Mastercard: Democratizing Data Analytics and AI To Level the Playing Field for Small Businesses
Mastercard is supporting initiatives to democratize data analytics and AI for small businesses. The company highlights three projects:
1. Datasketch's chatbot program in Bogotá, Colombia, helping small businesses like Azahar Coffee analyze their data for better decision-making.
2. Community Reinvestment Fund's CRF Insights tool, which provides quick financial snapshots for small business advisers in Chicago.
3. Vested Impact's platform for affordable ESG measurement, aiming to assess 1.2 million small businesses by the end of 2024.
Mastercard is also partnering on the AI2AI Challenge to recognize innovative AI solutions for inclusion, and collaborating with Create Labs to develop an inclusive AI tool for small-business owners.
Mastercard sta supportando iniziative per democratizzare l'analisi dei dati e l'IA per le piccole imprese. L'azienda evidenzia tre progetti:
1. Il programma chatbot di Datasketch a Bogotá, Colombia, che aiuta piccole imprese come Azahar Coffee ad analizzare i propri dati per una migliore presa di decisioni.
2. Lo strumento CRF Insights del Community Reinvestment Fund, che fornisce istantanee finanziarie rapide per i consulenti di piccole imprese a Chicago.
3. La piattaforma di Vested Impact per la misurazione ESG a prezzi accessibili, con l'obiettivo di valutare 1,2 milioni di piccole imprese entro la fine del 2024.
Mastercard sta anche collaborando all'AI2AI Challenge per riconoscere soluzioni innovative in materia di IA per l'inclusione e sta collaborando con Create Labs per sviluppare uno strumento di IA inclusivo per i proprietari di piccole imprese.
Mastercard está apoyando iniciativas para democratizar el análisis de datos y la IA para las pequeñas empresas. La compañía destaca tres proyectos:
1. El programa de chatbot de Datasketch en Bogotá, Colombia, que ayuda a pequeñas empresas como Azahar Coffee a analizar sus datos para una mejor toma de decisiones.
2. La herramienta CRF Insights del Community Reinvestment Fund, que proporciona instantáneas financieras rápidas para asesores de pequeñas empresas en Chicago.
3. La plataforma de Vested Impact para la medición ESG asequible, con el objetivo de evaluar 1.2 millones de pequeñas empresas para finales de 2024.
Mastercard también está asociándose en el AI2AI Challenge para reconocer soluciones innovadoras de IA para la inclusión, y colaborando con Create Labs para desarrollar una herramienta de IA inclusiva para propietarios de pequeñas empresas.
마스터카드는 소상공인을 위한 데이터 분석 및 AI의 민주화를 지원하는 이니셔티브를 추진하고 있습니다. 회사는 세 가지 프로젝트를 강조합니다:
1. 콜롬비아 보고타의 Datasketch 챗봇 프로그램은 Azahar Coffee와 같은 소규모 기업이 더 나은 의사 결정을 위해 데이터를 분석하도록 돕고 있습니다.
2. 시카고에서 소상공인 고문을 위한 빠른 재무 스냅샷을 제공하는 Community Reinvestment Fund의 CRF Insights 도구.
3. 2024년 말까지 120만 개의 소상공인을 평가하는 것을 목표로 하는 Vested Impact의 저렴한 ESG 측정 플랫폼.
마스터카드는 포용성을 위한 혁신적인 AI 솔루션을 인정하기 위해 AI2AI Challenge에 파트너십을 맺었으며, 소상공인 소유주를 위한 포괄적인 AI 도구를 개발하기 위해 Create Labs와 협력하고 있습니다.
Mastercard soutient des initiatives pour démocratiser l'analyse des données et l'IA pour les petites entreprises. L'entreprise met en avant trois projets :
1. Le programme de chatbot de Datasketch à Bogotá, en Colombie, qui aide de petites entreprises comme Azahar Coffee à analyser leurs données pour une meilleure prise de décision.
2. L'outil CRF Insights du Community Reinvestment Fund, qui fournit des instantanés financiers rapides pour les conseillers de petites entreprises à Chicago.
3. La plateforme de Vested Impact pour une mesure ESG abordable, visant à évaluer 1,2 million de petites entreprises d'ici fin 2024.
Mastercard collabore également sur le AI2AI Challenge afin de reconnaître des solutions innovantes en IA pour l'inclusion, et travaille avec Create Labs pour développer un outil d'IA inclusif pour les propriétaires de petites entreprises.
