Transforming Conversational AI

Michael McTear is an emeritus professor of Ulster University who has worked in spoken dialogue technologies and conversational AI for more than 20 years. He is author of several books, including Spoken Dialogue Technology (SpringerLink, 2004), The Conversational Interface (SpringerLink, 2016), and Conversational AI (SpringerLink, 2020). Currently Michael is involved in several research and development projects investigating the use of conversational agents in socially relevant projects such as mental health monitoring and home monitoring of older adults. Michael's main motivation for writing this book is to bring new developments in conversational AI to the attention of conversation designers and other professionals in a clear and accessible manner.

Marina Ashurkina is Product Manager in Generative Assistants Inc. , a US-based startup striving to streamline the creation of generative AI assistants. Marina studied linguistics and translation studies, she has over 8 years of experience working with dialog systems, including working in the company api. ai before it was acquired by Google and became Dialogflow, also she had her own consultancy Cherry. ai helping companies build smart assistants and worked on building a multi language voice assistant platform for Huawei. In 2020 Marina created and lectured on a conversation design course to 60 students with a focus on building skills for smart speakers. Besides that Marina is a certified Project Manager Professional, Scrum Master and Product Owner which helps her to set up and drive complex Conversational AI projects.