Robot revolution is on the way

Industry 4.0

The World Economic Forum (WEF) performed a detailed review in to the impact Industry 4.0 will have on integration of robots and AI in our lives especially companies. Experts and analysts remain concerned about wide spread adoption of robots and digital transformation resulting in massive unemployment for millions.

Invisible robots

How would you describe a robot, experts say that “we should change our definition of robots”, in the future robots may not come in types and forms that are known to us today. Many automation technologies of the future will be invisible to us.

Self service kiosks are form a robot that guides you through a transaction without having the typical form associated with traditional robot.

• 3D printing (additive manufacturing) is a great example of a robot building a component.
• Autonomous cars will be driven by automation of the steering, acceleration, braking, and many other things however they are being controlled by technology that not visible to the passengers.
• In the medical industry, micro robots the size of a medicine pill will be performing surgery inside the patients body.
• Military has been developing autonomous combat alternatives for a long time and in the future robots (drones) will fight the battles.
• Remember the movie “Robo Cop”, many countries are developing autonomous solutions to augment and eventually replace human police squads

Robot revolution

For the last decade, robotics industry has evolved rapidly, prices have come down and robots have become just as capable especially in low-complexity tasks. Robots and their control systems have evolved to a point where safety related concerns have given rise to robots and humans working together in “co-inhabited” cells. Artificial Intelligence and deep machine learning is allowing programming of robots to be as simple as “showing” the robot what to do vs typing thousands of coding lines.

Getting along

Experts and analysts believe that the first step of robot revolution will be increasing numbers of applications where robots will augment human workforce in complex tasks while replacing humans in low complexity tasks. The second phase will result in replacement of human workforce from most monotonous tasks and however this stage will give rise to job creation in related fields such as next generation robotics, deep machine learning, etc..

The final phase which is purely speculative at this time is “machines building machines to build machines”, nobody is sure about the feasibility of such a phase however experts agree that mankind will reach this phase eventually.

The author, KetanDeshpande, lives in Minnesota and writes about a variety of topics in his blog such as global economy, market and industry trends, successful strategies for businesses, and others. Leveraging his global strategic leadership experience from the manufacturing industry to offer insights in to how businesses can meet the sustainable growth and profitability goals.

Ketan Deshpande is also passionate about sustainability and renewable energy; he curates and shares latest updates in his blog posts. Recently the Southern Minnesota Municipal Power Agency(SMMPA) of Litchfield, Minnesota, endorsed Ketan Deshpande for an energy conservation project.

This blog also features memorable events, travel experiences and his favorite places to visit in the great state of Minnesota.

Blog post by Ketan Deshpande, Minnesota, MN