Mastercard unterstützt Initiativen zur Demokratisierung von Datenanalytik und KI für kleine Unternehmen. Das Unternehmen hebt drei Projekte hervor:
1. Das Chatbot-Programm von Datasketch in Bogotá, Kolumbien, das kleinen Unternehmen wie Azahar Coffee hilft, ihre Daten für eine bessere Entscheidungsfindung zu analysieren.
2. Das CRF Insights-Tool des Community Reinvestment Fund, das schnelle Finanzübersichten für Berater kleiner Unternehmen in Chicago bietet.
3. Die Plattform von Vested Impact zur kostengünstigen ESG-Messung, die bis Ende 2024 1,2 Millionen kleine Unternehmen bewerten soll.
Mastercard arbeitet auch beim AI2AI Challenge zusammen, um innovative KI-Lösungen für Inklusion zu erkennen, und kooperiert mit Create Labs, um ein inklusives KI-Tool für Kleinunternehmer zu entwickeln.
- Mastercard is supporting initiatives to make AI and data analytics more accessible to small businesses
- The company is partnering on the AI2AI Challenge to recognize innovative AI solutions for inclusion
- Mastercard is collaborating with Create Labs to develop an inclusive AI tool for small-business owners
- None.
Insights
Mastercard's initiatives to democratize AI for small businesses are promising but not immediately impactful for investors. The company is developing tools to help small businesses leverage AI for data analytics, which could potentially increase Mastercard's market share in the small business sector long-term. However, these projects are still in pilot stages and their financial impact is unclear.
The chatbot program in Bogotá and the CRF Insights tool show Mastercard's commitment to innovation, but their scale is The Vested Impact platform's goal to assess 1.2 million small businesses by 2024 is more substantial, yet its revenue potential for Mastercard isn't specified.
While these initiatives align with Mastercard's strategy to expand its services beyond payments, they don't represent a significant near-term revenue driver. Investors should view this as part of Mastercard's long-term strategy to strengthen its ecosystem and potentially create new revenue streams in the future.
Mastercard's focus on AI democratization for small businesses is a strategic move in a growing market. The global AI market size was valued at
By developing accessible AI tools, Mastercard is positioning itself as an innovator and potential leader in this niche. This could lead to increased brand loyalty and customer retention among small businesses, a important segment for payment processors. The company's partnerships with organizations like Datasketch and Vested Impact also demonstrate a commitment to global expansion in emerging markets.
While the immediate financial impact may be , this initiative could provide Mastercard with valuable data and insights, potentially leading to new product development and revenue streams in the long run. Investors should monitor the adoption rates and scalability of these tools as indicators of future success.
NORTHAMPTON, MA / ACCESSWIRE / September 20, 2024 / Mastercard
By Dorothy Pomerantz
Originally published by the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth
Given that Colombia is the second-largest exporter of coffee, the mission of Azahar Coffee might seem a little counterintuitive: Keep as many Colombian beans in Colombia as possible. The rationale? Colombians deserve to drink the best coffee too.
As a small business built upon a reputation for fare that's both on trend and fresh, Azahar needs to stay sharp to be able to compete in a growing market. Using artificial intelligence (AI) could help, by giving the café a way to use its own data to make smarter, more efficient business decisions. For example, by analyzing how many sandwiches are sold per day, it could eliminate waste by buying only as much as bread as is needed that day. Knowing which tables are busiest at which times could improve staffing, and analyzing how many people prefer oat milk over cow's milk could help fine-tune dairy inventory.
These kinds of tools are already being adopted by large organizations. According to one recent study, about
Small businesses will need customized, easy-to-use, accessible solutions. Here are three that are being developed with support from Mastercard Strive.
Building chatbots to harness data
Azahar is part of a pilot program from Datasketch, a small social technology company that is democratizing data science to combat social inequality.
The program is bringing chatbot-enabled AI to small businesses in Bogotá. Existing data analytics services are out of reach for the 50,000 independent stores and restaurants in Bogotá that could benefit from using AI to simplify their data for better decision-making.
For years, these businesses have grappled with a significant challenge: how to harness the power of their data with limited resources. The corner café or local store often relies on gut instinct, basic spreadsheets or incomprehensible reports from the various digital platforms they use. Datasketch's chatbot generates the insights small businesses need to get to the next level by working with models trained exclusively on a small company's own data.
