Posts Tagged: "robotics"

Blizzard response may be aided by salt-infused asphalt, robotic snow plows

Some tech firms are trying to go all-in on AI solutions for snow removal by developing autonomous, self-driving snow plows that could be deployed without human operators. At the end of this January, autonomous plow developers will come together in St. Paul, MN, for the sixth-annual Institute of Navigation Autonomous Snowplow Competition. This year, there will be 11 student teams from the U.S. and Canada attending the event competing to see which of their autonomous snow plows performs best at navigating the competition’s course solely through computer control. Robotic, self-driving snow plows could be implemented for municipal snow removal in the future, although the current state of the tech hasn’t gotten far beyond prototypes that cost $4,000 to $12,000 per unit.

The Top 10 Patents Issued in 2015

2015 was a truly remarkable year for innovation and we saw major trends in self-driving cars, wearable technologies, digital wallets and much more. I hope you will enjoy this top 10 listing, which includes innovations for providing water in arid regions, wireless charging systems for electronic devices and even the collection and retransmission of sunlight. Of course, as with all of these types of lists, the criteria used for inclusion on this list is subjective, based on my own personal preferences. Please feel free to let us know if you saw something particularly noteworthy in 2015.

Disney loses TV subscribers but innovates in amusement rides and robotics

Through most of 2015, the Walt Disney Company had earned a total of 206 U.S. patent grants from all of its subsidiaries, with significant development in the fields of display devices, media content, video streams and 2-D imaging… A pair of patents issued to Disney in recent weeks showcase some intriguing improvements to the user experience for various rides and attractions at amusement parks. U.S. Patent No. 9155971, titled “Selective Illumination of Physical Scenery in Amusement Park Rides,” protects a display system for use with amusement park rides and other attractions. A tool that can help water ride passengers escape without becoming soaked is featured within U.S. Patent No. 9174704, entitled “Interactive Water Shield for Rafts or Boats in Water Rides.” It discloses a passenger boat for interactively shielding passengers.

Automation will cause worker displacement but will also create jobs

Google, now Alphabet Inc., is one of the world’s most valuable companies but employs only a tenth of the number of workers of past giants of industry like AT&T and General Motors did about a half century ago. But we need to point out some obvious problems with the theory that technological innovation is dealing irreparable harm to the American workforce. Simply stated, you cannot ignore the reality that technological innovation is a net creator of jobs, from those who create the innovation, to those who market and sell the innovations, to those who install and maintain the innovations. Focusing only on the low income workers who will be displaced by robotics, for example, creates an inaccurate picture that significantly distorts the workplace realities. Further, it is those innovation based jobs that are the high paying jobs that our economy most wants and which will pay livable wages.

Advances in farming robotics could address shortage in agricultural workers

With American farmers already heavily involved in the regulatory conversation involving the commercial use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, we thought that it would be interesting to delve into the world of farming robotics and see the recent advances in that particular field. It’s important to understand first that the robotics being developed for commercial use on farms won’t be stand-alone humanoid units ranging through fields to pick crops. Any piece of hardware implementing an algorithm which automates some of the manual work of farming falls under this heading.