AI Foundations for Business

This unit introduces major families of artificial intelligence, their technical constraints, and implications for business decision-making, governance, and sustainability. It builds on foundational business concepts and prepares learners to apply, govern, and evaluate AI solutions in subsequent applied units.

Learning Objectives

• Analyze and categorize major AI approaches (logic/algorithmic, neural/evolutionary, emergent, brain-emulation, augmentation, and embodied robotics) and summarize their potential business applications and technical limitations.
• Evaluate ethical, accountability, and control issues associated with deploying AI in organizations and recommend governance strategies to mitigate bias, misuse, and loss of human oversight.
• Apply data-privacy, cybersecurity, and emerging-technology constraints (including quantum and post-Moore considerations) to assess risks in data-driven decision systems and propose appropriate mitigation measures.
• Design a concise business-focused proposal that leverages AI for computational sustainability or urban transit improvements, articulating expected benefits, risks, and accountability mechanisms.