At the first day of the National Asphalt Pavement Association (NAPA) Mid-Year meeting 2023, in downtown Kansas CIty, MO, a major partnership was announced with XBE, a leading technology company. The announcement was made during anAI-focused session with XBE CEO Sean Devine, featuring the by now familiar themes of Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT, and what the emerging technology might be able to do for the asphalt industry. Previously, I've covered similar questions here conducting an experiment where I asked an AI how it would do a highway paving job.
Hey, NAPA!
The new partnership with XBE, a company that provides operations management solutions for the horizontal construction industry, is set to develop an AI-based service called "Hey, NAPA." This is based on a service that is currently available on AsphaltPavement.org and HeyNAPA.com. This innovative service offers NAPA members and industry stakeholders a faster and more efficient way to access the Association’s valuable content and technical documents on all aspects of asphalt pavements.
The "Hey, NAPA" avatar
This collaboration expands on the XBE team's previous success with their "Hey, Kayla" service, an educational tool and invaluable resource for their customers by providing instant, accurate answers to questions. The power of "Hey, NAPA," is that members will have access to AI-powered search engine that draws on accurate information on NAPA's wealth of best practices, and documentation based on NAPA's library of content.
“We’re thrilled to partner with NAPA and bring our AI-driven technology to its members,” said Devine. “By leveraging our expertise and existing infrastructure, we’re confident that Hey NAPA will provide members with the quick, reliable answers they need, enabling them to make informed decisions and access NAPA’s excellent content more efficiently than ever before.”
Brett Williams, Director of Engineering & Technical Support at NAPA, added, “Our partnership with XBE is a testament to our shared commitment to provide NAPA members with superior resources and tools. We’re excited to see the positive impact Hey NAPA will have on our members and the industry as a whole.”
Positive Potential
What set's the "Hey, NAPA" project apart from general AI tools and language models like ChatGPT, is that it will base its learning on the specific information and data contained by the industry's top minds, research, and organizations. According to the press release, the answers that it provides should link back to documentation to ensure that your answers are backed up and accurate.
Up until now, one of the biggest problems with other tools has been the fact that AI tools show the tendency to fabricate answers and sources. That made it a liability for those looking for applicable, practical answers on the jobsite. If "Hey, NAPA" works as expected, it could revolutionize asphalt education and on the job practices.