"If you're a small business, you may have one software for payments, another for accounting and another for online sales," says JP Marin Diaz, Datasketch's founder. "We are able to integrate that data and put an AI chatbot interface on top of it so they can ask questions about their businesses in a simple way and get an answer based on the company's data."
For example, a manager at one of the Azahar cafés could ask, "How much milk should I buy for next week?" and get a simple answer based on complex analytics of café traffic, local preferences and seasonal sales. The tool gives Azahar and other small Colombian businesses a way to compete against bigger companies using the latest technology.
Empowering community business coaches with faster data insights
Building new ways for small businesses to use advanced data science can even have a ripple effect, improving the prospects for exponentially more entrepreneurs. Take Community Reinvestment Fund, USA (CRF), for example, which offers lending and technical solutions to help community finance organizations better support and grow the small businesses they serve.
In Chicago, CRF is working with Allies for Community Business (A4CB), which provides the capital, coaching and connections entrepreneurs need to grow stable businesses, which in turn create jobs and wealth in their communities. The partnership is bringing better insights to the small-business owners they work with.
CRF Insights, the latest technology innovation from CRF, enables A4CB advisers to sit down with small-business owners and, within a minute, compile a snapshot capturing two years of financial performance and health trends. Typically, this process could take up to two weeks and mean manually collecting financial statements, then doing the data entry and the modeling. CRF's tools use open banking to automate this process, pulling financial data from multiple sources (bank accounts, payments systems, etc.) to present all the information in one easy-to-read dashboard.
Coaches then use those insights to help businesses set goals and benchmarks that can be tracked and measured over months and years. The system also responds to data insights, with the option to provide nudges and alerts to the coach. For instance, the platform can help advisers evaluate the impact of a marketing campaign or address demand spikes and suggest actions like a line of credit for inventory needs.
We shouldn't expect, small business owners to be data scientists. We should build products and services for small business owners that help them make sense of their data, make better decisions, connect to resources at the right time, and better manage the overall financial performance of their businesses.
Patrick Davis
Senior vice president, technology & platform service, Community Reinvestment Fund
Helping small businesses compete on sustainability
It's becoming increasingly clear that for small businesses to compete on a bigger stage, they'll need to be able to measure and report their ESG (environmental, social and governance) risks, opportunities and impact. Doing so can lead to new business opportunities, given that the proportion of major organizations that require small-business owners to disclose ESG metrics is expected to reach
"Small businesses don't have the capacity or the skills for this," says Kimberley Abbott, founder of Vested Impact, a U.K.-based global company that leverages AI and 300 million science-based and other relevant data points to automatically assess and quantify the impact of companies and investments. "We need to meet small businesses where they are. Democratizing this technology is also about making sure the price is fair for everyone."
In Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America, Vested Impact, with support from Mastercard Strive, is developing an affordable small-business platform to measure a company's impact in seconds. Their goal is to assess 1.2 million small businesses by the end of 2024. Their platform takes into account what the company does and where it does it, along with impactful data points, and measures the company's impact against U.N. Sustainable Development Goal targets. The platform will be able to quickly create an impact report that small companies can then use as proof of the good work they are doing.
Ensuring everyone benefits from the AI revolution
These are just three examples of how AI can help level the playing field for small businesses. AI can also help these businesses attract and maintain customers, make marketing more targeted and efficient and increase cybersecurity. To make sure AI reaches small businesses will require involving them in the design process to ensure solutions are meeting real needs.
One way we're helping to democratize AI is through the Artificial Intelligence to Accelerate Inclusion Challenge (AI2AI Challenge) - a partnership with data.org and Dasra to recognize organizations that offer innovative AI solutions that have demonstrated success and are ready to scale with additional funding and technical support.
Mastercard has joined forces with Create Labs and diverse global media partners to develop and pilot a new inclusive AI tool that delivers customized assistance to small-business owners.
The bottom line is that the AI revolution is here, and it's up to all of us to ensure that everyone, everywhere can benefit. We need to be intentional about helping small businesses access AI technology and tools, whether that means creating easy-to-use chatbots, helping business coaches in underserved communities or bringing ESG measuring tools to businesses already doing good work. The power, resources and opportunities are there. It's time to embrace them.
Learn more about Mastercard's work in artificial intelligence.
Dorothy Pomerantz is a managing editor at Fitch Ink where she writes and edits stories for Mastercard Newsroom and beyond. She spent 15 years at Forbes Magazine where she was L.A. Bureau Chief.
Originally published by the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth
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SOURCE: Mastercard
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