Beyond Chatbots
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard the news: AI is here, and here to stay. In fact, you’ve probably already started to integrate it into your business. Maybe you’re letting Gemini help you draft emails to clients, or using Midjourney to help add some pizazz to your social media posts; it’s easy to think you’ve ticked the “AI” box. But the truth is, that’s only scratching the surface.
For the past couple of years, generative AI has been the face of artificial intelligence. We type a prompt, and it generates text or an image. This is a useful and familiar system by now, but it’s just one part of a bigger puzzle.
The real revolution, the one that will offer the biggest competitive edge is happening right now: it’s moving beyond simple chatbots and generative AI into a deeper, more connected, and more powerful era of AI. For businesses in Japan and beyond, this isn’t just about keeping up—it’s about knowing what you need to get ahead. This is where two groundbreaking technologies come into play: multimodal AI and AI agents.
More Than Just Text: Multimodal AI
In the first AI models, users were limited to one mode. They might be able to generate or process either text or images, but not much more than that. OpenAI’s image generation model DALL·E could make some flashy images, but if you needed something to write up a report, you had to look somewhere else. Not so with multimodal AI.
Multimodal AI is exactly what it sounds like—AI that can understand and process multiple modes of data simultaneously. Think of it as upgrading your AI from a text-only interface to one that can see, hear, and read all at once. It can analyze text, images, audio clips, and video to form a much richer, more contextual understanding of a situation. Models like the latest versions of Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT are able to handle much more comprehensive tasks.
The uses for businesses are almost endless. For example, you could use a multimodal AI to analyze the marketing strategy of your competitors, breaking down the copy, visuals, and strategy, as well as the user comments across social media—telling you exactly what you need to respond best. Or it could review recent voicemails and emails, sorting them into categories, assigning them priority, and even suggesting responses, saving you time and money.
The Autonomous Workforce
But let’s take it a step further. If multimodal AI gives your business the ability to perceive and analyze, agentic AI gives it the ability to act.
An AI agent is an autonomous system designed to perform tasks and make decisions on your behalf. Instead of you prompting it for every single step, you give it a goal, and it works independently to achieve it. This is the step beyond an assistant—it’s a digital employee that can manage complex workflows.
Of course, the uses for this are wide and varied. For example, you could set an agentic AI as your communications lead; monitoring your inbox, responding to regular inquiries, and elevating only the most important ones to you. Another AI agent could supercharge your sales funnels, watching for website traffic, autonomously building leads, and reaching out on your behalf before handing it over to you or a human representative once they’re ready to move to the next step.
The Future is Integrated and Autonomous
The era of the simple chatbot is evolving. While generative AI remains a powerful tool, the future of business lies in more sophisticated applications. By embracing multimodal AI, you can gain a far deeper understanding of your customers and your market; by deploying AI agents, you can automate complex processes and empower your team to focus on what they do best.
The businesses that will thrive in this new landscape are those that see AI not just as a tool for generating content, but as a fundamental part of their operational fabric—an intelligent, autonomous force that drives efficiency, unlocks insights, and creates new opportunities for growth.
At Paradigm, we’re building the future of business using the latest AI technologies to deliver cutting-edge solutions. We’ve built a number of multimodal and agentic workflows for a number of clients. So if you’d like to find out more, get in touch.
