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Americans Freaking Out About Robots Taking Jobs, But Not Their Jobs

The majority of Americans in a new survey predict that within 50 years robots and computers will do much of the work now done by humans. The Pew Research Center polled Americans for their thoughts on the future of workforce automation and found that 65% think that within 50 years robots and computers will “definitely” or “probably” do much of the labor currently done by people. The tally was 15% definitely, 50% probably, 25% probably not and 7% definitely not. But respondents in general said their own jobs were safe from the robot and computer takeover. Asked if they expected their own job to exist in its current form in five decades, 80% replied in the affirmative. The tally was 36% definitely, 44% probably, 12% probably not and 6% definitely not. Americans who work in the government, nonprofit or education sectors believe their jobs are less likely to be replaced by robots or computers than people who work for large corporations and midsize or small businesses. Some 86% of Americans who work in the government, education or nonprofit sectors believe their jobs will definitely or probably exist in 50 years. That compares with 79% of workers in large corporations or medium and small businesses. Just 11% of workers overall are concerned about losing their current job due to workforce automation. They rank competition from lower-paid human workers and broader industry trends as bigger immediate worries. Pew surveyed 2,001 U.S. adults June 10 through July 12 for the study, the results of which were released Thursday. Do Robots Help Create Jobs? While Americans express concerns about robots and computers taking their jobs, some studies show that new technology creates jobs by freeing up workers for other tasks. The Association for Advancing Automation (A3) last October released a study showing that use of factory robots is actually associated with increased employment. Using data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the trade group showed that during recent non-recessionary periods (1996-2000, 2002-07 and 2010-14), general employment and robot shipments both increased. This week, a survey by research firm Evans Data showed that software developers fear that the rise of artificial intelligence might take away their jobs. Technologists see increasing factory and warehouse automation in the years ahead, boosting companies like ABB ( ABB ) and Teradyne ( TER ). They envision autonomous vehicles from the likes of Alphabet ( GOOGL ) and Uber taking the place of human taxi and delivery drivers. They even see robots taking a bigger role in fighting military conflicts. Last year, industrial robot orders and shipments in North America set new records, according to the Robotic Industries Association . More than 28,000 robots valued at $1.6 billion were shipped to North American customers in 2015. Shipments rose 10% in units and 9% in dollars. RELATED: Next-Gen Robots Poised To Enter Industrial, Commercial Markets Danger Will Robinson! A $15 Minimum Wage Will Only Help Robot Burger-Flippers  

AI Meets ROI: Where Artificial Intelligence Is Already Smart Business

Decades of research and billions of dollars have poured into developing artificial intelligence, which has crossed over from science fiction to gameshow novelty to the cusp of widespread business applications. Artificial intelligence is an area of computer science where computers are designed to think and operate much like a human brain, supported by advanced forms of computing and software. But it’s only as smart as the amount of information fed into its memory banks. The more information, the smarter it gets. The greatest advancements have been demonstrated in the area of game playing, but AI is now showing its mettle in the business world. “People are starting to kick the tires, looking to see how it can help their business and the bottom line,” said David Schubmehl, who follows the AI field for research firm IDC. “The return on investment evidence is not yet clear, but it’s starting to happen.” Facebook ( FB ), Alphabet ( GOOGL ), IBM ( IBM ) and Nvidia ( NVDA ) are among tech leaders with big artificial intelligence ambitions. “We’re starting to see a lot of companies beginning to use different types of AI tech for various uses,” said Schubmehl. “We’re also seeing a lot of venture capital money flowing in and a lot of acquisitions taking place.” IBM, which may have the deepest AI investments and most far-reaching ability of any company, has pitched “cognitive computing” as a tool for businesses via its cloud-based Watson platform. Facebook is using AI to decipher the best ways to bring Internet service to remote areas of the world and to make its News Feed feature more relevant to users of the social network. Alphabet is using it to enhance Google search abilities, improve voice recognition and to derive more data from images and video. Nvidia has developed chip technology for AI platforms used in autonomous driving features, and to enhance how a driver and car communicate. Alphabet,  Mobileye ( MBLY ) and others also are tapping AI in the race for driverless cars. It’s not enough to have Google Maps loaded up: A self-driving system must identify potholes, weather conditions, traffic congestion and other drivers’ behavior — improvising and improving on the fly. AI: Ready, Chess, Go Artificial intelligence, a term coined in 1955, was popularized when IBM’s “Big Blue” became the first computer to beat a reigning world chess champion, Gary Kasparov, in 1997. IBM won again in 2011, when its Watson computer on “Jeopardy!” outsmarted the game show’s two top players ever. Last October, an AI computer beat a three-time European champion in the ancient Asian game of “Go.” AphaGo, built by DeepMind, part of Alphabet’s Google, beat Fan Hui by 5 games to 0, the first time a computer program has ever beaten a professional Go player and a feat thought to be a decade away. On Tuesday, AlphaGo won the first game vs. Lee Sodol, who is ranked No. 5 in the world. Tuesday’s match shows that AlphaGo has made big improvements since beating the No. 633 ranked Fan Hui last year. Google paid $400 million to acquire DeepMind in 2014. But despite rapid advances, artificial intelligence is still in the early stages of business deployment. “A lot of what AI is being used for today only scratches the surface of what can be done,” said Babak Hodjat, co-founder and chief scientist at Sentient Technologies . “It will become so ubiquitous that we won’t even call it AI anymore.” AI Picks Out Your Shoes Sentient emerged from stealth mode in late 2014 with a massively distributed AI platform that companies can use to boost performance. As shoppers at Shoes.com  browse through photos of shoes and click on ones they like, Sentient’s technology narrows the selection, so people don’t get overwhelmed by choices. There’s no need for text-based searches or drill-down navigation, said Hodjat. The AI technology deciphers what shoppers are looking for, letting them quickly dive deeper into a catalog to find the perfect item that might otherwise go undiscovered. “We’ve revolutionized the user experience on an e-commerce website,” said Hodjat. “It’s a huge change in the way users interact with products online and therefore drives conversion.” Sentient has received $143 million in venture capital funding, the most of any AI startup, according to research firm CB Insights. Since 2010, AI startups have received $967 million in funding.  Intel ( INTC ) alone has invested in 16 AI companies, including  Saffron Technology . Saffron says its platform “mimics the fundamental principles of how humans remember and learn.” In a case study on its website, Saffron helped an insurer to identify fraudulent auto insurance claims. Over 10 weeks, Saffron examined 113,000 claims from one year in one state and found three potential fraud rings. It then detected that these rings were part of a larger ring involved with 38 claims, of which the insurance company had paid out about $400,000 in claims. Saffron was able to collect data that identified relevant and unknown relationships, including different providers, demographics and injury descriptions, creating a knowledge store that had never been done before. Saffron forecasts that the insurer can avoid a payout of tens of millions of dollars a year. AI goes by terms such as machine learning and deep learning. IBM calls it cognitive computing. In October it launched Cognitive Business Solutions, with 2,000 consultants skilled in data analytics, cloud computing and other areas. More than 500 companies have deals to use Watson, as a cloud service, to develop commercial products, apps and services. Turner Broadcasting on Feb. 29 signed a deal to use Watson in its ad sales efforts. The  Time Warner ( TWX ), unit owns TBS, TNT and CNN. Using IBM Watson, Turner expects to parse through all manner of data to help draw in more advertisers and provide them with greater impact. Watson Can Predict Low Blood Sugar Watson Health is a platform for physicians, researchers, insurers and other companies focused on health and wellness. Medtronic ( MDT ) is collaborating with IBM on personalized care for people with diabetes. By analyzing patient info and data from Medtronic devices, Watson can predict low blood sugar programs three hours in advance. Artificial intelligence is all about using advanced technologies to help develop brainy reasoning from disorganized information — unstructured data — to derive accurate decisions. “What we’ve done with all our research is to really understand how to add unstructured data to a decision,” said David Kenny, general manager of IBM Watson. Unstructured data comes from a multitude of sources that is not organized. It can be the data bits from photos, medical images or video and audio transmissions. It can be the tons of data that flows in from cameras or sensors in buildings or smartphones, from Web traffic, tweets, inside emails, government filings or business documents. The more information an artificially intelligent computer can digest the smarter it gets. Today The Weather, Tomorrow… Collecting data on a massive scale is among the reasons IBM acquired several Weather Co. properties, including Weather.com, Weather Underground and mobile and cloud-based assets, for a reported $2 billion in October. IBM will be able to analyze data from more than 2 billion weather reference points, over 40 million smartphones and 50,000 airplane flights per day, letting it offer a broad range of data-driven products and services to more than 5,000 clients in the media, aviation, energy, insurance and government industries. IBM said it can provide predictive weather analytics along with real-time analysis of social media chatter, detailed understanding of transportation flows and other data that will benefit retailers and distributors. The Weather Co. assets will serve as the foundation of a new Watson unit focused on the Internet of Things (IoT). Early this year, IBM announced that it would invest $3 billion to build out IoT products and services. “The more we do this, the smarter Watson gets and the smarter AI gets,” said Kenny. As to why AI is becoming more widespread: “It works,” Kenny said. “Users of AI are saving time and money. They’re making faster decisions and getting better outcomes.” An analysis of Facebook and Alphabet’s Google by research firm Innography shows a surge in AI patent filings that began in 2010. Alphabet currently has more than 3,000 AI patents that are active or pending government approval. Facebook has about 870. AI Knows Where You Live Facebook last June opened an artificial intelligence lab in Paris with a goal of improving the way users interact on the world’s largest social network. “It’s our hope that this research will ultimately help us make services like News Feed, photos and search even better and enable an entirely new set of ways to connect and share,” Facebook said at the time. It also has AI research teams at its Menlo Park, Calif., headquarters and in New York. Facebook in February revealed its Connectivity Lab project. It used AI to analyze 8.3 million square miles of land, using roads, schools and other structures to determine where and how many people live in a given area. That can tell Facebook’s Aquila drones where to go to provide Internet access to less-developed areas, as part of the company’s Internet.org initiative. “This data will give us a greater understanding of how populations are dispersed, so governments and others can prioritize investments in infrastructure, from transportation to healthcare and education,” Facebook said.

