Only a few years ago, it seemed like intelligent assistants were only found on Star Trek. But now they’re becoming an everyday reality. At their best, intelligent assistants can provide a convenient, friendly experience for business customers. An example is Capital One’s Alexa skill, which allows customers to manage credit cards, checking and savings accounts, auto finance, and home loans using just their voice. In this talk, I discuss key technologies for creating better intelligent assistants, including question answering, machine learning, dialogue management, information extraction, and commonsense reasoning.