Category Archives: Automation

Jammu: Financial Commissioner, Finance Department, Dr. Arun Kumar Mehta, today convened a meeting to review status on completion of online utility for reimbursement of taxes to eligible industrial units for availing the facility under different reimbursement schemes announced by the Government of Jammu and Kashmir in order to provide budgetary support to the industrial units for growth and development in the Union Territory.

Commissioner State Taxes Department P.K Bhat, SIO NIC Abhay Kumar and other technical officers of State Taxes Department and NIC attended the meeting.

Pertinently, the most attractive aspect of the facility is that it provides faceless facility to the industrial units through single window application wherein there will be an ease of filing of claims, online tracking of filed claims by the Industrial units, event based e mail and SMS alerts.

The system will help the Government/State taxes Department in management and disposal of cases without any physical interaction besides ensuring disposal and reimbursement of the due claims in a time bound manner as prescribed in the schemes.

All the reimbursement claims from 3rd quarter 2020-21 onwards shall be processed through the system only and the Industrial units are required to apply online after getting themselves registered in the portal so as to claim the benefits under the scheme. The system has built in checks and the processes are time bound and the discrepancies, if any, shall be communicated to the industrial units on their registered emails and mobile numbers.

The meeting was informed that application has been designed as per the reimbursement schemes announced by the Government from time to time and will surely be a big step towards ease of doing business and Atamanirbhar Bharat. The application has been designed and developed by NIC, J&K in collaboration with the State Taxes Department.

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Mehta reviews development of online facility for automation of tax reimbursement to Industrial units of Jammu and Kashmir - India Education Diary

Despite persistent fears that robots and computers are coming for our jobs, most labor market experts agree that fears (or hopes) for a future where work will be optional, or worse, extremely scarce due to technological change areunlikely. In rare instances, such as the elevator operator, jobs will be rendered completely obsolete. Most jobs, however, will still exist even if fundamentally changed in both task content and form. Technological change willcreatenew tasks and jobsas well.

The productivity and efficiency gains of technological change will be a net positive for society. However, this does not mean wehave no reason for concern. First, the availability of work for all who seek it isa preconditionfora prosperousand equitable society.Advances in automation and AI have the potential to magnify many of the challenges currently facing our society: income and wealth inequality, concentration of corporate power, reduced upward mobility, and persistent disability, gender, and racialdiscrimination. Mitigating potential negative tradeoffs of technological change will require new public policy paradigms to ensure that the most at-risk segments of the population are not left even further behind.

To that end,theFuture of the Middle Class Initiativeat Brookings hosted aneventexploring these topics. A two-part panelfirst considered the role and design of social insurance programs and second, discussed how to foster social mobility and ensure equity of opportunity in the face of automation. The panelists identified key public policy challenges in a technology-driven economy and offered potential non-incremental solutions to best supportlow andmiddle-incomeAmericans.

The first panel,Social Insurance in an Automated Future,featured comments from Diana Farrell, founding President & CEO of the J.P. Morgan Chase Institute, Michael Strain of the American Enterprise Institute, Byron Auguste,CEOand cofounder of Opportunity @ Work, and Marcus Casey, Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Illinois atChicagoand a Nonresident Fellow in Economic Studies at Brookings. The key unifying question: suppose it is 2050 and all routine tasks have been automated, how we can optimally design social insurance so as to insurewellbeingbut also not disincentivize skill acquisition and work? The panel agreed that social insuranceshould not be aimed at long-term replacement of income streams,suchas Universal Basic Income (UBI).Instead, thefocusshould beonredesigningsystems to help themefficiently meet the needs of workers.Accordingly, the panelists offered four key policy solutions:

The second panel,Opportunity and Equity,included NY Times columnist Kara Swisher, Senior Fellow in Governance Studies and Director of the Center for Technology Innovation Nicol Turner Lee, and Peter Blair, an Assistant Professor at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education.They considered the role of private and public institutions in ensuring opportunities and resources would be equitably distributedgiven current inequalities.Without substantial commitment by both market leaders and policymakers, such inequalities are likely to expand rapidly in the future.In this conversation, three key suggestions were made:

Taken together, the two panels emphasize principles for ensuring wellbeing and equitable opportunity for all in atechnologicallydrivenfuture.The viability of this system will require substantial public policy engagement to revise our social infrastructure, including asocial insurance system that provides sufficient, comprehensive, and timely assistance for workers displaced by technological change. It will also require more concentration onensuringequitable pre-market resourcestovulnerablecommunities.

Itis clear that policymakers, private sector organizations, and businesses will needtopartner to develop consensus on theappropriate pathforward.We haveworked on a number of these issuesoverthe past two years, please visit theFuture of the Middle Class Initiativesite to find more information on the various public and private conferences, research papers, and podcast conversationsexploringthis topic.

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Opportunity, Policy, and the Future of Automation - Brookings Institution

Technology is advancing at a rapid rate, and according to leading researchers, its showing no signs of stopping.

As claimed by Gartner, AI augmentation will create $2.9 trillion of business value and 6.2 billion hours of worker productivity globally in 2021. These figures are as remarkable as they are frightening. While it seems like AI and humanity will continue to work together in symbiotic harmony, not everyone is convinced. With every stride that technology makes, society asks the question: Will automation make humanity obsolete?

Russell Brunson

Meet Russell Brunson, a New York Times best-selling author and the cofounder of ClickFunnels, a software company that helps tens of thousands of entrepreneurs spread their message in the marketplace through automation. Brunson popularized the concept of sales funnels, and his system has led to unprecedented levels of business growth for his clients. As of 2020, his training and teaching have produced over 1,000 millionaires who belong to an exclusive group that he fittingly calls the Two Comma Club. Incredibly, every member of the group has made at least $1 million in each of their respective sales funnels.

With a following of over 1 million entrepreneurs, its hard to ignore the impact that Brunson has made. In perfecting the lead generation and business scaling process, ClickFunnels is now the fastest-growing non-venture-backed software company in the world. But while automation has undoubtedly augmented the process in countless ways, one starts to wonder whether theres any room for human endeavors.

Brunson thinks so. His mission extends past business growth to non-profit organizations, like Village Impact. ClickFunnels helps those living in underprivileged conditions access an education. Every new funnel that goes live inside of ClickFunnels equals a dollar donated to building schools in Africa. With these donations, millions of people can start to build the foundations of their future.

With their unique business insights, these five influential entrepreneurs tackle the question: Is it humanity or automation? By using their acumen and experience, you can learn how to scale your business fast in 2021.

Aj Angoluan

Coming in with our first piece of advice is Aj Angoluan, CEO and founder of Rockstar Funnel Builders. His company helps marketing agencies across the world build world-class sales funnels and stunning graphic designs. A human can't beat technology. Automation can't replace a human. I started my outsourcing company three years ago to provide a quality service around the world, and we've been using both human and automation power ever since. The result is amazing, Angoluan says, asserting that a balance is imperative for long-term business success.

Let's get straight to the point: human or automation? The answer is always both. You can't run your business without human power as well as automation power. Much like Brunson, Angoluan believes that automation alone is not enough to carry a business toward success.

Danny Carlson

Danny Carlson, Amazon e-commerce expert and CEO of Kenji ROI, has this to say about scaling a brand fast: Its hard to beat paid ads on Amazon. If ads are working well, they can be scaled up much faster than SEO, social media content, or other online marketing tactics. A well-run Amazon Ads account is a beautiful mix of automation and human interaction. For our clients, we leverage automation tools. They make rapid improvements based on rules programmed by our team and perform these improvements at a higher speed and volume than a human could, Carlson explains. In some instances, you need to use automation to maximize efficiency. But for the best results, he believes that a human still needs to be behind the wheel.

A human touch is still required to guide the automation and make decisions too complex for a computer algorithm to handle. One example is keyword relevancy, which is something best left to trained ad managers. The key to scaling fast in 2021 is leveraging the output of all team members by having them use powerful automations, guided by their expertise.

Carlson founded his agency in 2016 and has since grown the company to over 15 team members, producing over 1,300 high-conversion Amazon product listings.

Rey Perez

Rey Perez, CEO and founder of The Entrepreneurs Agency, believes that its not what you know or who you know, but who knows you. He says, The key to growing your digital online presence is based on leveraging systems, processes, technology, and automation. All the while, you still need to keep a personal feeling.

To maximize online presence, Perez believes that people need to feel connected with you personally, but at no detriment to your time. The more people you can connect with and the faster you can do it, the more brand exposure that you and your business will receive. Your network is your net worth, and business is always based on relationships.

Leveraging nearly two decades of sales and marketing experience, Perez and his team of experts create renowned celebrity brands for top entrepreneurs looking to dominate their niche or industry.

Jon Penberthy

Jon Penberthy, founder of AdClients, believes that streamlined software and systems have paved the way for innovation in the marketing industry. Its clear that automation in the world of marketing has evolved a great deal in recent years, but not so much that we can remove the human element. We have been able to scale multiple seven-figure companies over the years utilizing paid ads and automated follow-up, but we still need people who can actually manage those campaigns. Its so interesting to look back before the explosion of the internet and social media and remember how everything was extremely manual, Penberthy reflects.

If business was going well and you wanted to scale, you needed to hire more people. That was always the answer, it seemed. Nowadays, with software, systems, and automation, we can do a lot with a little. Rather than hire more people, we can simply turn up ad budgets, send more emails, and launch more campaigns. In fact, in some ways, it feels like were in the golden years of online marketing. I hope that its just the beginning.

Junior Anthony

At odds with other industry leaders like Brunson, Junior Anthony believes that a sense of humanity will always supersede automation. The founder of LiveSotori, Anthony shares how he automates businesses in the most powerful way. As an online coach, you can never go wrong with the human touch. I teach my students how to automate their businesses, but before they do, I share an important lesson. I show them that they have to start the most powerful way: the organic way. Its what brings warmth and life to the business, and as a result, it builds long-lasting relationships. Having immense human skills will make you invaluable because theyre not easily replaceable.

Anthony argues that no level of automation will substitute the need for compassion. He uses a completely human approach toward coaching and stresses the importance of personability in building the trust of your consumers.

