Since July 2020, the 200 skips that collect Toulouse inhabitants’ waste from the 13 waste disposal centers managed by SUEZ have been equipped with embedded artificial intelligence. Under test since 2019, the ffly4u solution has been deployed with the objectives of reducing fuel consumption, optimizing skip flows and reducing costs by optimizing collection resources.

“Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is a low-threshold option to acquaint an organization with digital transformation,” says Nikie van Duurling, Strategic Lead RPA at Deloitte Tax & Legal. “Instead of working with complex technology projects, here very simple tools are used to assist and improve existing processes.” 

Finnish Stora Enso has undergone a colossal transformation: from a mere paper manufacturer to a sustainable specialist in renewable products. Its CFO, Seppo Parvi, has been overseeing this repositioning for nearly seven years. Today he is once again steering the €10 billion turnover conglomerate through turbulent waters. His recipe is remarkably simple: keep a constant eye on your cash flow and your working capital, and make sure your people are always on board.

The key theme of SAS Open D[N]A Café on March 4 was symbiotic robotics, the interaction between humans and robots. The host of this café, Arthur de Crook, interviewed Jaimy Siebel and Joost van de Loo of RoboValley, the thriving robotics community driven by TU Delft Robotics Institute. RoboValley aims to stimulate the development of intelligent robotics by furthering collaboration between industry, government and academia. Here are some takeaways.

A team of researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has developed a new early warning system for vehicles that uses artificial intelligence to learn from thousands of real traffic situations. A study of the system was carried out in cooperation with the BMW Group. The results show that, if used in today’s self-driving vehicles, it can warn seven seconds in advance against potentially critical situations that the cars cannot handle alone – with over 85% accuracy.

In customer service it is important to achieve an equilibrium between automation and the human touch. A robot can be of great value. But there comes a point where humans provide the added value, and are able to prevent frustration by the customer. We talked about bots and customer service with Darren Parker,  Director EMEA Enterprise Customer Success at Zendesk. The key is the classic ‘know your customer’.

Ambi Robotics, formerly Ambidextrous Laboratories., introduces AmbiOS, an advanced robot operating system based on simulation-to-reality artificial intelligence (AI). AmbiOS rapidly trains robots before deployment to pick and pack items for fast and affordable integration. The technology powers the company’s two flagship products, AmbiSort and AmbiKit.

Scientists at the University of Göttingen have now investigated how efficient the use of AI can be in the commercial management of trucks. Their answer: the best option is an intelligent combination of human decision-making and AI applications. The study was published in the International Journal of Logistics Management.

Boston Dynamics has revealed Stretch, its new box-moving robot designed to support the growing demand for flexible automation solutions in the logistics industry. This debut marks the company’s official entrance into warehouse automation, a fast-growing market fueled by increased demand in e-commerce.

The promise of process mining is using large volumes of data to analyse and optimise processes. Are these tools a key to value creation?