The establishment of innovation centers by tech companies isn’t new. These centers typically exist to ideate concepts, improve existing products and develop new ones. What sets the Dell Technologies Inc. apart in this area is its focus on a top-down approach to artificial intelligence competence, application and innovation.

All told, Dell’s Center of Excellence for AI aims to cover the company’s 125,000 employees, according to Jeff Boudreau (pictured), chief AI officer of Dell Technologies Inc.

“We call it the ‘Center of Innovation and Excellence for AI at Dell,’” he said. “It’s really what I look at as more of an enablement function for us to get our AI muscles in place and our knowledge in place. We have great talent, [and] we want to make sure we bring that talent along. It was about creating governance, it was creating policies, it’s enablement.”

Boudreau spoke with theCUBE Research’s Dave Vellante and Savannah Peterson at Dell Technologies World, during an exclusive broadcast on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed Dell’s strategic approach to AI, underpinned by strong leadership and a commitment to ethical practices. (* Disclosure below.)

How Dell is leading the AI charge with strategic focus and comprehensive training

Similar to the industry-wide trend, the initiative for Dell’s steadfast commitment to AI development came from the top. Leading the charge, CEO Michael Dell and vice chairman Jeff Clarke created the chief of AI office and spearheaded the innovation center’s creation. The initiative was especially imperative given AI rapid rate of change, Boudreau explained.

“What Jeff and Michael would ask me to do is really look at the strategy and say, ‘We had a definition of it, but let’s refine it now that it’s been eight months.’ I’ve never seen anything like [this pace of innovation] in my 30 years,” Boudreau said. “Learning from the pace of the market, learning from our customers, we fine-tuned it. We evolved it to accelerate the adoption of AI. Then we had our strategic framework.”

Training and upskilling are at the core of Dell’s AI strategy. Recognizing the diverse roles within the company, from software developers to finance professionals, Dell has developed a comprehensive curriculum tailored to different personas. This curriculum follows a structured approach akin to a university system, offering levels from foundational to advanced training.

In addition to training, Dell also streamlined AI implementation by placing a strategic focus on impactful use cases. Initially, the company had 800 potential AI value areas but narrowed these down to 36 key initiatives across four domain areas and three AI disciplines. This focus ensures that the AI projects undertaken impact the business meaningfully, Boudreau explained.

“That’s what actually drove how we trained the teams to get up to speed in these different areas,” he said. “Within a company of our size, there are different personas and different archetypes. You could be a software developer, you could be a finance person, you could be in the supply chain. We want to make sure everybody comes on the journey.”

Similar to the evolution of multicloud and hybrid cloud environments, AI will operate across edge, core and cloud infrastructures. This hybrid approach is driven by the understanding that most data is generated outside traditional data centers, according to Boudreau.

“It’s going to be a hybrid AI world, just like multicloud or hybrid cloud,” he said. “Most of the data is growing outside the data center anyway, so let’s follow an object. It’s going to be everywhere. Let’s get over with it, bring AI to the data — let’s move on so we can support our customers where they are.”

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE Research’s coverage of Dell Technologies World: 

(* Disclosure: Dell Technologies Inc. sponsored this segment of theCUBE. Neither Dell nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE