Re-Think

Amara’s law says – “We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”

I see a lot of shared two-wheelers on Bangalore roads these days. The expectations of the companies which buy these for shared mobility would be very different from individual buyers of two-wheelers. As of today, I do not know of any company designing vehicles keeping shared mobility in mind; but I am sure it is not far away. Someone is going to do a deep re-think on this and come up with a design that is amenable to mass public ride sharing.

Samsung opened a large experience center in Brigade road, a high street shopping destination in Bangalore. MI has a similar one in Indiranagar, another bustling area of Bangalore. The emphasis in these places is not on selling but letting consumers experience the product. These centers would roll up to marketing functions than to sales. If you think about it, sales and logistics are no longer the thorny problems they used to be before; technology has taken the pains out of these to a large extent. I believe physical retail is going to go through a deep re-think where it will be more about product experience than selling.

Boston Dynamics has been releasing jaw-dropping videos of their robots in action. These robots seem to be getting better by the day. We are not far from a time when a lot of the hard and mundane physical labor will be carried out by these automated agents than humans. But none of our current products have been designed keeping these automated agents in mind. For example, if you want an army of drones to fix and replace the street lights, the light assembly needs to be designed in a way that is drone friendly. As of today, it is not; these have been designed keeping in mind a human carrying out these maintenance tasks. The same applies to almost everything that we see around. Someone is going to start re-thinking on these designs and changing them to be more automated agent friendly.

I firmly believe the trifecta of technology, automation and sharing economy is going to bring about a massive re-think in how we look at the design and assembly of almost everything.

Photo by Tincho Franco on Unsplash