This is our 3rd article in our Urban Foresight and Innovation series where we unpack a range of forces which will shape the way we use our urban areas over the next decade.
In this article we examine the role of AI (Artificial Intelligence) in the delivery of services. It is inevitable that the delivery of services to individuals or to business will substantially change over the coming decade as the 4th industrial revolution takes hold – the blurring of lines between physical, digital and biological spheres.
AI – Technologies and their Application
The term artificial intelligence (AI) refers to computing systems that perform tasks normally considered within the realm of human decision making. These software-driven systems and intelligent agents leverage Big Data repository to make decisions and take actions that approximate cognitive functions, including learning and problem solving.
To understand what changes are likely, we first need to understand more about AI, it’s technologies and application.
A literature study in May 2020 titled “Artificial Intelligence in Service Delivery Systems” identified 4 main AI technologies that are being used;
- Machine Learning – which often uses statistical techniques to allow computers to learn with data and includes artificial neural networks and deep learnings.
- Speech recognition – which enables devices to recognize, adapt and translate voice information in understandable forms
- Visual recognition – which enables a device to reproduce the effect of human vision by electronically perceiving and understanding an image, and
- Natural language processing – which is similar to speech recognition but which is more intuitive, enabling a dialogue to continue between a person and a machine.
When put to work these technologies enable a range of services to be performed with greater speed and accuracy than convention human based systems.
There are many examples that exist where we these technologies are already in use in our day to day lives eg route planning in google maps, voice activated prompts like Siri, Alexa, the picking and packaging of products in a warehouse, the prediction of delivery times at the point of an on line sale etc etc.
Service Industries using AI
With a comprehensive understanding of business processes, many organisations are using AI, armed with Big Data and the key technologies outlined above, to shape a better delivery of services.
The service industries which are at the forefront of AI include;
- Financial Services
- Insurance Services
- Healthcare & Life Sciences
- Communications Service Providers
- Government Services
- Energy & Utilities
- Building Design & Automation
- Transport & Parking Services
Initially, these industries are focused on improving internal processes to delivery more efficient outcomes, including
- Intelligent alerting
- Problem solving
- Root cause analysis
- Threat detection
- Incident auto-remediation
- Capacity & space optimization
- Systems control
- Transport / Travel optimization
However as AI evolves, service industries will use the same technologies to;
- identify target markets
- profile consumers
- provide for faster customer verification and on boarding processes
- establish customised solutions for customers
- predict and safeguard customer behaviour
- generate greater customer loyalty
As tools, AI will provide a faster speed to market for products, solutions and services.
What are the implications for our Urban Environment ?
Our urban areas will become smarter with technology assisting in the efficient movement of people, goods and services around the cities.
The following NVIDIA video is just an example of how technologies company are already putting plans in place to aide this process.
The embedding of sensor information in cameras and pavements or anywhere in the built environment could theoretically be used with AI to bring insights and avoid problems before they occur.
To do this Governments need to build systems that talk to each other and bring together sources of information from a variety of areas in a way that allows AI to analyse, interpret and provide insights and recommendation to city planners and managers.
The NSW Government has started this process with by created a Digital Twin NSW of the state. The intention is to facilitate better planning, design and modelling for future needs. The Department of Finance, Services and Innovation’s Spatial Services and the Commonwealth Scientific Industry Research Organisation’s Data61 have developed an interactive platform to capture and display real-time 3D and 4D spatial data in order to model the urban environment.
AI Technology will ultimately assist in produce better planning outcomes, and more efficient systems.
What are the Implications for Real Estate ?
The implications for Real Estate are that service businesses which currently occupying space under an old model of service delivery will no longer require the same space with a new AI driven approach.
Business in the industries listed above may find that large corporate office space for call centre staff or processing will be obsolete.
The workforce needed to develop, consider and run the technologies may also be in different areas (or countries) to the current business, again influencing the current demands for office space.
There will however be greater demand for more DataCentres as the need to store data locally and securely will be of critical importance.
Artificial Intelligent systems have and will continue to be put to use to bring about more efficient delivery of services. The speed of change will increase and the implications for the use of real estate space should be top of mind when considering investment options.
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