All posts by Paul Stradling

News

Tech News : UK Could Be Like Silicon Valley Says Hunt

Speaking in the House of Commons, UK chancellor of the exchequer Jeremy Hunt said that Brexit “freedoms” could be leveraged to “turn Britain into the world’s next Silicon Valley.” 

How? 

Mr Hunt highlighted artificial intelligence (AI), quantum technology and robotics as key areas he believes the UK could excel in. In his speech, he drew upon ‘lessons’ from a previous Conservative chancellor, Nigel Lawson, and highlighted four changes that he believes could support innovation and make the UK a major technology centre. These are:

– By the end 2022, the UK government plans to make changes to EU regulations in five growth industries: digital technology, life sciences, green industries, financial services, and advanced manufacturing. Mr Hunt suggested that these regulations changes will, helped by Sir Patrick Vallance, “support safe and fast introduction of new emerging technologies.” 

– Legislating to give the Digital Markets Unit new powers “to challenge monopolies and increase the competitive pressure to innovate.” Mr Hunt believes this could help create a more favourable competitive environment for UK tech companies.

– Increasing funding for the UK’s nine catapults (nine leading technology and innovation centres) by 35 per cent and committing to the Project Gigabit ultrafast broadband roll-out with a view to maintaining the target of 85 per cent coverage by 2025. Project Gigabit ultrafast broadband is the project to connect up 7,000 more remote properties on UK’s Jurassic coastline with fast broadband by 2025.

– Reform of R&D tax reliefs to improve the effectiveness of how public money is spent.

Challenges 

Despite Mr Hunt’s ambition and optimism, tech, communications, and business commentators have been quick to highlight challenges to this vision becoming a reality. These include:

– The effects of the recession (which may last years) and the cost-of-living crisis.

– A predicted fall in GDP, rising unemployment (predicted by the Office for Budget Responsibility / OBR).

– A tech skills gap and 60,000 vacancies in the IT sector.

– A need to give investment help more equally across the country and to close the digital divide.

– Worries that cutting R&D tax credits for small businesses could adversely affect the UK’s most innovative start-ups.

– Concerns that the UK is lagging behind other countries in terms of fast broadband provision and the rollout of 5G, thereby affecting competitiveness.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

Mr Hunt’s aim and vision to boost the UK’s technology industry and make it a tech centre has been welcomed by many but has echoes of previous pledges over many years to make this happen. The UK has suffered from a tech skills gap for many years and Brexit led to fears that skilled tech workers, many of whom came from overseas, would leave (which happened in many cases), leaving employers struggling to attract new skills compared to other countries. Mr Hunt’s speech highlighted his beliefs, however, that changes to regulations (which in reality, are unlikely to happen until the end of next year) and challenging monopolies could be a way to create a more favourable environment for tech innovation to flourish in the UK.

The idea of cutting R&D tax credits, however, appears to have the potential to be counter-productive to the aim of giving a boost to innovative small businesses. The recession, cost of living crisis, tech skills gap, and the UK lagging behind in terms of fast broadband provision and 5G rollout are very tough challenges that are hard to ignore and so it appears that there’s a lot of work to do to make the UK like ‘Silicon Valley’ although the ambition and the vision are welcomed.

News

Tech Insight : Google’s New Features For Maps, Search, And Shopping

Following the roll-out of a range of new features for Google’s Maps, Search and shopping, we take a look at what they are and what benefits they could bring to users.

Two New Features For Shopping 

It’s the ideal time of year to introduce new features to Google Shopping, hence the roll-out of two new features now. They are:

1. AR Shopping. This feature allows users to see how beauty products would look on their face, i.e. whether a shade of foundation would suit them. To do this, Google’s AR shopping presents users with a photo library featuring 148 models representing a diverse spectrum of skin tones, skin types, ages, genders, face shapes and ethnicities.  Users can search for a foundation shade on Google across a range of prices and brands, and see what that foundation looks like on a model with a similar skin tone, including before and after shots. This can help make the decision of which one to purchase easier, more convenient, more personal, and may give the user more chance of selecting the right product. Once a foundation brand/type is selected, the user can then select a retailer to buy directly through Google. This feature is helpful for both retailers and customers, and, like several of the other new features, may encourage more of boost in Google Ads plus more engagement with Google’s services from businesses.

2. Try out products in 3D and AR. This feature allows customers to examine a product all the way around, e.g. spin and zoom, as well as see a product up close. For example, users can look at shoes in their space so they can really decide if elements like the colour, laces, tread, or sole fit their style. As of now, Google says users can look at brands like Saucony, VANS and Merrell in 3D and AR, and that other brands are on the way. To use the feature, it’s a case of typing (for example) “Shop blue VANS sneakers” and tapping “View in my space.”

Three New Features for Maps 

Originally announced in September but rolled out in time for the festive season, Google has introduced three new features for Google Maps which are:

1. Live View. Using a combination of AI, billions of Street View images and augmented reality, Google says this feature allows users to navigate a city more intuitively. For example, Google says tapping the camera icon in the search bar lets users see nearby stores, coffee shops, banks and ATMs, and AR-powered directions and arrows show which direction a user is travelling and how far away they are. Users can also tap on different place categories to explore what restaurants, bars, dessert shops, parks and transit stations are nearby. One really helpful aspect of the feature is that AR overlays key information about each spot, e.g. opening times and prices. For users who are not very familiar with the area of a city they’re in (e.g. for a shopping trip), this could be a real timesaving and value-adding feature. Google says that this feature is first being rolled out for use in London, Los Angeles, New York, Paris, San Francisco, and Tokyo (on Android and iOS).

2. Find the best charging station for your electric vehicle. Although Google Maps already gives some real-time charging point information, with the new feature, users can search for “EV charging stations” and select the “fast charge” filter. Users can also see stations with chargers 50kW or higher (to charge up faster) plus, in some cities, the feature will allow users to filter for stations that offer a particular EV plug type. One of the key challenges for EV owners is finding suitable charging points nearby which can be more of a headache if you’re not familiar with the area, so this new feature offers convenience, greater peace of mind, and saves time for users.

3. See wheelchair accessible, stair-free places. Using information from business owners and contributions from the Google Maps community, this feature can be useful not just for wheelchair users, but anyone with a pushchair, or luggage. Tapping the “Accessible Places” setting in the Google Maps app shows a wheelchair icon on the business profile if it has a wheelchair accessible entrance, plus the same icon with a strikethrough if it’s a non-accessible place. Users can also use the feature to check if a place has accessible seating, disabled toilets and suitable parking. Business owners can contribute to this; i.e. they can show that their business is accessible by finding their profile, tapping “About,” and then “Edit features.”  Although Google Maps has given accessibility information since 2020, this feature expands the scope of what users can find out in advance and could therefore be extremely helpful, save time, and save potentially poor experiences. With this feature, Google is leveraging different technologies to advance the idea of virtual shopping (similar to the Metaverse idea), handling the whole shopping process, and linking directly to retailers in Google, e.g. advertisers, thereby appealing to brands, retailers and customers as well.

Search 

Google’s core service has always been its search, and this has been expanded  again with two new features that link it with local food businesses, thereby competing with aspects of food ordering apps, and its Maps feature. The new Search features are:

1. Search for your favourite dish. Originally announced in September, this feature allows users to save time and increase the personalisation and precision of their search. Users can search for an exact dish, and where they can find it nearby by typing the dish name into search, e.g. “mac and cheese near me.”

2. Multisearch near me. The introduction of this feature means that Google Lens in the Google app can be used to snap a picture or take a screenshot of a dish or an item, and the words ‘near me’ can be added to quickly find a place that sells it nearby.  Cindy Huynh, Product Manager for ‘Lens’ says “This new way of searching will help me find local businesses in my community, so I can more easily support neighbourhood shops during the holidays.” 

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

With these exciting new features, Google is funding more ways to leverage, combine, and integrate its existing services (Search, Maps, and Shopping) to create more value by focusing on improving how they can be used to link them more closely to smaller businesses for use on the go.

These features are likely to be of particular interest to users at this time of year (Christmas shopping) which could in itself encourage more trial and more of a buzz about them. This combination of new features also integrates with Google My Business, Google Ads, and aspects of Search which, in turn, could make local city businesses engage more with Google’s service and could boost ad sales too. These are also a way for Google to compete with the many popular other Map apps that people now use, such as Waze, HERE WeGo, Bing Maps, MapQuest, Maps.me, OpenStreetMap, OsmAnd, and more.

News

Featured Article : How Investment In Sustainability Could Protect Against Disruption

After a new report published which says that most business leaders plan to increase investment in sustainability initiatives to protect against disruption, we look at what this means.

Report 

A recent Gartner report highlighted how 86 per cent of business leaders plan to increase their organisation’s investment in sustainability initiatives to protect against disruption and 87 per cent are already engaged in sustainability initiatives and expect to expand them in 2023 and 2024.

What Kind Of Disruption? 

The kinds of disruption to businesses, supply chains, and the wider economy that businesses need to protect themselves against include:

– Economic uncertainty. In the UK, for example, the effects of recession, inflation, rising interest rates, sluggish productivity, problems in the labour market and an IT skills gap plus a relatively weak post-pandemic recovery are all creating less certainty and a tough economic environment. For example, Office for Budget Responsibility (figures) show that the UK may not return to its pre-pandemic growth level until the end of 2024, while ONS figures show that by September, the economic output in the UK was still 0.4 per cent lower than pre-pandemic.

– Geopolitical conflict. For example, the war in Ukraine and its multiple effects, notably including high energy costs, higher commodity prices, and disrupted supply chains are causing cost pressures on a number of industries, high food prices, a squeeze on consumer (end-user) spending. This has led to uncertainty over future supply chains (especially if businesses deal in Europe), difficulty for central banks to forecast and plan, and overall uncertainty.

– Escalating materials and energy costs. Again, mainly due to the war in Ukraine, this is having a major effect on business costs and consumer spending. The soaring cost of energy could also increase data centre costs by 40 per cent which may soon mean price rises for business customers who are now very reliant on the cloud.

How? 

As highlighted in the Gartner report, the ways that business leaders plan to tackle disruption centre around re-examining all forms of business expenditure and seeking new, longer term, sustainability initiatives and new revenue streams that leave them less at risk of the uncertainty that’s part of current models, i.e. less reliance on fossil fuels such as oil and gas (and less reliance upon big oil companies).

Sustainability 

As identified by a report in October (Gartner), most investors see sustainability as the key strategic technology trend for 2023 and most CEOs see environmental and social changes as a top three priority for investors, behind profit and revenue.

In addition to getting away from expensive, volatile, and environmentally damaging fossil fuel reliance and the disruption it is currently linked to, other main drivers for business investing in sustainability initiatives include:

– Customer demand. The Gartner report shows that most business leaders (80 per cent) identified consumer pressure behind sustainability as the key reason for investing in sustainability initiatives.

– Environmental, social, and governance (ESF) expectations.

– More environmentally focused government regulations.

– Growing availability of sustainable technology.

– Opportunities to find new revenue streams, accelerate innovation, and develop new forms of customer engagement.

What Kind Of Sustainability Investment and Initiatives? 

Some examples of how businesses could use/are using sustainability investment and initiatives include:

– Investments in sustainability as regards energy consumption, and reallocating energy sources to areas with renewable energy sources.

– Software sustainability. Developing and using software that causes less environmental impact and producing new software standards that prolong devices’ lifecycles, thereby helping to reduce the amount of e-waste.

– Sustainability investments related to business travel, customer transactions, and productivity.

– Investing in more efficient hardware.

Return 

The recent Gartner report says that 83 per cent of business leader respondents said that their sustainability investments have created both short term and long-term value, and supply chain savings, and that costs for their initiatives have been outweighed by immediate efficiency improvements. There is also the key benefit of the promise of a more stable future for their companies/organisations. That said, it’s still relatively early days for many businesses that have invested in sustainability and, as such, the returns on investments are still unclear.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

The Gartner report appears to reveal a growing consensus among business leaders that consumer demand is a major driver for businesses investing much more in sustainability. The current economic uncertainty, geopolitical conflict, escalating materials and energy costs, increase environmentally focused government regulations, and the growing availability of sustainable technology, all alongside the climate crisis are also now major reasons why businesses are looking seriously at how sustainability investment could help. Turning to sustainability-focused solutions could help businesses not just to reduce business expenditure, but to possibly create new revenue streams and tackle the threat of disruption more effectively over time.

News

Sustainability : Data Centres In Space?

A feasibility study is to be carried out into whether solar powered data centres could be put into orbit to reduce their carbon footprint.

Who And What? 

The European Commission has chosen Thales Alenia Space, a joint venture between aerospace and defence companies Thales (67 per cent) and Leonardo (33 per cent) to lead the ASCEND (Advanced Space Cloud for European Net zero emission and Data sovereignty) feasibility study as part of Europe’s vast Horizon Europe research program.

Why? 

A growing number of devices and the IoT, the increased demand digitalisation and for cloud services mean that data centres in Europe and other parts of the world are growing at an exponential rate. Data centres, however, require large amounts of power and are major carbon producers. This means that they are having environmental and energy impact.

The idea of moving data centres into the earth’s orbit, powered by solar power plants would not only solve the problem of the carbon (and physical) footprint of data centres but, in the process, make it more likely that Europe’s Green Deal goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 can be met.

The Feasibility Study 

Thales says that the project is expected to demonstrate to what extent space-based data centres would limit the energy and environmental impact of their ground counterparts. Thales also says that feasibility study will have two main objectives, which are:

1. “To assess if the carbon emissions from the production and launch of these space infrastructures will be significantly lower than the emissions generated by ground-based data centres”. 

2. “To prove that it is possible to develop the required launch solution and to ensure the deployment and operability of these spaceborne data centres using robotic assistance technologies currently being developed in Europe, such as the EROSS IOD demonstrator.” 

Investment If Feasible 

If the feasibility study indicates that building and launching orbiting solar-powered data centres produces less carbon than normal, terrestrial data centres, Thales says this could mean major investments within the scope of Europe’s Green Deal. It could also justify the development of a more climate-friendly, reusable heavy launch vehicle, thereby enabling Europe to regain its leadership in space transport and space logistics, and the assembly and operations of large infrastructures in orbit.

What Does This Mean For Your Organisation? 

Data centres are power-hungry and produce a lot of carbon. With demands upon and demand for data centres increasing, but the need to reduce their carbon footprint and meet environmental targets mean the search for solutions is on. Carbon offsetting has been a major way that big tech companies have tried to become carbon neutral, but this doesn’t stop the carbon being released in the first place. On the face of it, putting solar-powered data centres into orbit sound a promising idea, but the scale of the data centres needed, and the carbon footprint of the development, testing, and operation of spacecraft that blasts them into orbit in the first place mean that it’s possible that they may not be more environmentally friendly than current data centres. If the feasibility study shows that putting data centres in orbit does significantly reduces their carbon footprint, this could bring the funding that could help make it a reality.

News

Security Stop-Press : Google Chrome Extensions Risk

After analysis of 1,237 Google Chrome extensions available via the Chrome Web Store, researchers from data protection company Incogni concluded in a recent report that almost half (48.6 per cent) have a high or very high-risk impact. This means that they may be storing sensitive, personally identifiable data. The advice is for users to be vigilant and to only choose extensions from trusted developers, i.e. those with a history of problem-free software development and high user ratings.

News

Tech Tip – Set Pages To Load Automatically In Chrome

If you’d like to save time by making your most often used and/or favourite pages load automatically whenever you open Google Chrome, here’s how:

– In Chrome, click on the three dots top-right and select ‘Settings’.

– In the left-hand menu select ‘On startup’.

– Select ‘Open a specific page or set of pages’.

– Click on ‘Add new page’ and add the URL of each page you’d like to load automatically load in separate tabs when Chrome is opened.

News

Featured Article : What Is Twitter’s ‘Blue Tick’ All About?

Following announcements that Twitter under Musk will generate revenue by blue tick subscriptions, we look at what this means and at the blue tick chaos that followed the announcement.

What Is this ‘Blue Tick’ ? 

Twitter’s paid-for Blue service, launched last year, is a subscription service – $7.99 (£6.99) per month in the US, also available in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and now in the UK since 10th November. Primarily, the Blue service is a way for users to verify (by use of a blue tick next to their name) that their account is genuine. The Blue service also gives subscribers other editing and customisation options that free accounts don’t have.

Why Blue Tik? Why The Need To Signal That An Account Is Genuine? 

Back in 2021, the service was introduced following reports that perhaps as much as 19 per cent of Twitter accounts could be fake and untrustworthy. This problem appears to have persisted.

Back in June, for example, When Elon Musk was in the process of trying to buy (i.e. a takeover of) Twitter, he threatened to pull out of the sale over the amount of spam and fake accounts / bot accounts (not run by humans) which Twitter said made up 5 per cent of Twitter accounts.

These fake / bot accounts, and parody accounts are a problem, not just from Twitter’s (and Musk’s personal) point of view in that they affect the platform’s quality and could reduce value for money for advertisers but mainly because, from the user’s point of view, they are used to (for example) send adverts or scams to users, influence public debate by tweeting political propaganda, and generally spread disinformation.

What Should The Blue Service (Blue Tick) Provide? 

Subscribers to Twitter’s Blue service should receive:

– The verifying tick next to the name in the user’s profile.

– The ability to edit their tweets, e.g. to correct typos or clarify meanings, up to five times within the first 30 minutes of tweeting. However, the tweet shows that it’s been edited and shows users the previous versions.

– An ‘undo’ function which gives a short “cooling-off” period before a tweet goes live. This could, for example, be used to tag more people.

– The ability to change the colour of the app icon, change the general colour theme, and change the text size.

– The ability to upload longer (up to 10 minutes) and better-quality videos (1080p HD quality).

– The ability to use NFTs (non-fungible tokens) as profile photos, e.g. a piece of digital art they’ve purchased.

– Top Articles and priority ranking for subscribers. Users can use this section to see what which articles are creating a buzz.

Other points of interest about the blue tick system are:

– Whereas the old blue checkmark (prior to Musk taking over) indicated active, notable, and authentic accounts of public interest that had been independently verified by Twitter based on certain requirements, the new post-Musk blue checkmark could mean:

– Either that an account was verified under the previous verification criteria, or that the account has an active subscription to Twitter Blue.

– Accounts verified under the old system can keep their own blue badges.

There is also news that features coming soon to the Blue service will include fewer adverts, priority ranking in search, and mentions and replies for “quality content” posted by subscribers.

Backdrop Leading To Blue Service Chaos  

Elon Musk’s Blue service introduction, however, has been born out of great change and turmoil for the social media platform which has led to a chaotic week for blue tick. Some of the turbulent backdrop which has fuelled the chaos includes:

– Musk’s $44 billion takeover leading to mass job cuts – Twitter cutting roughly 50 per cent of its workforce.

– Twitter top executives reportedly being sacked, i.e. Chief Executive Parag Agrawal, Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal and legal affairs and policy chief Vijaya Gadd.

– Fears that Twitter could change for the worse under Musk’s ownership, i.e. reinstating unpopular banned users and controversial figures and allowing the wrong kind of ‘free speech’. Also, the dropping of thousands of (outsourced) content moderators have led to fears of a drop in quality and possible rise of misinformation.

– Elon Musk warning that Twitter could face bankruptcy unless more (non-advertising) revenue could be generated, e.g. by the Blue service.

– Elon Musk announcing that all but “exceptional” Twitter employees need to come back to working in the office for at least 40 hours per week or their resignation will be accepted.

– Reports that Twitter users are leaving the platform in protest over Musk’s ownership and moving to competing, and decentralised social network ‘Mastodon.’

– America’s Federal Trade Commission warning that “no chief executive or company is above the law”, fears over Twitter’s approach to security, and questions about this in relation to possible Saudi involvement in the Twitter takeover.

Blue Chaos 

It is against this backdrop that the introduction of the Blue service, a way to generate revenue at a time of falling ad sales, appeared to be in chaos as the following, and more, happened:

– A wave of blue tick verified (but fake) accounts impersonating influential brands and celebrities tweeting fake news plus having to be suspended and removed. Fake/parody accounts included those for Apple, Nintendo, BP, Chiquita, Mark Zuckerberg, President Joe Biden, Donald Trump, George W Bush, Tony Blair and, almost inevitably, fake Elon Musk and Tesla accounts.

– Reports that US far-right activists have been able to purchase Twitter blue ticks, and of accounts purchasing blue ticks using AI generated images of fake personalities.

– Confusion over the introduction of new grey “official” badges instead of blue ticks on some high-profile accounts, which were then suddenly scrapped by Elon Musk, only to be re-instated on some Twitter profiles.

– Some US users reporting that the Twitter Blue subscription system was no longer available to them.

– Elon Musk announcing that parody accounts would need to include parody in their name going forward.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

The takeover, the speed and apparently drastic nature of the job cuts (mass layoffs by email) and other changes and concerns about what Twitter could now become under the ownership of the controversial Elon Musk have created a turbulent environment in which to try and quickly introduce a new and apparently flawed blue tick service.

Falling ad revenues were the main reason for the introduction of the blue tick service as a much-needed extra source of revenue. However, an air of chaos and parody and fake accounts may have seriously dented confidence in blue tick, and it appears that a general unease about what Twitter will be under Musk may account for many users apparently switching to Mastodon. Given that Tesla’s fate may also be linked to the fate of Twitter, despite Musk optimistically tweeting that “Usage of Twitter continues to rise. One thing is for sure: it isn’t boring!”, chaos, turbulence, uncertainty, and security fears are not attractive to businesses (and advertisers), and news of brutal mass layoffs by email ordering people back to the office and acting too much like a billionaire are not attractive to many social media users.

Also, there is a fear that Twitter could now be much more easily exploited by bad actors to spread disruptive disinformation and other malicious activities. Events are still happening thick and fast at Twitter but for the time being, confidence in blue tick appears to have been seriously dented.

News

Tech News : Meta Cuts 13% Of Its Workforce

Meta has announced that it is laying off a masive 13 per cent of its workforce globally in re-structuring market uncertainty about the Metaverse vision.

Losses Lead To Layoffs 

Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, announced the 11,000-employee layoff from Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, after Reality Labs, the division building the metaverse, suffered £3.16bn losses between July and September this year (the largest loss the company has made). The previous quarter also showed disappointing results.

Expensive Re-Brand 

It should also be noted that Meta also spent around $15 billion last year on its re-brand which, coupled with the lack of growth and the losses may also have contributed to the need for re-structuring and layoffs.

Told By Email 

Mr Zuckerberg reportedly emailed staff about the layoffs, blaming his own over-optimistic view of post-pandemic demand for e-commerce. Employees were informed that the layoffs will mean:

– There will be reductions in every organisation across Meta’s Apps and Reality Labs and some teams will be affected more than others.

– Recruiting will be disproportionately affected because fewer people will be hired next year.

– The business is being restructured “more substantially.”

Thanks For The Impact

In the US, as well as being thanked for their “impact” on Meta’s business, those being laid-off were reportedly told in their emails that they would receive at least 16 weeks salary plus two weeks’ wages for each year served with company.

Remind You of Twitter? 

The big Meta layoffs are painfully similar to Twitter’s recent massive job cuts with 50 per cent of the company’s global workforce (7,500 people) being given their marching orders. Elsewhere in the big tech company world, Amazon, Alphabet and Apple are reported to have hiring freezes in place.

Ploughing On With The Metaverse 

Despite half a year’s poor financial results due to cash being shovelled into the slow-moving Metaverse vision, Mark Zuckerberg appears to be fully committed to it and ready to plough on. Also, despite little investor confidence betraying a lack of understanding of the Metaverse vision, some commentators have noted that society is moving more towards the virtual world every day. This could mean that Mark Zuckerberg is on the right track but may not be moving fast enough with it yet.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

Meta, like other big tech companies has faced challenges like a lack of growth and declining ad revenue since the pandemic, as well as stiff competition from the likes of TikTok. Meta, however, appears not to have been able to communicate to investors exactly what the Metaverse and its value is while at the same time appearing to plough a lot of money into a vision that is not delivering yet. This combination of the investors’ responses to a lack of certainty, tough times, plus outside competition have therefore led some people to speculate that big tech itself may be in trouble and this has prompted Meta’s need to shed jobs to steady nerves.

News

Tech Insight : Amazon’s Sparrow Robot Could Replace Humans

Amazon is reported to be testing the machine learning ‘Sparrow’ robot arm that could handle 65 percent of its 100+ million diverse parcels.

Challenge 

Although Amazon already uses robot arms called ‘Robin’ and ‘Cardinal’ to re-direct boxed-up pre-delivery items around its warehouses, the challenge has been to create a robot arm that can detect, recognise, select, and handle a huge variety of different shapes and sizes of products prior to packaging, in the handling part of its business.

Sparrow 

The Sparrow robot arm leverages the technologies of computer vision and artificial intelligence (AI) to help detect and select items.

The Benefits 

Amazon sees the potential benefits of Sparrow as:

– Enabling the company to work smarter, not harder, and to operate efficiently and safely.

– Enabling employees to focus their time and energy on other things by taking on repetitive tasks for them.

– Helping to drive efficiency by automating a critical part of the fulfilment process.

Replacing Human Workers?  

Although Sparrow’s unique capabilities may be good news for Amazon’s Ecommerce future, it could be bad news for its human workers. The effects on jobs by increased automation at Amazon have been a concern of labour unions (the Amazon Labor Union) for some time now, although a recent study suggested that more robots were needed anyway to plug a labour shortage at Amazon. Also, some commentators have suggested that rather than creating large-scale job losses, an increase in the use of robots in Amazon warehouses could simply mean a de-skilling of the labour force (saving on training), job stagnation and insecurity.

Supporting, Not Replacing 

Amazon, however, chooses to frame Sparrow as “a major technological advancement to support our employees” rather than a machine learning, highly dextrous robot that could cost many of them their jobs.

Back in September, for example, Amazon’s robotics chief Tye Brady, however, was reported as saying that the robots are not intended to replace workers but to collaborate with human workers to do a job.

Create New Kinds Of Jobs Too 

Amazon has highlighted how it believes the use of Sparrow and other robots in its business has already created (and could create more) new kinds of jobs related to maintaining the robots. Amazon says, for example, “The design and deployment of robotics and technology across our operations have created over 700 new categories of jobs”. 

On its ‘About Amazon’ website, the company gives the example of its Amazon Mechatronic and Robotics Apprenticeship which it says helps employees “learn new skills and pursue in-demand, technical maintenance roles” and leads to a 40 per cent increase in the pay of participants.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

With Amazon being the largest manufacturer of industrial robots in the world, and with Sparrow being another of several types of robot arms already in use in Amazon warehouses, it is highly likely that automation plus the pursuit of benefits like efficiency, safety, and 24-hour / 365 days a year working (and no protests) looks likely to continue. Although unions have protested about automation, some have suggested that more unionisation could simply mean a harder push for automation.

Amazon’s re-framing of Sparrow being a robot that will help rather than replace workers and even create more tech maintenance-based jobs sounds good, but with more than 1.6 million people on the Amazon payroll, and more robots like Sparrow that can ‘learn’ to keep improving, its hard to see how many people at the company’s warehouses aren’t going to end up being made redundant over time. For Amazon, however, the efficiencies automation could bring are likely to make the company even more competitive and powerful.

News

Tech News : Zoom Hopes New Features Make It “One Stop Shop”

Zoom has announced that its new (beta) productivity tools, Zoom Mail and Calendar (clients and Services), combined with its existing features will mean that workers will have everything they need in one app.

Give Workers A ‘Toggle Tax’ Break 

Zoom says that the new productivity tool, working together with existing features within Zoom, such as Zoom Meetings, Phone, Whiteboard, and Team Chat will mean that “teams can move quickly and seamlessly from email to a video meeting, elevate a chat message to a phone call, collaborate on projects, and early next year, they can share out whiteboards, all without ever leaving the Zoom app.” 

The New Tools 

Zoom’s new (beta) productivity tools are:

– Zoom Mail and Calendar Clients. These will let any Zoom user (free or paid) access their existing email accounts from popular third-party email services directly in the Zoom desktop app. Zoom says that this is designed to help users to focus more on their work by saving them the trouble of having to toggle between different apps.

– Zoom Mail and Calendar Services. The Zoom Mail service will allow customers (in the U.S. and Canada at present) with Zoom One Pro or Zoom Standard Pro plans to be set up an email account hosted by Zoom at no additional cost. Also, customers with a Zoom One Business or higher plan will be able to set up a custom domain. The Zoom Mail service also gives end-to-end encryption for any emails sent between active Zoom Mail Service users and expiring emails with access-restricted links for external recipients. Zoom says that its Zoom Mail Service is “designed for small-to-medium businesses without dedicated IT resources who also have a need for enhanced privacy in their business communications, such as law firms or any business needing to share private information within their team.”  

More Planned 

Zoom is also set to introduce features like Zoom Spots in early 2023. The feature “virtual coworking space” enables more spontaneous video calls to replicates the “working alongside” aspect of an open office. Zoom also offers cloud VoIP services with ‘Zoom Phone.’

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

These new tools are squarely aimed at SME businesses and see Zoom competing with platforms like Teams, Slack, Google Meet, Skype, and the likes of WhatsApp which has been introducing a raft of new features, thereby widening its appeal to business customers. As Zoom points out, it hopes that these tools, which relate to “business critical” communications will make business customers more dependent on (and loyal to) just the Zoom app for most of their business comms needs and stop them from “hopping between apps”, i.e. using competing apps. The end-to-end encryption and expiring emails aspects of the new tools are reminiscent of valued features of WhatsApp (Teams also offers E2EE for calls). Ever since the pandemic dramatically swelled the numbers of users for Zoom and other comms apps and collaborative working platforms, there has been a battle raging for market share with an expansion of features to cover more and more business needs to make themselves more of one-stop-shop.