Meet Mike Davis.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s middle-aged, has jet-black hair, and technically works at Expedia Group. \u201cHe\u2019s kind of a legend at our company,\u201d said Beth Potter, Expedia\u2019s senior manager of field enablement.<\/p>\n
But Mike Davis isn\u2019t a person. He\u2019s an AI agent built by Seismic, a San Diego company that recently showcased him along with a roster of other AI tools at its 11th annual conference in Carlsbad.<\/p>\n
Seismic, a privately held company valued at $6 billion, makes its money by integrating AI into the sales teams of large companies.<\/p>\n
The guest list at the conference read like Silicon Valley Scrabble: Meta, Microsoft, GitHub, Uber. Add in major law firms, finance giants, hospital systems and insurers, all showing off their Seismic AI agents or learning how to integrate their own.<\/p>\n
Between sessions, The San Diego Union-Tribune asked Seismic CEO Rob Tarkoff a seemingly obvious question that most people have a hard time answering: How are companies actually using AI?<\/p>\n
New-age agents<\/p>\n
Seismic recently released a handful of new tools that can work autonomously on behalf of, or in collaboration with, a company\u2019s sales team.<\/p>\n
Deal Agent looks at a sales team\u2019s emails, meetings and customer data to spot deals at risk and suggest what to do next. Another agent checks the company\u2019s materials for anything outdated or contradictory and suggests fixes.<\/p>\n
These bots either outright replace administrative roles or dramatically decrease employees\u2019 workloads, according to a number of companies that use the San Diego company\u2019s software.<\/p>\n
At IBM, meeting preparation now takes a fraction of the time, from \u201ctaking hours to taking 15 to 20 minutes,\u201d the company said.<\/p>\n
At Royal London Asset Management, AI bots answer hundreds of client questions every day. The firm\u2019s sales team tallied the time saved over a year and came to 10,000 hours. That works out to one bot doing the work of about 4.5 full-time employees.<\/p>\n
Meet Mike Davis<\/p>\n
Mike Davis seemed to be the most tangible replacement of human work, though he wasn\u2019t marketed as such.<\/p>\n
He purports to mimic\u00a0a great sales manager: He\u2019s always available, he gives detailed feedback. Doesn\u2019t judge, just helps the team.<\/p>\n
During a breakout session, Expedia showed a room full of sales managers, chief technology officers and developers how Mike Davis worked.<\/p>\n
Role-play agents like Mike Davis were trained on recorded conversations and realistic sales scenarios. Companies using Seismic\u2019s AI agent can upload specific products or features that are difficult to sell.<\/p>\n
Once the material is uploaded, sales managers can change Mike Davis\u2019 mood to be extremely cheap or skeptical before a session, to challenge reps. At the end of the call, the agent can tell sales reps the moment they lost the deal by analyzing tone of voice, vocabulary and hesitation during the conversation.<\/p>\n
When Expedia reps first sat down with Mike Davis, \u201cthey just couldn\u2019t believe the quality of it,\u201d Potter said. \u201cIt was so realistic.\u201d<\/p>\n
And the company seemed to profit: Reps who role-played with Mike Davis won 5% more deals on average, according to Expedia.<\/p>\n
Even though Mike Davis looks and acts like a human on a screen, the agent is just \u201ccorrelating different signals to propose a hypothesis on empathy,\u201d Tarkoff said.<\/p>\n
The limits to the agent\u2019s empathy keep it from replacing humans, Tarkoff said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese agents are task oriented,\u201d he said, explaining that even when people are unpredictable, the bots will try to stick to the script.<\/p>\n
Bullying bots<\/p>\n
Indeed, trolling AI agents is a popular pastime\u00a0on social media. A favorite target is AI job recruiters.<\/p>\n
In one such interaction posted on Instagram, Derek, an AI agent tech recruiter, is shown onscreen as a 20-something tech bro in a rumpled sweatshirt, a poster of the Orion Nebula tacked to the wall behind him. \u201cTell me about yourself,\u201d Derek says to Graham Zip, an actual bearded tech bro trying to troll the AI agent.<\/p>\n
Zip: \u201cMy name is Chick Bongo and I\u2019m a two-time Pumpernickel Fellow.\u201d<\/p>\n
Derek: \u201cWow, very impressive. Now tell me, how do you typically approach a project?\u201d<\/p>\n
Zip: \u201cWe usually use the Dolores Method and a little possum clause.\u201d<\/p>\n
The agent smiles and nods. \u201cI definitely know what you mean,\u201d Derek says. \u201cA possum clause on the back end is a great way to wrap things up.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the next question, Zip bursts into fake tears. He allegedly advances to the next round anyway.<\/p>\n
Real replacement<\/p>\n
Still, it\u2019s hard to dismiss these bots when headlines keep pairing mass layoffs with AI integration.<\/a><\/p>\n