Machine learning (ML) is the scientific study of algorithms and statistical models that computer systems use to effectively perform a specific task without using explicit instructions, relying on models and inference instead. It is seen as a subset of artificial intelligence.
A good AI needs time to develop and training, aka machine learning process, and it usually takes a large amount of time and effort to analyze and tweak. A good machine learning protocol and infrastructure is ideal in order to shorten the time of development.
If you are interested in developing any form of automatic or semi-automatic smart appliance that is capable of making decisions based on previously trained behaviors from big data that is known as Artificial Intelligence, you need to train your AI. Thus, you need machine learning.