Its clear that theres no winner in the battle between humanity and automation. According to the expert advice shared by these inspiring entrepreneurs, both are crucial, and business owners should incorporate each one to maximize growth opportunities.

Most of our entrepreneurs agree: Its best to find a middle ground because the two cant replace each other. In your pursuit of finding that balance, make sure to leverage your use of industry experts. Only a human can guarantee the efficiency of your automation, and your automation can only improve your business with the use of customer feedback.

Its simple yet vital: Understand, communicate, and connect with your market organically. Your customers want to be heard, and when you listen, they take notice. Weave each piece of advice into the foundations of your business, and youll make 2021 the year of unprecedented growth and success.

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Human Or Automation? The Answer To Scaling A Business In 2021 With Russell Brunson - Forbes

BERLIN, GERMANY - DECEMBER 12: Co-founder and CEO of UiPath Daniel Dines and TechCrunch Senior ... [+] Writer Darrel Etherington speak on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin 2019 at Arena Berlin on December 12, 2019 in Berlin, Germany. (Photo by Noam Galai/Getty Images for TechCrunch)

This week UiPath filed for its IPO (on a confidential basis) and it will likely hit the markets in February.Like other enterprise software companiessuch as Snowflake, C3.ai and Palantirthe offering should do extremely well.

UiPath is the leader in RPA (Robotic Process Automation), which allows for the automation of repetitive and tedious tasks.And yes, the sector is the fastest growing segment of enterprise software.A key reason is that the ROI (Return On Investment) is quick and substantial.

Consider that UiPath is on track to generate over $360 million in revenues this year and the customer count is more than 6,300.The company also recently raised $225 million at a valuation of $12.2 billion from investors like Accel, IVP, Dragoneer, Coatue, Sequoia, Kleiner Perkins and Capital G.

This IPO will certainly raise the visibility of the RPA market and there will probably be more dealmaking.Keep in mind that there are a myriad of smaller operators in the sector.

But what are some of the other trends we may see?Whats on the radar for next year? Lets take a look:

Muddu Sudhakar, the CEO of Aisera:

Larger players are entering the market.One notable case is ServiceNow, which bought Element.ai.This will bolster workflow automation to compete with Automation Anywhere and UiPath. ServiceNow wants to have document scraping, build a knowledge graph, and perform analytical queries against the knowledge graph.

Then there is Adobe, which bought Workframe. Adobe is the Document Maker and owns knowledge and PDF creation as well as document scanning. Adobe wants to own the whole automation process for documents.

Tolga Tarhan, the CTO at Rackspace Technology:

The digitization of work at this new scale will cause tech leaders to rethink enterprise security and the increasingly popular zero trust strategy will take center stage.

Alex Rinke, the CEO of Celonis:

One group we are seeing in the automation space is the hyper-automate everything crew, where you can find a lot of the RPA vendors dropping bots on everything that moves. The impact of Covid has driven reduced workforces to look for any help they can get, and in the short term, the automation-fix might feel good but the automation-tax is going to be high once those bots start limping and eventually breaking down. This approach has proven to be brittle and fail when the business changes, because it automates steps regardless of the business context, process situation, management objectives, etc. It assumes there is always one way to execute thingswhich is never the case in business.

Eric Musser, the General Manager of Intelligent Automation at Pega:

Next year, were going to see a fall-off of RPA vendors as they try to diversify their solutions and expand into other markets. Businesses are waking up to the fact that RPA has not lived up to the hype and delivered the promised value. Standalone RPA vendors are going to be scrambling to rebrand themselves.

Michael Gilfix, the Vice President of Cloud Integration and Chief Product Officer of Cloud Paks at IBM:

RPA, when paired with AI, can help CIOs for example, self-detect, diagnose and respond to IT anomalies in real time. RPA can help close the loop and ensure consistent data across all tools that connect to the AI system, for example, IBMs Watson AIOps. This can increase data quality and improve the accuracy of AI, as well as the productivity of engineers involved.

Sebastian Schroetel, the Vice President and Head of Intelligent Robotic Process Automation at SAP:

Accelerated by the pandemic, a broader and more agile implementation of automation in all functions of an enterprise is becoming an ultimate priority. By enabling business users or citizen developers without coding skills to automate processes and tasks, companies are much more flexible and quicker to adapt to changing business requirements. Those business users are also the ones who know their processes best and can therefore unlock a full citizen automation experience. Citizen Automation is the application of the current Low-code/no-code trend to the business process automation world.

Vadim Tabakman, a Director at Nintex:

As things start to settle around the workplace and return to some level of normal, RPA vendors will not be able to continue to do the same thing they did in 2020. Evolution of the business will be required, as they set themselves apart from the rest of the pack.

Dennis Ortiz, a managing director of strategy and analytics at Deloitte Consulting:

RPA will become part of the AI solution set.While less complex in nature, RPA will be a foundational component of an array of AI solutions.

Stephen DeWitt, the Chief Security Officer at Automation Anywhere:

Intelligent Document Processing (IDP), in particular, will emerge as a major tool for businesses to successfully navigate a completely remote workforce. Every organization will need to be able to process structured and unstructured data autonomously to work efficiently. IDP allows bots to process emails, signatures, and PDFsenabling document-intensive processes such as insurance claims, loan applications, and invoices to be automated.

