Formidable Challenges to Our Technology Wizards

First-ever cars and trains awed our forefathers, now Alexas and Watch ECG awe us

When are we going to awe 'them' 

''Tora! Tora! Tora!'

That coded signal confirming the success of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour ignited the war spirit in America, which, till then, was isolationist, pacifist and neutral to the World War II raging in Europe. America plunged into the War as an Allied power and virtually led the Allies to victory with a sad, though technologically decisive, the step of dropping an atom bomb on Hiroshima! That was a victory as much for the Allies as for the technocrats and scientists in the USA. Atomic energy has since been used for several peaceful projects like electricity generation.                          

'Robot! Robot! Robot!'

This is another signal that too roused the spirit of technology campaigns on a war footing towards the end of the last century. The basic robot concept has so far led to AI, Big Data, 3D Xerox, Automation, Cloud Computing…… With these, they have created many 'Wonders of Our World'! Now, a revolutionary new concept rises up with each sunrise. Steve Job's Apple, Larry and Sergey's Google, Bill Gates’ Microsoft, Elon Musk's Tesla and SpaceX bring surprises that raise productivity and with it the level of quality of life. Several of Elon Musk’s projects hold far-reaching consequences. He is aiming to create a colony on Mars and with 'Neuralink' aims to transform humans with brain implants.

The spinoff of these miraculous pioneering achievements is leading to super-modernisation in other parts of the world. There is news about a Chinese builder constructing a 57-storey skyscraper in 19 days. Another Chinese company created an 'unmanned factory' with only three workers keeping a watch on the lines from a control room. Transportation, too, is autonomous. 

All this is exhilarating and awe-inspiring. But the danger of creating monsters that would end humanity is also a talking point in many quarters. The immediate adverse effect is the inequality and misery in the countries that are the laggards in the Fourth and Fifth Industrial Revolutions. Already millions of jobs are likely to be taken over by machines. There is a possibility of a 'machine-centric' world. There is also the technological inequality portended of the jobless poor eking a low-level life on dole under the sophisticated term of 'Universal Basic Income'.

This is not simply a case of fear-mongering, but a high probability scenario. Let us look at one indicator of technological inequality. According to the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), the degree of automation is shown by the number of robots per 10,000 workers - termed as Robot Density. The top 10 countries with the highest robot density are South Korea, Singapore, Germany, Japan, Sweden, Denmark, the USA, Italy, Belgium, and Taiwan.

Not many realise that the current concept of 'wage arbitrage' that involves moving jobs/work to lower-wage countries to keep the cost of production competitive is at risk.  Very soon there will be a 'capital arbitrage' resulting in lower cost, more consistent quality, and quicker deliveries. Because of this, most countries with higher automation will attract higher quality talent for fewer, highly-skilled jobs.

India does not figure in the automation race for an umpteen number of reasons. There is an urgent need for the upskilling of workers. But the absence of even serious and widespread discussions about the strategies to address such a bleak immediate future is not very encouraging. Our Robot Density is 3 against South Korea's 853.

 

There are many (speculative ) forecasts about the impact of robotization and AI. Let us go by the one of  World Economic Forum (WEF) which predicts a displacement of 75 million jobs and the creation of 133 million new jobs by 2022. Let us raise legions of automation wizards to fill most of the 133 million new jobs. We have an unmatchable vast reserve of about 410 million youthful and talented people. We should start on war footing massive upskilling and training programmes across the country. We should also increase robot designing and manufacturing companies. We can thus become the main suppliers of robots and consultants of AI and allied disciplines to the world.

With such a bold strategy we can awe the world instead of getting awed for a century  by their creations as depicted in the following fable

There is a fable in Marathi from the time that the train was introduced in India in the ‘50s of the last century. A ballad was composed: "Sahebache por kiti nakali / Bin bailachi gadi kashi dhakali" which means “how clever is the saheb’s boy; he pushes a train without bullocks”. People thronged to railway stations, not to travel but 'to see a train' and marvel at it.

There is the same, or perhaps, a higher level of awe and admiration in India for the saheb's innovations like the ‘automatic banking', 'Siri, Alexa' talking and watches that can display an ECG.  

The name of the game is 'quicker automation'. Let's all wake up and Innovate! Innovate! and Innovate!