Robotic revolution mulled at Davos
LABOUR
DAVOS, SWITZERLAND • Implantable mobile phones. 3D-printed organs for transplant. Clothes and reading-glasses connected to the Internet.
Such things may be science fiction today but they will be scientific fact by 2025 as the world enters an era of advanced robotics, artificial intelligence and gene editing, according to executives surveyed by the World Economic Forum.
Nearly half of those questioned also expect an artificial intelligence machine to be sitting on a corporate board of directors within the next decade.
Welcome to the next industrial revolution.
After steam, mass production and information technology, the so-called “fourth industrial revolution” will bring ever faster cycles of innovation, posing huge challenges to companies, workers, governments and societies alike.
The promise is cheaper goods and services, driving a new wave of economic growth. The threat is mass unemployment and a further breakdown of already strained trust between corporations and populations.
“There is an economic surplus that is going to be created as a result of this fourth i ndustrial revolution,” Satya Nadella, chief executive of Microsoft Corp., told the WEF’s annual meeting in Davos on Wednesday.
“The question i s how evenly will it be spread between countries, between people in different economic strata and also different parts of the economy.”
Robots are already on the march, moving from factories into homes, hospitals, shops, restaurants and even war zones, while advances in areas like artificial neural networks are starting to blur the barriers between man and machine.
One of the most in- demand participants in Davos this year is not a central banker, CEO or politician but a prize- winning South Korean robot called HUBO, which is strutting its stuff amid a crowd of smartphone-clicking delegates.
But there are deep worries, as well as awe, at what technology can do.
A new report from UBS released in Davos predicts that extreme levels of automation and connectivity will worsen already deepening inequalities by widening t he wealth gap between developed and developing economies.
“The fourth i ndustrial revolution has potentially inverted the competitive advantage that emerging markets have had in the form of low-cost labour,” said Lutfey Siddiqi, global head of emerging markets for FX, rates and credit at UBS.
“It is likely, I would think, that it will exacerbate inequality if policy measures are not taken.”
An analysis of major economies by t he Swiss bank concludes that Switzerland is the country best placed to adapt to the new robot world, while Argentina ranks bottom.
There will be winners and losers among companies, too, as new players move into established industries with disruptive new technologies.
That is something uppermost in the minds of Davos attendees such as General Motors Co. CEO Mary Barra, who is confronting the threat of driverless cars — another science fiction that has become science fact — or bank boss Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan Chase & Co., f acing competition from digital “fintech” startups.
Such innovations, coupled with the rise of robots in both the manufacturing and service sectors, could automate vast numbers of jobs. Oxford University researchers predicted in 2013, for example, that 47 per cent of U. S. jobs were at risk.
But ManpowerGroup CEO Jonas Prising is more upbeat for the long term. “If history is any indicator, we’ll have more jobs being created in the end than are going to be destroyed,” he said.
However, beyond t he Davos talking-shop there are doubts about how well business leaders will actually plan for the future.
“When you have these very big levels of disruptive change you need some pretty serious thinking and action,” said Ian Goldin, professor of globalization and development at Oxford University.
“But the CEO who really looks years ahead and looks at broader social issues is rare, even in Davos.”