Sept 19 Reuters Amazon.com announced on Thursday a new artificial intelligence application that it says will help its independent sellers with sales metrics, inventory maintenance and product advertising, among other things.

The move is part of a broader Big Tech effort to employ the technology for greater automation.

The software, dubbed Amelia, can provide instantaneous answers to broad questions such as how to prepare for the holidays and how a sellers business is performing, including units sold and website traffic.

Later, the company says, the software will be able to help resolve problems of sellers such as delayed shipments without additional human intervention.

In a demonstration of the software for Reuters, Amazon showed how Amelia can quickly call up metrics for a seller, such as sales data. It also made suggestions for preparing for major sales holidays, including promotions and buying advertising on Amazon.com.

Amelia is meant to give sellers their own personalized expert in selling on Amazon, said Dharmesh Mehta, vice president of worldwide selling partner services at Amazon. It needs to be a deep expert in all these kind of core parts of running your selling business.

Amazon, which relies on thirdparties to supply more than three out of every five units it sells, has had an attimes testy relationship with sellers, particularly over fees.

By automating some of the seller customer service, Amazon may be able to more inexpensively handle complaints and…