At the AsiaTechxSG 2023, TechThirsty.com had an interesting encounter with HPC and AI Senior Solutions Architect at Dell Architect Romain Bottier. We got Bottier to share deep insights on Artificial Intelligence (AI) along with its impact on the workplace as well as on the booming tech industry. He also deep dived on evolving concepts like prediction technology, the future of digital twins, significance of data privacy, AI tools, language chatbots, use of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and Internet of Things.
This is the first of the Two-Part Interview with Bottier.
Join us as we delve into the fascinating developments in the world of technology and the potential impact that it can have on our lives!
TT: Let’s start with something that all of us at TechThirsty are passionate about. What’s your favourite innovation of this decade?
Bottier: Definitely generative AI. There’s been a lot of interesting developments over the last five years with artificial intelligence. However, I think we are reaching a critical point right now with generative AI. We are not just limiting artificial intelligence to doing a simple task better than us, but it’s actually mimicking what we can do.
Potentially, with speech to text, text to speech and voice, picture, audio and video generation. So it’s an amazing technology. However, it’s also a bit scary because it’s becoming closer to what you might do.
We are trying to bring generative AI to the world specifically from Dell Technologies, but with some restrictions. This way, we want to ensure that it respects the environment of the customer and does not become too wide. But yeah, generative AI definitely is the most interesting stage in AI development and my favourite innovation of this decade.
TT: How are Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies being used at Dell?
Bottier: We do use it within our industry but with fairly limited usage. Since Dell is technically an IT manufacturing company, we use AR for maintenance reasons. For example, we can use the AR headsets to provide us with additional information about equipment or a server.
Based on the kind of problem that has been detected, AR can suggest to the user what to look out for. This is typically how AR and VR are used in the manufacturing industry, for example. Either to train or to look beyond what your eyes can see. This extends beyond AR and VR and is also tied to IoT.
TT: As you know, AR and VR technologies are been used to provide training to doctors in the healthcare industry. In which other industries do you see a potential application of AR and VR technologies?
Bottier: I do believe AR and VR will become a tool for education in the future. Doing hands-on work on everything is challenging, but doing it in a virtual lab is relatively easier. And through a virtual lab, you can create scenarios easily. And even better than that, over time, we will be able to create evolving scenarios generated through artificial intelligence which can enhance hands-on learning experiences.
TT: How do you see IoT impacting our daily lives in the near future?
Bottier: IoT is already everywhere and it happened because the cost of the components have dropped dramatically over the years. We are all using some sort of IoT all the time, even though we don’t necessarily notice it anymore.
For example, in your pocket right here, the phone is loaded with dozens of sensors already. Whether it’s GPS temperature, the way you move, the way you are, or the way you hold your phone. All these are being used for different purposes. They can be used for safety and security reasons, or simply to understand you better as a person.
We are seeing more integration between IoT as a source of information with AI that can learn from it and act on it. This integration will become more interesting, especially in the field of healthcare. It will feed the system to give us predictive healthcare treatments.
TT: What do you think is the future of all of these technologies?
Bottier: When you observe it carefully, all these technologies we discussed are combined. And this combination is leading to what we call digital twins. We’ve discussed digital twins in the manufacturing industry a lot. That’s mainly because this is where we can put sensors. But we will also have digital twins of humans, which we will probably call metahumans.
The idea will be that we can pull data out of humans from sensors and how we interact with the world. Then, we’ll be able to act better in the digital world with that. So in my view, this is the future: a combination of IoT with AI, AR or VR. But at what pace? That’s difficult to tell because it’s still fairly detached, even though we have started seeing aggregation in some industries.
Even in the service industries, we may not necessarily see the digital twins yet. But it’s getting there. For example, buildings are getting embedded and now have more sensors.
We are building cities in a digital way with Singapore being probably in front as a smart nation. A digital city is where we can use smart tools that act upon the data we collect. So digital twins will go beyond humans, products and services. In the future, everything will become digital and we will be able to optimise everything through that. It is easy to simulate on the computer with digital data, but not so easy to simulate with people in real life.
TT: Given all of these developments and a potential future of digital twins, what would you advise the common layman people on safeguarding against data privacy?
Bottier: That’s actually a very good question. I think over time, people have learned to lower their guard when it comes to data privacy and social media platforms have contributed a lot with people not understanding how valuable their own data is. They are aware of the issues, but they don’t care anymore. That’s because they don’t understand necessarily how their data is being used.
Having said that, what I would recommend to people is to understand these tools. You don’t necessarily need to be a technologist. However, you need to understand what these tools are and how they work. When we talk about artificial intelligence, we need to understand that it learns from data. And, that data comes from you. So, whatever you say or do will be used for learning. If you don’t want to see your personal information being a part of a larger AI solution, then be more cautious about what to share in public space.
My advice would be understanding these tools and more importantly understanding that your data is valuable.
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed within this interview are the personal opinions of the interviewee. The facts & statistics, the work profile details shared by the protagonist/ protagonists do not reflect the views of TechThirsty or its Journalist. Neither TechThirsty nor the Journalist hold any responsibility or liability for the same.
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