Hello, everyone. Um Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, depending on where you are. Um My name is Rare Maheshwari. Um And as you can know, my session today is on emerging tech for driving.Uh And before I start a little bit about myself, I've completed my engineering, you know, early in the nineties. Um and I did it in computer science. So technology is where I always wanted to be. Uh I've been in the tech industry for about over 25 years now with various roles in um consulting development across multiple geographies. Um and I'm really excited to be here and, you know, speaking to all of you, um I would, I would like this to be an interactive session so I'll save some time towards the end for discussion. Um But let me start um with a little story from my childhood. Um as you know, like I said, you know, I worked for 25 years so I have seen technology work, you know, in the pre internet, pre cellphone era to now and growing up and I grew up in India.

So growing up in a small town in India, uh we did not have television, you know, when I was seven or eight. And I was really excited, you know, uh, during one of my summer vacations, we were going to go to, uh, Mumbai to my grandmother's place and I was, uh, excited because it was the first time I was going to actually get to see the television and, uh, I couldn't wait for those holidays to begin.

Um, but once I got there and once I actually finally got to see the television set, I was disappointed. Boy, I was disappointed because, uh, the television was nowhere, what I had expected it to be. I thought we'd probably get to see, you know, all the funny things, cartoons, everything, right. Um, during the day and night whenever I wanted to, but in reality, the television was just a box and the program started only at about 730 in the evening and they were just news or, you know, something boring. So, um, uh, that experience stayed with me even till date. Right. I was quite disappointed and, uh, it didn't stand to my expectations. Of course, the television progressed through the years and it catered to, you know, what the, the users or the customers or the viewers wanted.

Eventually we had satellite television. Uh, and that created the exposure to the world and brought the world in our living rooms. Uh, but the message is technological advancements have come a long way. There was a time you know, when they uh uh were made based on what the user expectations were today, we have to create our own expectation based on, you know, what technology can give. So that was my little story of the television. But if you just take a step back and look, technology has touched every aspect of our life, the way we work, the way we travel, entertain, read, write, publish, learn, educate our health and our health care and not just our living conditions, but also our environment and the planet in general.

And all of this also has an impact on how businesses are transforming and addressing the mega trends and the micro changes in our lives. Uh technological advents such as uh A I Analytics API S robotics and cloud have already made waves. So today, I'm going to share the tip of the iceberg of what you could expect to see in the future in the future. Business is getting ready uh for. So sit back, relax and enjoy the ride. So let's start, let's start with my favorite. That's the A I and how A is are transforming businesses. And you might, you know, uh have noticed A I all around you, you know, when you're watching TV, and programs, you know how they get um uh uh you know, pro promoted based on what your tastes are. But today, I'm going to talk about something more impactful than that. So let us look at renewable energy one barrier to mainstream use of renewables is integrating sustainable energy sources into the current power grid. And this is where big data and A I have made it easier to predict how much power the wind turbines will produce and anticipating. The power fluctuations is the key to developing technologies uh for integrating wind and solar into our power grid. So that is one high impact example right there, you know of how A I is supporting renewable energy. Uh Let's take another example A I in microbiology.

So the use of A I technologies in medicines is not only reducing costs in the industry, but with its health, uh health doctors and biologists are creating newer drugs and antibiotics thanks to which it is becoming possible to treat rare diseases. So that was A I. Uh Now let's look at uh you know, something else. Let's look at robotics. So recently engineers have experimented with what is called as a dynamic balance, um uh dynamic balance research, right? It's, it's a feature that allows robots to maintain balance while walking. Now, you may say, OK, so what right balance while walking, what this allowed to successfully create was a robot that can walk across uneven and unsteady surfaces. What does that mean for us? Right. So what if a robot can walk across uneven and unsteady surfaces? Um So this new innovation opens doors for greater use of robots in let's say emergency operations. Um or let's say helping elderly uh and differently abled individuals with chores and daily tasks. That's a completely different uh use case there for robots right out there. Um So that's about robotics. Uh Let us segue into something, you know, completely different. Let's talk about 3D printing and 3D printing is my, you know, one of my favorite technological advancements, the potential of 3D printing technology, you know, has many people excited about, you know, the newer uh applications.

But if you look at the limitations, um and if you look at the current printers and you know what their important limitations are up until recently, most 3D printers could use only plastic. So a group of researchers at Harvard have created, you know, they've started to actually develop a new 3D printer ink. Now, this enables printing intricate objects using materials that are chosen based on their mechanical properties, electrical conductivity, uh and other traits.

Um So eventually the new INS will enable a wider variety of functions including, you know, hold your breath, they can even create artificial organ. Um uh Also, right. So that's a completely new area where 3D printing can have a play. OK. So we have so far taken a look at technology's impact on renewable energy, medical research, high precision surgeries, artificial organ creation and also assisting the aging population. Uh and the differently abled let's switch gears and let's just look outside, let's talk about agricultural drones.