Jon Knisley, the Principal of Automation and Process Excellence at FortressIQ:

As the market transitions from point deployments within a specific business unit to wider adoption across an enterprise, the issue of data security and privacy will get bigger and suppliers will face greater scrutiny. Suppliers will need to be able to mask sensitive corporate data and personally identifiable information (PII) to meet requirements.

Michael Beckley, the Chief Technology Officer and cofounder at Appian:

2020 was about buying RPA bots and AI services. 2021 will be about organizations looking to scale those technologies, realizing the full value of those investments by unifying the modern workforcewith humans in control.

Guy Kirkwood, the Chief Evangelist at UiPath:

RPA will become the new ERP. I predict that the community of global system integrators (GSIs) and audit-based consulting companies will encourage and train thousands of workers to embrace automation. And that GSIs will do so in the same way they did with enterprise resource planning (ERP) software in the 1990s. My view is that these firms recognize that the automation industry is poised for explosive growth and see a very real opportunity to sell business strategy and enablement services to help their clients reap new benefits, much like they once did with ERP.

Shay Antebi, the Chief Technology Officer for Kryon:

The largest RPA providers will be forced to explore new verticals, and the small-to-medium enterprise (SME) sector will be one of them. I expect to see RPA vendors will go all-out to appeal to SMEs. But if they're going to gain any traction with this market, they have to revamp their entire user interface. The UX will have to be far less complex and onboarding needs to be more straightforward.

Rajendra Prasad, the Global Lead for Automation at Accenture:

We will witness the rise of the digital co-workers, with AI and machine learning augmenting human workers and helping with human + machine collaboration. This includes not just chatbots, for example, but AI assistants helping with project management, testing or data management. Paired with a culture of modern engineering (Agile, DevOps) and a continuous innovation mindset, automation in software development and application management are opening the door for IT to be an innovation partner to the business."

Eric Tyree, the Head of AI and Research at Blue Prism:

AI-infused automation will increasingly be linked to core strategic initiatives such as improved customer focus, revenue growth, capital allocation, supply chain management, risk management, cost and operational efficiency and more. AI-powered digital workers will be leveraged as primary tools for executing on corporate strategy and managing enterprise scale risks.

Spiros Liolis, the Chief Technologist at Micro Focus:

While RPA is still in very early stages in supply chain operations, many if not all, organizations have established automation in supply chains for efficiency and speed. Technologies such as bar-code scanning, QRs, RFID, resource planning, and CRM are very well established and to a large degree, they offer automation, speed and agility. But these were mostly single system automation, usually with very structured data. For more complex systems, or systems with unstructured data, manual intervention is key. Today, by introducing intelligence with cognitive and machine learning, RPA systems mimic many human actions. With these additional abilities to RPA, we can automate tasks that are rules based, and follow workflows and instructions for processing inputs and developing outputs. Furthermore, RPA can be gradually trained to forecast outcomes and enable digital decisioning. While putting these pieces together wont happen immediately, developing a strategy and creating a roadmap of the implementation and integration, while gradually introducing a change culture, will allow the organization to drive necessary digital transformation.

Tom (@ttaulli) is an advisor/board member to startups and the author of Artificial Intelligence Basics: A Non-Technical Introduction, The Robotic Process Automation Handbook: A Guide to Implementing RPA Systems and Implementing AI Systems: Transform Your Business in 6 Steps. He also has developed various online courses, such as for the COBOL and Python programming languages.

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RPA (Robotic Process Automation): Predictions For Next Year - Forbes

AUBURN HILLS, Mich., Dec. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --WKW Automotive, a major Tier 1 supplier, has awarded Shape Process Automation, a program valued at approximately $15MUSD to provide two inline laser systems complete with material handling capabilities.

This program has the potential to be the highest throughput aluminum robotic laser cutting line in the world.

Shape Process Automation's solution reduces cost and floor space by nearly 50% by utilizing the NEWTON technology compared to traditional robots that articulate a cutting head. Laser cutting assembly lines with NEWTON enable customers to reduce their long-term program cost by eliminating direct labor, reducing engineering floor labor, increasing quality, and sustaining long term OEE gains. "WKW is excited to work with world-class technology in delivering industry-leading aluminum fabrications," said Prakash Patel, Director, Program Management at WKW Automotive.

This project will push Shape Process Automation's install base of robotic laser cutting robots to surpass 50 units in 3 years. An achievement that would not be possible without repeat customers, SPA's professional team, and proven suppliers like FANUC Robotics and TRUMPF laser sources.

"This automated production line incorporates the latest in robotic laser cutting, delivering big gains for cutting 3-D automotive components via the NEWTON cutting head technology. Combined with our other fully integrated manufacturing processes and numerous operational enhancing upgrades, this technology essentially represents the culmination of our 35 years of experience in the industry," said Nino LaDuca, President of Shape Process Automation. "SPA has supported automotive programs dating back to the 1980s, first on the trimming of automotive interior parts and through to the very latest lightweight structural automotive parts. Being awarded this project demonstrates that Shape Process Automation continues to lead the industry in both design and technology."

Automotive light-weighting is the concept of using advanced materials such as ultra-high-strength steel (UHSS), aluminum, and other lighter composite materials to reduce the weight of a vehicle to meet increasingly stricter government regulations. Lowering a vehicle's bodyweight reduced emissions and improves fuel efficiency without compromising safety or performance.

These lightweight materials vary in their methods of assembly and processing (compared to traditional steel). As such, automotive OEM's & Tiers depend on those in the industry who understand these unique properties and have a proven history of expertise in processing them efficiently and effectively while maintaining the materials' integrity.

Shape Process Automation is the leader in advanced materials processing. Our expertise in waterjet, router, and laser cutting solutions spans decades. Through our unique state-of-the-art Customer Solution Center, we can provide proof of concept for processing a variety of composite materials. Our customers have come to rely on us to provide the technology and know-how to help them realize their light weighting objectives.

Shape Process Automation is a leading supplier of custom factory automation and advanced materials processing solutions. Since the mid-1980s, we've designed and installed over 6,000 systems in more than 70 countries, providing world-class solutions and service to the world's largest companies across multiple industries, locally and around the globe.

SOURCE Shape Process Automation

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Shape Process Automation Brings Advanced Material Processing And Handling Solutions To The Automotive Light-Weighting Initiative - PRNewswire

On the morning of November 18, 350 Coles warehouse workers in Smeaton Grange, New South Wales began a rolling twenty-four-hour strike. Within hours, the supermarket giant responded by locking them out for a period of three months. At time of writing, the battle has lasted for over a month.

The lockout revolves around an automated smart warehouse being built by Coles. The company wont allow long-serving workers to be redeployed to the new site. In response, the workers are seeking five weeks of redundancy pay for every year of service, capped at 104 weeks. This would mean that someone who has worked at Coles for more than twenty years would receive a maximum of two years pay once the site has been automated.

Australian supermarkets like Coles are on the front line of the latest wave of workplace automation, which is leading to job losses and site closures. The outcome of this battle will set an important precedent for other industries going through the same process.

Some workers at the Smeaton Grange warehouse have been with Coles for more than thirty years and want the opportunity to work at the new warehouse. As one locked-out worker explained:

We know the world is going this way with automation ... but they are putting us out into an economic recession. This is really a fight for our future and trying to retire with some respect. A lot of these guys wont get another job after this. The new shed is automated, but it still needs people, so why not us? Weve made Coles a lot of money, and this is how they treat us now?

Coles claims that the demands of the workers are unreasonable. Yet their tactics suggest a vicious, anti-worker agenda.

A lockout is a work stoppage initiated by management intended to bar workers from their own jobs. The use of this tactic is quite rare in Australias labor history. One exception was the 2011 dispute involving Qantas, Australias leading airline. Qantas CEO Alan Joyce took the unprecedented move of grounding planes and locking domestic workers out amid ongoing industrial action. Within two days, the federal government had intervened to end the lockout.

However, there are signs that lockouts will become more frequent. In the United States, they are already on the rise as strike rates continue to fall. The trend reflects both increasing employer militancy and their indifference to public backlash over how workers are treated. High-profile lockouts have become common in professional sports, production sites, hospitals, and universities.

Australian firms have typically preferred to maintain a public image however insincere as worker-friendly and nonhierarchical. However, US-style trends are starting to manifest themselves.

Historically, working at Coles was seen as an attractive and secure job. It was once Australias largest private-sector employer: for many people, working life began with a stint stacking the companys shelves or on a Coles checkout. Now, Coles is trading its brand reputation for greater power over workers and the supply chain.

Long-term Coles workers have noticed a dramatic cultural change in recent years:

Twenty years ago, I came in early and stayed late because I wanted to. I loved working here, we all did. But its not like that anymore. Now its all about money with them. Coles dont care about us at all. A lot of people have mental health issues from the stress of the pick rates and now because of the site closing. I told them Im really suffering, and they flicked me a card with the EAP (Employee Assistance Program) number, and thats it.

During the pandemic, Coles established pop-up warehouses across strategic areas, ostensibly to cover surges in demand fueled by online shopping during statewide lockdowns. These warehouses draw upon large reserve armies of labor-hire casual workers.

Deliveries are carried out by gig workers rather than by in-house drivers or traditional third-party logistics companies such as Australia Post or Toll. For example, Uber Eats now offers grocery delivery services. Coless iconic red trucks, driven by unionized workers, are being replaced by nonunion gig workers in unmarked sedans.

The supermarkets have claimed that traditional supply chains were incapable of handling the increased demand. But some Coles workers werent convinced. They argue that it was an anti-union strategy:

Weve worked through the bushfires, floods, the pandemic, everything. We were ready. We had the capacity to do everything here but the bottom line is they wanted casuals on twenty-something dollars an hour. So they set up new sheds to get around us. They are wasting millions of dollars on those sheds, just to get around the union.

While the robotized warehouses of Walmart and Amazon have captured the public imagination abroad, in Australia, the supermarket giants Coles and Woolworths are leading the charge. Already, Australias grocery industry is among the most concentrated in the world. Between them, three firms Coles Group, Woolworths Group, and Aldi account for approximately 70 percent of market share.

Coles and Woolworths are racing to implement smart warehouses that draw upon consumer data, predictive analytics, and advanced robotics to manage supply chains and solve the last mile problem namely, reducing the cost of delivery to customers doors. This is a key consideration in meeting next-day delivery targets, a growing consumer expectation that was, until recently, unheard of in Australia. Industry leaders call it the Amazon effect. Amazon may not yet be a big player in Australias e-commerce industry, but the symbolic power of the companys brand still looms large, spurring local actors to act preemptively.

Of course, Amazon is not entirely to blame for Australias shifting industrial relations landscape. According to Coles warehouse workers, technological changes that undermine job security started coming in about a decade ago, with headsets and GPS-enabled scanner guns:

Before, you just did your work and that was that. That all changed with the headsets and the (scanner) guns. Now they know exactly where you are and how long its taking. If you take too long, maybe going to the toilet or something like that, they call it an event gap. If they want to target you, they find event gaps and youre on the hook.

Oppressive workplace surveillance and work intensification go hand in hand. Locked-out Coles workers report dangerously fast pick rates, with workers regularly moving tons of packages each shift. Workplace injuries such as hernias are commonplace. And casualization only worsens the picture. As one worker explained:

Safety goes out the window when Im working with casuals who are running around trying to meet those pick rates. When I slow down [my forklift] to avoid hitting one of them, I get pulled up for idle time, and I have to answer for that. People think anyone can do this job, but it requires a lot of experience.

These developments are far from inevitable. As the critical historian of science and technology David F. Noble highlighted decades ago, the drive to automation greatly favors innovations that take decision-making power away from workers and hand it to management or increasingly, to algorithms and machines.

Coles workers estimate that the new smart warehouse will need fifty to one hundred workers. However, the company has prohibited long-serving workers from applying for these roles because the company wants a lower-paid, precarious workforce.

Since the Industrial Revolution, at least, narratives about the future of work have been dominated by the threat of technological unemployment. Rise of the robots dystopias were undoubtedly overstated but large swathes of workers are at risk of job loss or underemployment.

However, it is not technology itself that is to blame. Rather, the culprit is a stagnating global economy and managers who pursue profits with increasingly hostile anti-worker strategies. This is why, as the political economist Aaron Benanav observes, we are seeing the reemergence of automation anxiety as a symptom of our era, one in which the global economy is failing to create sufficient employment opportunities.

Recent, as-yet-unpublished research led by Australian Catholic University academic Dr Tom Barnes has developed a five-year longitudinal study of Australian warehouse workers who experienced site closure due to automation.

Take, for example, former workers who regained employment after the 2019 closure of the Woolworths Hume Distribution Centre in Melbournes north. They found that their once-permanent jobs had been overwhelmingly replaced by labor-hire or agency-based precarious jobs. Before the closure, 43 percent of surveyed workers were permanently employed. One year afterward, this figure had more than halved only 21 percent of re-employed workers had a secure job.

Wages also dropped precipitously. Previously, the average fortnightly wage was $2,064. Because of a reduced hourly rate and underemployment, one year later, it had dropped to $840 per fortnight.

As employers gain power, workers lose it. So long as this is the case, the benefits of technological innovation will not be equally shared. Asset-rich companies like Coles will grow wealthier, while wages as a share of company profits will decline.

The 350 locked-out Coles warehouse workers understand this situation intimately, and they know the stakes are high. By fighting for redundancy pay, they are challenging the dictatorial power of management, exercised via automation.

Theyre also contesting the assumption that a redundancy payment is a parting gift from the employer a farewell bonus. Its not. Its just a fraction of the value that workers have created over the space of many years.

The locked-out workers know they deserve everything their labor has created fair redundancies are just the beginning. Like Coles, they are fighting to shape the future, defending not only their own interests, but those of all Australian workers.

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The Coles Warehouse Lockout Is a Front-Line Struggle in the Battle Over Automation - Jacobin magazine

In his 2016 State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama singled out automation as the number one reason why Americans feel anxious about the economy.

Later, just before Donald Trump took office after having won many states that are likely to be most highly affected by automation, President Obama used his farewell address to urge action to adapt to the upcoming automation wave. [T]he next wave of economic dislocation wont come from overseas. It will come from the relentless pace of automation that makes many good, middle-class jobs obsolete, he noted.

Public fear of automation-related displacement has since grown. Experts are undecided on how many jobs automation will ultimately create or eliminate, but we now know what kinds of jobs are most likely to be automated first: jobs composed of routine tasks which make up a majority of low-skill occupations.

As the pandemic continues to hasten automation, workers need to upskill and quickly. From the international platform of the World Economic Forum to factory shop floors, workers need governments, education providers and employers to develop a plan for navigating automation-enabled displacement.

Quality, non-degree credential programmes can play an important role in empowering worker transition in the automation era and advancing the vision of the Forums Great Reset which features inclusive jobs.

A traditional baccalaureate education wont suit all. Those at highest risk of displacement are working adults, including women and underserved minorities, who balance caregiving, paying their bills and minding their personal and mental health. They deserve faster, more affordable pathways to quality jobs.

There are more than 475,000 non-degree credentials in the US including industry certifications, certificates, licences, apprenticeships and more. Which ones are worth pursuing?

The truth is we dont know for sure. In the US, outcome data for non-degree programmes is not standardized nationally which makes it challenging for workers to know which ones are of quality.

But these credentials do have value and there are markers for what constitutes a quality non-degree credential: programmes should lead directly to a quality job, contribute to gender and racial equity, 'stack' towards continuing education, be affordable and command a respectable completion rate.

Consider a video posted earlier this year from the Indiana Department of Workforce Developments Trade Adjustment Assistance programme, which is designed to help with upskilling workers. The video proudly highlights the story of a laid-off manufacturing worker looking to upskill for a new career.

She enrolled at a for-profit allied health school for a 30-week medical billing and office administration programme and then found work as a release of information specialist at a nearby hospital where she would also earn more.

In theory, this is a success story; a job is better than no job. However, as the World Economic Forums 2020 Future of Jobs report illustrates, data entry clerks and administrative secretaries are ranked number one and two respectively for decreasing demand in the age of AI-enabled automation. This job may be safe for now, but for how long?

What jobs will be in demand by 2025?

Image: World Economic Forum

Even government programmes intended to help workers upskill may be unintentionally directing people into jobs that are of low quality or at high-risk of automation.

Instead, governments, education providers and employers need to help workers earn quality non-degree credentials that lead to high quality, future-resilient jobs.

This fear of automation is not new. As the late Harvard professor Calestous Juma laid out in his seminal book Innovation and Its Enemies: Why People Resist New Technologies, technological progress has always come with some level of public concern.

The bellhops feared automatic elevators and so did bowling pin resetters. Video did indeed kill the radio star and it wasnt long before internet media streaming services made video retailers obsolete in the mid-2000s.

This creative destruction means that automation-enabling technologies will destroy jobs, but they will also increase productivity, lower prices and create new (hopefully better) jobs too.

Some have even advocated that in order to help low-income workers, we should speed up the automation of low-income jobs. Non-degree credentials can help workers adapt.

To be sure, non-degree credentials are no silver bullet to automation displacement. A number of policy recommendations can help our world transition to new, high-quality jobs. However, in our current skills marketplace, helping at-risk workers acquire quality, in-demand non-credentials offered by reputable education and training providers is the right first step.

President-Elect Joe Biden will soon stand where President Obama and President Trump before him stood. He will face unemployment levels at historic highs and a global pandemic, as well as automation continuing to revolutionize our workplaces. In this climate, we must help more vulnerable workers obtain quality short-term credentials that lead to decent, future-resilient jobs.

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Teaching 'future resilient' skills can help workers adapt to automation - World Economic Forum

Artificial Intelligence is a machines ability to demonstrate human skills like thinking, understanding, planning, and innovation. These innovations have been deployed in industries to speed up operations, increase productivity, and meet large-scale needs. Voice is one such sector that has benefited from automation and AI.

In voice, AI allows users to understand the query and initiates a run-through of their data sets (memory) to address accurately. It is built to look for trends, learn from experience, and provide answers. The technology allows us to perform repetitive tasks with simple controls quickly. Every new voice-interactive technology that we add to our lives deepens our dependence on artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning from our telephones, computers, watches, and even our refrigerators.

The connection between machines and humans, which we had been seeing and dreaming about a few decades ago (Voice Assistants like Amazon Echo, Siri, Google Assistant, Google Home, Amazon Alexa) has been fictional. But today, the fact is real and incredible. The next digital trend on the market is voice search technology, and in some cases, touch screens already have been replaced.

Today, some common uses of artificial intelligence are object recognition, translation, speech recognition, and processing of natural languages. Automatic transcription by Rev is powered by automated speech recognition (ASR) and processing of natural language processing (NLP). ASR converts the word into text, while NLP processes the text to extract its meaning. Since people often speak with colloquialism, abbreviations, and acronyms, thorough computer analysis is necessary to produce a correct transcription of the natural language.

There are various but confined problems with speech recognition technology. They involve getting the better of inapt recording equipment, background noise, arduous accents, and dialects, along with the numerous voice tones of people. It is so much more to listen to and understand what a person says than to hear the words the person uses. It is something that has not yet been mastered to teach a machine to learn to read a spoken language as humans do.

But voice-controlled technology is gaining popularity and has many advantages, such as saving a lot of time, being easy to use, comfortable, and multi-tasking. People are currently responding by reacting to rational people or individuals by voice technologies. More people use voice at Smart Homes on their mobile retrospects with the exciting progress in this place.

The digital voice helpers of Alexa, Amazon, and Apple are a couple of examples that are much more than a helpful tool. They are very real implementations of artificial intelligence that are increasingly central to our everyday lives. They both rely on the generation and processing of natural languages and on machine learning, types of artificial intelligence, in order to function efficiently and accomplish well over time.

The use of AI applications is on the rise. Advances in a variety of sectors help to increase the sophistication and usage of automated voice assistants for regular use. Very soon, voice-based automation will become part of our everyday workplace by providing a high shoreline and formerly inaccessible services.

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What is the Role of Voice Automation/AI and how does it work? - Analytics Insight

As artificial intelligence (AI) plays a growing role in the everyday lives of people around the world, views on AIs impact on society are mixed across 20 global publics, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey.

This analysis is based on a survey conducted across 20 publics from October 2019 to March 2020 across Europe, Russia, the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region. The surveys were conducted by face-to-face interviews in Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, India and Brazil. In all other places, the surveys were conducted by telephone. All surveys were conducted with representative samples of adults ages 18 and older in each survey public.

Here are the questions used for the report, along with responses, and its methodology.

A median of about half (53%) say the development of artificial intelligence, or the use of computer systems designed to imitate human behaviors, has been a good thing for society, while 33% say it has been a bad thing.

Opinions are also divided on another major technological development: using robots to automate many jobs humans have done in the past. A median of 48% say job automation has been a good thing, while 42% say its had a negative impact on society.

The survey conducted in late 2019 and early 2020 in 20 places across Europe, the Asia-Pacific region, and in the United States, Canada, Brazil and Russia comes as automation has remade workplaces around the world and AI increasingly powers things from social media algorithms to technology in cars and everyday appliances.

Views of AI are generally positive among the Asian publics surveyed: About two-thirds or more in Singapore (72%), South Korea (69%), India (67%), Taiwan (66%) and Japan (65%) say AI has been a good thing for society. Many places in Asia have emerged as world leaders in AI.

Most other places surveyed fall short of a majority saying AI has been good for society. In France, for example, views are particularly negative: Just 37% say AI has been good for society, compared with 47% who say it has been bad for society. In the U.S. and UK, about as many say it has been a good thing for society as a bad thing. By contrast, Sweden and Spain are among a handful of places outside of the Asia-Pacific region where a majority (60%) views AI in a positive light.

As with AI, Asian publics surveyed stand out for their relatively positive views of the impact of job automation. Many Asian publics have made major strides in the development of robotics and AI. The South Korean and Singaporean manufacturing industries, for instance, have the highest and second highest robot density of anywhere in the world. Singapore is also pursuing its goal of becoming the worlds first smart nation, and the government has identified AI as one of many key development areas necessary to reach that goal. Japan has also long been a world leader in robotics manufacturing and development, and robots and AI are increasingly integrated into everyday life there to help with tasks ranging from household chores to elder care.

Men are significantly more likely than women to say artificial intelligence has been a good thing for society in 15 of the 20 places surveyed. In Japan, for example, nearly three-quarters of men (73%) have positive views of AI, compared with 56% of women. In the U.S., 53% of men say AI has been a positive thing, compared with 40% of women.

People with more education are also more likely to have a positive view of AI. This gap is largest in the Netherlands, where a majority of those with a college education or higher (61%) see AI favorably, compared with 43% of those with less education. In the 11 publics where age is a significant factor in views of AI, younger people usually have a more positive view of the technology than older people.

There are similar patterns by gender and education in views of job automation. The educational differences are particularly large in some places: In Italy, for instance, about two-thirds of people with at least a college education (65%) say job automation has been a good thing for society, compared with just 38% of people with less education. Among adults with more education, those who took three or more science courses tend to see job automation more positively than people who took fewer science classes.

Note: Here are the questions used for the report, along with responses, and its methodology.

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Are AI and job automation good for society? Globally, views are mixed - Pew Research Center

FREMONT, CA:

GLogistics automation can be a comprehensive concept that covers all functions that are performed at the technological level, like a Transportation Management System (TMS) for managing the transportation and freight departments in each company.

Logistics is a massive field with a large number of specialists involved in various processes. The processes carried out at each stage are extremely important as they contribute to the smooth movement of goods along the supply chain. With the help of automation, these processes become more efficient. Automation in logistics can have various benefits like saving on labor, inventory, energy, and more. Also, the logistics processes are carried out faster, more precisely and qualitatively, more economically and more efficiently. On the whole, it reduces errors and improves customer service.

Logistics automation can be a comprehensive concept that covers all functions that are performed at the technological level, like a Transportation Management System (TMS) for managing the transportation and freight departments in each company. It helps with work in all possible units, including stock monitoring, planning, administrative, accounting, and management departments. Here are a few advantages of logistics automation.

Reducing Costly Errors

Automation can help businesses to integrate inventory management through the ERP system fully. It includes all fixed and current assets and goods available. Automation will be able to give direct access to address book, fuel charges and other types of automatic storage, which can help eliminate significant errors. The possibility of making errors can be very high while making multiple data entries by hand from available documents. This can have a considerable impact on the bottom line of the company. Investing in freight management software will help optimize the logistics business. Several features can be integrated into this system, relieving managers from a great deal of stress. The number of mistakes will also decline, and there will be no need to solve problems continuously.

Improved Customer Service

Customer satisfaction is the ultimate goal of every business. Every organization is looking for new and innovative ways to attract new customers and at the same time, retain loyal ones. However, there is always a chance to lose those customers that have been with the company for a very long time. When a new company offers them shipping conditions that are cheaper and better, the customer tends to choose them. This is the first indication that something is wrong with the quality of service, speed or price. Logistics automation can help avoid these situations by providing better control of the shipment while managing the supply chain.

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The Role of Automation in the Future of Logistics - CIOReview