You'll See a Lot More Robots Soon. Here's Where.

Without much fanfare, the field of robotics has undergone a revolution in recent years. Robotics has long been a feature of various manufacturing sectors, but it has recently become more pervasive and essential in a growing number of workplaces across industries.

Consider that global shipments of mobile robots topped out at 4 million in 2012. By 2020, those shipments are expected to total 25.4 million. The number of logistics robots alone is expected to climb from 1,400 to 95,000 over that eight-year period.

Investors are noticing this growth, too. Last month, one robotics company filed for $15 million in financing after successfully raising over $10 million previously.

What's largely driving this uptick are two tech trends particularly applicable to robotics: the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence.

The robots of the past were relatively dumb. They could perform routine functions, but more advanced and evolved functions were a major challenge that limited the utility of these robots significantly. Now that the IoT allows these robots to be equipped with connected sensors that plug them into adaptive environments, their potential applications are exponentially greater.

And although these robots are not HAL 9000 yet, AI has made them significantly smarter and more capable of learning from their environments. Robots that can learn on their own are much less complicated to develop. Plus, they are not limited to a strictly defined range of functions. Once introduced, these robots can adapt to serve in a wide range of settings performing a variety of different tasks.

A Peek Into Robots' Future

No one is predicting the rise of robot butlers or cars with personalities anytime soon. But robots are becoming a bigger feature within all workplaces, and they could even start taking the place of some human workers. Here are three areas in which you can expect to see the presence of robots surge:

1. Hazardous environments

We already send in robots to get a closer look at explosive devices. But now that robots have become both more mobile and more intelligent, expect them to journey headlong into many other hazardous spaces, like examining a gas cylinder for cracks. Using robots rather than humans can obviously keep people out of danger, but robots also have microscopic monitoring capabilities along with a huge capacity for analysis that make them more useful in dangerous scenarios than humans.

2. Complex operations

Think of how complicated the average big-box store's operations are. Even with an army of staff, it is a major challenge to keep the shelves stocked, floors cleaned, and lightbulbs changed. As robots become increasingly autonomous, expect to see them deployed in settings where it is unreasonable to expect humans to keep pace with the complexity. Many of these robots will work behind the scenes, but don't be surprised to see them gliding down the aisle of your favorite retailer.

3. Collaborative scenarios

This is by far the most interesting evolution of robotics, and it has the potential to be the most consequential, too. If you think of robotics generally as a means to standardize effort — to empower multiple parties to work in an identical way — then this technology has the potential to transform collaboration. Things that would have once been impossible to do without being in the same location could now be done by teams of individuals spread out across the world.

Robotics' rise in new sectors could displace workers in some industries, but it also has the potential to lower prices, increase productivity, and open up other avenues of employment elsewhere. What is important to remember is that robotics always creates more opportunities than it eliminates. We are building these machines to serve us — not replace us — which is why a robotic future is exciting for all.

 

K.R. Sanjiv is the Chief Technology Officer for Wipro, a global information technology, consulting, and outsourcing company.

Recommended stories

More stories

AR vs VR: Fight!

From the outset, 2016 was heralded as "the Year of Virtual Reality" with regards to the development of the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and several other PC/console V...

How to Turn Off the Handwriting Interface in iMessage

If you use your iOS device in landscape mode a lot, you’ve likely noticed that it swaps your keyboard with the handwriting interface. Don’t worry! You don’t have to give up on widescreen texting, you just have to set a simple toggle.