formed AI consultancy explains how they’re trying to get more POCs off the ground.
Anthony Ferrier, CEO at AI consultancy Choir Digital wants to remove the “scary” rhetoric around AI.
Speaking to CRN Australia, Ferrier noted that the negative connotations around the technology has hindered adoption in Australia.
“Part of the challenge for AI adoption in Australia is people have had that message that ‘it's going to destroy everything’,” he explained.
“You've got these evangelists on both sides, some people saying it's going to be amazing and lead us to a new societal structure, and other people say it's going to destroy society.”
Ferrier said that “fringe rhetoric” creates a lot of anxiety and tension for people.
“I personally am very much around partnering with people, meeting with them on a regular basis, having open conversations about challenges and opportunities to do their thing with AI,” he said.
Ferrier explained that despite them being an AI focused consultancy, they too are still going on this journey.
“By the way, we do AI and digital, as people are going through this stuff, we are very much hand holding them through that process and frankly, exploring ourselves,” he said.
“Because this is all new for everyone, we're transparent with this. We're transparent absolutely 100 percent with our approach, and that is what people are looking for.”
Choir Digital is an AI-based consultancy, which sees itself as an integrated development partner for organisations.
Ferrier explained Choir Digital can manage the development and strategy of a company, plus the skills.
“We become effectively a one stop shop to help them address kind of digital AI needs,” he said.
Looking at the Australian landscape, Ferrier said enterprises in the country are ready to build AI solutions.
“They just want to get things moving. They've done a bunch of proof of concepts (POCs), and they've been in this POC purgatory because they can't really get out of it. That is shifting where these businesses are looking for execution and impact,” he explained.
Being an AI-based consultancy, Ferrier said AI has been a core focus since the company’s inception.
“We started with AI as a core focus, right from the beginning. Whether we're developing a traditional digital solution and we're using AI to build that in, putting AI into an existing solution, or creating new value from entirely new solutions and products or agents, we have come from AI from the get go,” he said.
“That is how we've come together as a leadership team. We've come together with our investors, and that's become a focus for us. We're not shifting an organisation towards AI. We are AI from day one, and that's going to be our focus going forward.”
Wrong focus with AI
As the company has been running for just under three months, Ferrier said he wants five clients with a “deep partnership”.
"I want five clients that we are really deeply embedded with, that have a good level of trust, an excellent level of transparency, and that we're executing for them and creating business value,” he said.
Ferrier noted one of the issues with AI is that the focus has been on the technology than how it can be used for business impact.
“Instead of addressing proper business opportunities and challenges, everyone gets too pulled into what's the technology going to be and I don't think that gets people to the sustainability of these products and solutions,” he said.
“I want to have solutions that are sustainable, that are driving growth for organisations, and are continuing to evolve and shift and change. And you can do that through partnerships.”
Ferrier added that AI is not a “one and done” type of technology.
“I want to have solutions that are evolving, forming and addressing changing environments, because everything's changing so quickly, [it’s important] to have things that are sustaining,” he noted.