AI Articles and Analysis about Automation and robotics

Both artificial intelligence and robotics have been improving over the past few years. Large companies are betting billions that in the near future we will have cars that can drive themselves, drones that can fly themselves to deliver packages, automatic fast food chefs, AI personal assistants, manufacturing robots that can train themselves and other robots, etc.

Agriculture is both a major industry and foundation of the economy. In 2016, the estimated value added by the agricultural industry was estimated at just under 1 percent of the US GDP. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that agriculture contributes roughly $330 billion in annual revenue to the economy.

The food service industry is an economic staple generating billions of dollars in annual revenue and representing 2.1 percent of the U.S. GDP in 2016. Technology has made on-demand food ordering possible and the industry is pivoting towards more innovative approaches to meet and exceed customer expectations. As a result, artificial intelligence applications are steadily making their way into the food service industry.

As a human, we can often understand the mood, intention, and future action of another person just by looking at them. We see their posture, their facial expression, where their eyes are focused, and we can get a decent understanding of what they might do next. The problem of computer vision for body language is a much harder problem to solve, but we are indeed making progress.

Our cities, streets, homes, and businesses are built for beings that walk on two legs (biped). From stairs to the shape of hallways to the placement of kitchen cabinets, all have been designed for bipeds. The fact that a society of two-legged creatures designed everything around them for bipeds is so obvious most people don’t even think about it, but it becomes a serious issue when talking about the future of robotics.

The vision of an army of small unmanned aerial vehicles streaming through the sky to rapidly deliver food packages has captured the imagination of the public, the media, and most importantly some of the largest companies in the world. Achieving this vision won’t just require overcoming the technological and safety challenges, but also significant buy-in from the public and policy makers.

Several car makers predict they will able to make true self-driving cars in the next few years - as we've covered in our recent self-driving car timeline article. This technology, though, is only valuable if there are plenty of roads these self-driving cars are legally allowed to travel on. Even if the technologies allow for true autonomy, without legal permission the self-driving cars are mostly worthless to individuals and companies.

While in previous decades military unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) were very simple pieces of equipment, the technology has advanced rapidly. They are now used all over the world and are a multi-billion dollar industry. According to the Teal Group, current worldwide military UAV production stands at around $2.8 billion, and they project it will grow to $9.4 billion in 2025.