Welcome

Thanks for purchasing the MEAP for Machine Learning for Business. We are very excited to see the book getting into the hands of readers and looking forward to hearing how you apply the lessons in the book in your own companies.

The book is aimed at people beginning their journey in machine learning or, who are more experienced with machine learning but want to see how it can be applied in practice.

Richard (Ritchie) and I met at a procurement software company. I was CEO. Ritchie joined us as a result of our search for a developer who was good with data to help us categorise hundreds of thousands of products.

After leaving the procurement software company, I set up a consultancy training companies how to set up machine learning and robotic process automation teams and Ritchie went on to do his masters of data science at the University of Sydney, Australia.

Based on my experience helping companies set up automation and machine learning teams, I wanted to write a book that would allow anyone to start using machine learning in their company. The caveat to anyone is not that you need to have a certain technical background, it’s that you’re willing to put in the time when you run the code to understand what is happening and why.

I’ve got a lot of experience setting up automation and machine learning teams in companies, and I’m a good teacher; but I’m a bit of a hack when it comes to coding - good enough to get the job done but you wouldn’t want to learn from me. Enter Ritchie.