Box Stock Vaults 14% As Cloud Storage Firm Beats Q4 Views, Adds Customers

Box ( BOX ) reported a narrower-than-expected fiscal Q4 loss as revenue growth of 36% topped expectations. It sent the online data storage and file-sharing service provider’s stock up 14% in after-hours trading, just after the market close. The company forecast current-quarter revenue above expectations and a narrower-than-expected full-year fiscal 2017 loss. Aaron Levie, co-founder and CEO of Box, said the company closed 13 deals valued at more than $500,000 each in fiscal Q4. “Enterprise IT is experiencing a once-in-a-lifetime shift to the cloud,” he said on the company’s earnings call. Box’s new customers include AIG ( AIG ), Genentech and  Home Depot ( HD ). Redwood City, Calif-based Box said revenue for the three months ended Jan. 30 rose 36% to $85 million as corporate customer additions rose, beating views. Box said it lost 26 cents per share minus items. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had modeled a loss of 29 cents per share and revenue of $81.77 million. Box said its non-GAAP operating loss in Q4 was $31.1 million (37% of revenue) vs $32.2 million (51% of revenue) a year earlier. For the current quarter, Box forecasts revenue of $88.5 million at the midpoint of its range, vs. analysts’ consensus estimate of $86.9 million. For the fiscal year ending in January 2017, the company expects revenue of about $392 million and a loss of 84 cents at the midpoints of its ranges. Analysts had estimated that Box will report a full-year fiscal 2017 loss of 88 cents with revenue of $392 million. Box stock had closed up 3.7% in regular-session trading in the stock market today , prior to fiscal Q4 results. Box Unfolds Business Strategy Known mainly as an Internet cloud storage provider, Box has evolved from a provider of basic online data storage into selling file sharing and collaborative tools for team projects. It also sells content management software for large companies. The company added 3,000 business customers in the January quarter. It had 57,000 paying business customers as of Jan. 30, up from 54,000 in the October quarter. Box says that its paying customers include 59% of the Fortune 500. Box said fiscal Q4 billings, a sales growth metric, rose 59% to $130 million. Box competes with Microsoft ( MSFT ), though it’s now a partner for Office 365 products as well. It also counts as rivals  Alphabet ’s ( GOOGL ) Google, privately-held Dropbox, Amazon.com ( AMZN ) and others. Data storage costs have been falling, owing to the availability of remote data centers packed with computer servers, putting pressure on pricing. One of Box’s challenges, analysts say, is driving average selling prices higher with add-on software modules, such as file-sharing tools, as prices for online data storage continue to fall. Box has been aggressive on pricing to grab market share in the enterprise market, analysts say. It has a strong retention rate among customers. The company’s capital spending jumped in fiscal 2016 as it invested in server capacity and built a new headquarters, but capex is expected to drop sharply in the current fiscal year. “With data center investments nearing the end, 2016 is likely to see significant improvement in free cash flow,” said Rob Owens, a Pacific Crest Securities analyst, in a research report. Profitability Paradox The bearish view is that Box will need to keep buying more servers as it adds customers, making it harder to turn profitable. Box has forecast that it will be free-cash-flow positive starting in fiscal Q4 2017 and FCF positive for the full year in fiscal 2018. Under a “freemium” business model, Box also provides consumers with free personal data storage accounts. Box had 41 million free users as of Oct. 31. Aside from Microsoft, Box has alliances with IBM ( IBM ) and Salesforce.com ( CRM ) in the enterprise market. Box partnered with IBM in June 2015 to develop new applications and jointly market products and services The IBM relationship has enabled Box to target larger business deals, analysts say. At a Morgan Stanley conference last week, Box said it’s developing a new workflow technology with IBM that will use tools from IBM’s “Watson” artificial intelligence program. While competition has been growing in online data storage, Google and Amazon focus mainly on small and medium-size businesses. Box aims to set itself apart by targeting government agencies as well as industries such as health care, retail, and media and entertainment. It acquired MedXT, a provider of cloud-based medical image viewing, in October 2014. Box currently gets a low IBD Composite Rating of 26 out of a possible 99. The company went public in January 2015, with shares priced at 14. The IPO raised $175 million. Box’s stock spiked on its first day of trading and traded above 20 in June but swooned into the end of 2015, and slid more sharply in January. Its stock touched an all-time low of 8.82 on Jan. 20. Shares began an ascent in early February, though short interest also rose significantly.