Toronto, March 23 (IANS): Now get ready for motivational lectures from robots as the era of artificial intelligence dawns upon us.

California-based NGO XPRIZE has launched a competition inviting teams to develop artificially intelligent (AI) systems capable of delivering a talk at the TED (Technology, Education, Design) conference without human intervention.

"Advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence have made extraordinary progress over the past decade, but we have barely scratched the surface," Peter Diamandis, CEO of XPRIZE, said in a statement.

"This global competition could help spur its development across a myriad of areas -- including biological research, exploration, education, healthcare, and fields we have not yet even imagined," he explained.

According to Chris Anderson, curator of TED: "We are entering a future in which humans and machines must learn new ways to work with each other."

"We may discover that it is some form of human-machine collaboration that offers the most powerful prospect for creating and communicating ideas that matter," he added.

It has not been decided yet whether the artificial intelligence systems should preferably have a physical form of a robot or could be represented just by a voice.

Diamandis and Anderson announced the prize at the TED2014 Conference in Vancouver, Canada, recently.