Enterprise technology has come a long way from the conference-call speaker phone. Workers increasingly want artificial intelligence and automation to complete tasks on their behalf. But can we really expect Jarvis from “Iron Man” to show up and do spreadsheets any time soon?

“We do think that the enterprise will become more intelligent and that the providers are going to lead that charge,” said Jim Lundy (pictured), chief executive officer and lead analyst at Aragon Research Inc. It is, however, a stretch to call some of the new enterprise software offerings out there AI, he added.

Take heart; it’s not AI or nothing. Vendors are bringing intelligent digital systems to market that will make work easier. They will answer users’ questions and have conversations with them. For example, chatbots allow help desk employees to resolve internal and customer issues quicker.

Lundy spoke with Lisa Martin (@LisaMartinTV) and Stu Miniman (@stu), co-hosts of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the Enterprise Connect event in Kissimmee, Florida. They discussed the latest in intelligent systems and AI for enterprises (see the full interview with transcript here). (* Disclosure below.)

Contact centers are where enterprise-AI action is

Contact centers are particularly hungry for an automation-and-AI overhaul.

“Every client we’ve talked to in survey work said, ‘We wish we had more intelligence in our contact center,'” Lundy said. They ideally would have automation and assistants that handle at least part of a customer’s problem before it gets to a human.

If they don’t have one yet, it’s because contact-center applications are heavy duty and handle a ton of traffic. “I think they’re a little scared that they want to make sure they do it right … sometimes people rush too quickly and deploy it when it’s not quite ready,” Lundy stated.

Some cloud-based providers such as Five9 Inc. are taking an earnest whack at AI for the contact-center.

“Contact center is really, really complicated. You just don’t turn them on sometimes. There’s things you have to do to make them work,” Lundy said. Five9 provides high-touch support to customers implementing its solution.

“I think a lot of providers here, including Five9, are going to try to do AI the right way and not try to rush it,” Lundy said. However, these intelligent systems aren’t quite as sharp as Jarvis for the moment. There is a lot of hype about AI for the enterprise that is not equal to what’s really available, he added.

Lundy predicts that in the the next two years, we’ll see more bona fide AI in this space.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Enterprise Connect event. (* Disclosure: Five9 Inc. sponsored this segment of theCUBE. Neither Five9 nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE