This report has two primary purposes: to provide industry with an evaluation of the importance of AI development as a force for change, and to create an internal basis for PiiA’s future development efforts, within which AI can be described as the next phase of industry’s digitalisation. Both these objectives are naturally compatible with the overall ambition of the report: to reach our target group of industry leaders and to serve as a source of knowledge for ongoing activities within relevant companies.<\/p>\n
There are countless cases within technological industrial development of ambitious plans promising much but eventually proving to be costly dead ends. With this in mind, throughout our work in assessing the development of AI we have endeavoured to take into account the magnitude and direction of different vectors of change.<\/p>\n
On the one hand, we have attempted to understand the power of demand for AI by assessing the economic impacts at a macro level. We have focused on productivity and qualitative values at various stages of industry value systems. On the other hand, we have attempted to assess the range of available technologies by analysing initiatives taken on a global scale and through focused academic research. We have also put considerable effort into understanding the major commercial \u2013 or applied \u2013 forces that are crucial to development, both in the short and medium term.<\/p>\n
We have also strived to place AI development in the context of current systemic developments, as characterised by the \u2018platformisation\u2019 of company IT resources. By this we mean the transfer of automation and IT support to the cloud \u2013 a trend that is creating new competitive dynamics.<\/p>\n
Finally, we have attempted to translate this big picture into real impacts on the factory floor, and to revisit well-known concepts such as organizational development which \u2013 with the help of the raw power of AI technology \u2013 have the potential to make the previously impossible, possible.<\/p>\n
The report has been divided into two main sections: The Market, in which we assess the development and consequences on the factory floor; and The Technology, which provides a more in-depth understanding of the structures of industrial IT and machine-learning technology. The report concludes with some practical examples from industry.<\/p>\n