IBM's Watson, which bested Jeopardy!'s two most successful contestants, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter, continued its winning streak during a recent exhibition game played against teams of students from Harvard Business School (HBS) and the MIT Sloan School of Management.
The Watson software is powered by an IBM POWER7 server that has been optimized to handle the massive number of tasks that Watson must perform at rapid speeds to analyze complex language and deliver correct responses to the game's clues. The system running Linux also incorporates a number of optimized technologies for the specialized demands of processing an enormous number of concurrent tasks and data while analyzing information in real time.
The competition took place during a Watson symposium conducted by IBM with the HBS and MIT Sloan. The event brought together some of the brightest academic minds to collaborate on the use of advanced analytics, like those powering Watson, to transform the way the world does business.
The commercialization of Watson technology means that today's students will require new skills when they enter the job market. By bringing this technology to the university community, IBM aims to inspire the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs to think about the possibilities of Watson technology and the skills they will need to take advantage of the opportunities Watson creates. For more on Watson, go to www-03.ibm.com/innovation/us/watson/index.html.