The APO Secretariat organized an online training course on AI Applications in the Service Sector, 23–26 April 2024. The course was a significant step toward fulfilling the APO Vision 2025, which focuses on the value of generative AI and its applications in the service sector. The course aimed at understanding how AI enables predictive field service, anticipates service requirements, and automatically adjusts business processes, thereby maximizing productivity, workforce efficiency, and customer satisfaction while reducing costs.

Fifty one participants from 15 APO members attended the training course. Four resource persons from Japan, the ROK, Singapore, and the UK led participants through topics such as strategic perspectives on AI, sustainable design ecosystems and AI, best practices from the ROK, and AI in service industry customers’ assessment of service production from the perspective of Industry 4.0. The sessions were coupled with hands-on exercises to equip participants with essential skills and knowledge for implementing productivity through no-code ecosystems.

One attendee noted, “APO is the first project that improves my ability to use technology to make marketing strategies better and more effective. I will learn more about it so that I can apply it more effectively to my current job.”