Farmers have begun to use agricultural drones with cameras to improve the treatment of their crops. Now, there's something that you have to take note of. Um it's not just the drones and the cameras, there's a whole lot of other technology that is at play here. So what do these drones do you know they help expose issues with uh irrigation treatment with, let's say soil variation uh and disres plants at a much lower cost. Now, remember the success of these drones is made possible by technological advances in GPS modules in digital radios and small sensors. So together these advances allow farmers to bring greater precision in order to reap greater rewards. And uh while we are at it, let's look at forecasting climate change, right? And I'm very conscious, you know about taking examples which are, you know, slightly different from your, you know, day to day, you know, examples where of course things are getting delivered at our doorsteps, right?

Not all is happening already, right? Let's look at the bigger impact and the bigger picture. Let's look at forecasting climate change, let's look at what that is doing to the planet. So today we are better able to predict the climate change and the consequences of it. So these um technologies will only develop further over time and people will be able to better understand how to save the earth and improve the ecological uh situation. You might have also heard about uh nuclear reactor currently being built in France if not, you should look it up in all, likely show us in the near future how to scale at creating low-cost thermonuclear energy. Having cheap and potentially unlimited energy for our planet is the next stage. Civilization move. That's something to watch out for as well. So new technologies will also change our daily life. And the one of it that has already impacted is the power of being connected. You know, I don't know how many of you realize, but even look at this conference, right? It's possible with all of us sitting, you know, where we are. So there's a great power in being connected. That's one of the, you know, biggest impact of, you know, one of the recent technologies, right in the digital era. So today, six out of 10 people are having access to the internet. That means there are still four out of 10 who do not have access.

And as we speak, there's effort going on to create a mega constellation of satellites. Uh Now, what is this going to do? The main goal of uh uh of the whole mega constellation of satellites is uh to, you know, to create and provide high speed internet access for everyone on the planet. And with that other technologies such as A I will become even more accessible to the ordinary users. So with that in mind, uh and with that in parlance, let's take a glimpse of the future uh the future that is also, you know, accelerated by technology owing to the current COVID-19 crisis, you know, besides the rapid uh you know, generation and deployment of vaccines, you know, as a result of, you know, our reaction to the pandemic.

Uh We've also seen some other phenomenon like remote work adoption by both tech and non tech companies. Uh and that what what comes to my mind is, you know, there are other areas which are going to see, you know, some action in the next uh few years. Uh you know, as the immediate result of the pandemic and one of them is the disruption in the global supply chains because they are currently geared towards, you know, keeping quality relatively constant with, you know, driving lower cost. It has it has resulted in significant concentration concentration risk in terms of geographies and vendors. For example, uh if you take China scaling down due to COVID-19 and creating supply uh impacts, um there's also the chip shortage if you look at, right. So the overall the global supply chains have been disrupted because of just how they were, right. Um So this crisis um gave rise to a sharp need for a more distributed co ordinated and trackable supply of components across multiple geographies and vendors while maintaining the economies of scale as you can see now. And in the near future, of course, this would require global platforms to be erected that will use uh sophisticated technologies such as five G robotics, IOT and Blockchain to help link multiple buyers and multiple vendors reliably across a mesh of supply chains.

This will also lead to the adoption of self driving cars and delivery drones as a demand for ecommerce, logistics will far outstrip the number of drivers needed um to fulfill uh these demands. So businesses are going to create more supply, more sophisticated supply chain ecosystems in the next decade. That is something to watch out for. Also, what else do we see as a result of the pandemic? Right? We also see digital bureaucracies will become mainstream. Uh And in that, uh if you see the COVID-19 breakout has caused governments across the world to spin into action quicker than ever before. Some governments broke records by constructing their largest hospitals in just a matter of days. Some used smartphones to tag the movement of the infected, alerting the noninfected in real time updates. Now, there are umpteen examples of these efforts and innovative efforts at that. However, we could have done better if there were more smart cities in the world. According to the recent study, only 27 out of 5000 plus large size cities are considered leading in this area. So as the governments learn from the COVID-19 experience, it will shift investment in the favor of smart cities. So uh in conclusion, you know, for someone like me um who has seen the invention of color televisions and cell phone, the internet, all in my lifetime. I'm really looking forward to witnessing, you know, one of the best eras for humans to be alive in.

I'm looking forward to the creative ways we will be using technology to better our existence. Um And with that, I'll open the floor for any questions that you may have and thanks for being so patient. I'm looking at the chats to see if there are any questions, feel free to reach out to me in case you have any. Um I think you can. Um my bio is there on the website of the conference. Um Thank you, Katrina. Thank you. Thank you Christina A Lucia. Thanks a lot. All right. So with that, if there are no questions, I'll close um this um session, feel free uh to reach out to me if you want to know more or if you have any interest in any of these areas or if you're pursuing research in any of these, I really look forward to, you know, connecting with all of you.

Uh I'm also looking forward to some of the other sessions some of you are presenting today. Uh Thanks a lot. Thanks for attending. Thanks, Vicky for attending. Yeah. Thank you. I hope it was uh uh insightful indeed. Thank you.