AI and UWM Are Working to Change the Future

The AI data center is a specialized facility designed to handle massive AI workloads, featuring high-density machine learning that is extremely proficient at identifying patterns in the data. They solve problems at an unfathomable speed and arguably reduce the potential for human error.

The future of AI will continue to evolve. The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee opened its first Microsoft AI lab on Campus. The lab opened back in 2025. It’s an AI Co-innovation lab with a dedicated focus on manufacturing innovation. It demonstrates how manufacturers and other organizations are utilizing AI to address real-world challenges. From real-time fault detection in industrial machinery to multilingual voice assistants that streamline gate, dock, and yard logistics, local companies are working to apply Microsoft’s AI technologies to improve operations and decision-making.

“UWM has been one of, if not the, most focused entities in the universe,” said Shamar Webster, Research & Technology Program Manager.

“UWM was an early adopter of AI when it was still just a buzzword. The university implemented a range of AI programs across various colleges, including business, engineering, and other fields,” Webster said. “This also opens the door for many of the university’s partners and local businesses to tap into the growing talent here, as well as the AI capabilities the university is developing. A number of students from UWM are focused on making them manufacturing ready. But do they understand how AI can be leveraged?”

Webster gave a hint of the future.

“The future of AI is to move away from large language models and explore how to make AI more personalized for individuals. So, you’re noticing more companies shifting toward customized devices such as Microsoft Surface products, along with other specialized business applications designed for specific users rather than a one-size-fits-all AI model,” Webster said. “In manufacturing, it’s somewhat about personalized AI, but not necessarily for individual people. Instead, it’s about tailoring AI for individual plants or machines,” said Webster.

There are 47 data centers in the state of Wisconsin; in Milwaukee, it’s 21, and in Madison, there are 11. With the proximity to the great lake, there is an abundance of fresh water. Wisconsin has reliable power, renewable energy, and water availability that make the state an attractive location for data centers. Wisconsin’s background in manufacturing and agricultural heritage means that communities understand large-scale utilities, zoning, and environmental compliance. Dependable infrastructure and a Midwest work ethic also make it ideal for digital infrastructure.

“Wisconsin is the second most densely populated state in terms of manufacturing. Wisconsin is number two with around 9,000 different manufacturers in the state. The majority of them are smaller media manufacturers who don’t necessarily have the capital to invest in AI right away. But with Microsoft, which has been making a heavy surge of investment in the state, it opens a pathway for those smaller manufacturers to leverage AI,” said Webster.

AI will change society, but that will come with both positives and negatives. AI will change society with benefits like improved efficiency and problem-solving, and downsides such as job displacement, increased inequality, and potential for misuse.

AI can lead to significant productivity boosts and growth by automating tasks and creating new jobs in these areas. However, AI can also be used to create sophisticated and personalized disinformation that can spread misinformation to people. With a data center, there can be potential security threats from malicious use and a significant environmental impact from high energy consumption. Good AI can lead to significant productivity boosts and economic growth by automating tasks and creating new jobs in the data center for technicians who will work there. Depending on the scale or the way that advanced AI is adopted in the workplace, such as through generative AI systems, it could potentially replace workers.

 “The nature of technology in general, or AI in general, is not aligned with good or evil; just the nature of technology, it’s the form in which it’s used. One of the bigger things is AI being used to record and recover lost language, so indigenous people each have their own specialized language, which they use to communicate in their groups,” said Webster.

“They’re utilizing AI to record those languages so they can be passed on to the next generation. On the flip side, with the rise of generative content creation, it has seen elements of misleading imagery and videos going around. They are portraying the wrong type of view using others’ images in those AI contexts to mislead the public. In the manufacturing focus, there is some good and bad for that one. In the negatives first, it’s going to be a lot of job displacements,” said Webster.

“You need a person that AI could take over a little bit more, so with gathering data, some form of prediction and forecasting, where in manufacturing, you probably need to have a person do that fully for those types of roles, so displacement is one big one, data security, and safety when building these models, the data is currently stored offline” Webster added.