Predictive Maintenance

In O'Reilly.  Nicely done introduction.  Uses Cortana Intelligence Suite.

Predictive maintenance meets predictive analytics
Danielle Dean introduces the landscape and challenges of predictive maintenance applications in the manufacturing industry.  Video by Danielle Dean July 19, 2016 ... " 

Silicon Angle Examines the Analytics Market

Including mention of the Cortana BI and lead management release:

In Silicon Angle: With chief marketing officers expected to outstrip the technology spending of their peers in the IT department by the 2017, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that vendors are paying more attention to analytics, which has emerged as one of the hottest items on the shopping list. Microsoft Corp. joined the fray last week with a new release of its hugely popular lead management platform that uses machine learning algorithms to help organizations close deals more effectively.  ...  " 

Cortana Voice Assistant

Will be shipped with Windows 10.  Connected with analytics, but it is unclear still what that will look like.  This will compete with a number of other assistant systems, like Siri.    See my previous note which includes a list of a number of such systems in place today. Assistant advisors will continue to be a way that AI/Cognitive is delivered to users. How will these evolve under user context in the future?    These kinds of advisory systems will increasingly be part of our interaction with computers.  How will this additional cognitive channel, in many computers in use today,  change our interactions?

Microsoft Analytics Under Cortana, Adds Spark

Does this imply that their new analytics will be strongly voice driven?   Fascinating idea that will require some cognitive depth and context?     How will this connect to visualization capabilities like that of Power BI?  Will follow.

Microsoft Unites Analytics Under ‘Cortana,’ Adds Spark Support

Microsoft today unveiled a new suite of hosted analytic services named after Cortana, the software giant’s personal assistant software for smartphones. Meanwhile, the company is prepping to begin support for Apache Spark on Azure, its public cloud platform.

If you have a Windows-based smartphone, you’re probably familiar with Cortana, the smooth-talking female voice that does various digital chores at your behalf. The new Cortana Analytics Suite takes the personal assistant role and injects big data into it.

The new suite that Microsoft unveiled at its Worldwide Partner Conference today is essentially a mashup of new and existing data analytic capabilities from Microsoft that it will package and sell as an integrated offering with a simple monthly subscription. The offering will be generally available later this fall.  ... " 

(Update)  Informatica & Cognizant Embrace the Microsoft Cortana Analytics Suite