Bots & Business

Worldwide IT spending is projected to total $4.1 trillion in 2021, an increase of 8.4% from 2020, according to the latest forecast by Gartner, Inc. The source of funds for new digital business initiatives will more frequently come from business departments outside IT and charged as a cost of revenue or cost of goods sold (COGS).

Robotics company AutoStore announced that SoftBank has acquired 40% of its company.  AutoStore currently has a global customer base with more than 600 installations and 20,000 robots across 35 countries. It delivers automated storage and retrieval systems, coupled with its proprietary software, to serve the increasing demands of today’s supply chains.

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.

Christian Viguié, Président-directeur général de Delta Drone, confie ses perspectives d’expansion autour des drones et robots de surveillance et d’inventaires retenus par les professionnels dans leurs environnements portuaires, entrepôts et sites sensibles – tribunaux ou centres de recherches.

“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.” 

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.

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.

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.

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.