Now Wanted in Silicon Valley: Ho-Hum Businesses With Thin Profit Margins

Forget virtual-reality headsets and brain-chip implants. Silicon Valley is coming for boring businesses that do lots of clerical work. 

The prospect of artificial intelligence automating administrative tasks is attracting venture capitalists to ho-hum professions such as accounting, customer-service centers and property management. Tech entrepreneurs have raised hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit these businesses with AI tools and drive up their profitability.