Elaborating on the previous day’s session on Artificial Intelligence (AI), the first forum session of the second day focused on future trends in the industry and explored the possibilities that may emerge with AI technology.

At a critical turning point where technology is rapidly developing, Tracy Tsai, research vice president of Gartner, began with stressing the importance of adapting to industry changes to stay relevant. Technology advancements may spring up overnight, but business models are not able to do so at the same rate. Thus, businesses should be prepared for changes: some jobs may be eliminated, but this creates the opportunity to invest elsewhere to improve overall performance results.
Technology takes time to mature, and artificial intelligence should not be overlooked, Tsai said, adding that the technology is not as optimized as it is often suggested.
“[With technology] we tend to overestimate the impact in the short term, while underestimating the impact in the long term,” Tsai said.

Impact on Everyday Life

Raymond Teh, vice president of Worldwide Field Operation APAC of NVIDIA, talked about the immediate impacts of AI technology in preventing and curing diseases, improving safety in smart cities, and piloting autonomous machines. Automated transportation is the pinnacle of AI application technology, he said.
Ericsson Taiwan President Hakan Cervell covered trends and future uses of 5G in healthcare, connected vehicles, smart manufacturing and energy generation. He started out with a brief history of the technology revolution and elaborated on the changes in each respective field that have occurred moving from 3G to 5G.
For example in healthcare, 3G helped monitor patients, share medical records electronically and connect ambulances, while 4G enabled telesurgery, and augmented reality-assisted surgery and medical treatment. The emergence of 5G will enhance precision in medical treatment, and make remote robotics surgery and ambulance drones a reality. He summed up by emphasizing the significance of global connectivity to make possible our imaginations with future technologies.

The Revolution of 5G Begins Now

By telling a story that follows the production of a cotton dress, Jim Cathey, president of Asia Pacific and India and senior vice president of Qualcomm Technologies, made the future influence of 5G understandable and relatable to present day life. He traced the product starting from a cotton farm to fabric manufacturers, fashion designers, shipping, retail to end consumers and their shared social experiences. Explaining along the way how the new technology creates ripples that will bring forth great differences, Cathey explained that “5G will allow the wireless edge to reach its full potential.”
While 5G is expected to emerge in late 2018 or 2019, he also pointed out that the currently dominant LTE will not disappear, but is the foundation of providing essential capabilities that complement 5G from day one. Cathey urged developers and businesses to move quickly and seize the opportunity.

Time As a Drive for Advancements

With the topic “Future Trend Impacts on the Premium Automotive Industry,” Volker Kaese, senior director and head of Innovation Management for Products at Audi, shared his company’s vision of consumer autonomous cars by 2025. He used the term “growing the cake” to describe the benefits brought about by self-driving automobiles, which allow us to end up with more time on our hands and improved quality of life. “Time is the last luxury and it lets us take more control over our own lives,” Kaese expressed.
While previous talks discussed technology’s impact on people, industries and business models, IBM Blockchain Labs Director Nitin Gaur used examples in real life to show how technology shapes our surroundings, our lives and the way we think. With the example of cross-border money transfer, he pointed out that keeping up with advancements and instituting trust is our main goal as network speeds accelerate. From an expertise in artificial intelligence, Gaur shared a technical aspect and also addressed changes and challenges from the perspectives of other industries.
While our world is moving on to next-generation economies, the right application of technology can bring forth new interaction models, and patterns can be built to create the notion of trust and transparency, letting local economies expand into global ones in the near future. “At the end of the day, we are solving for two things: time and trust,” Gaur concluded.