An 8th Planet Is Found Orbiting a Distant Star, With A.I.’s Help

An 8th Planet Is Found Orbiting a Distant Star, With A.I.’s Help

Trilobites By NICHOLAS ST. FLEUR

DEC. 14, 2017

With eight planets whirling around its sun, our solar system has held the galactic title for having the most known planets of any star system in the Milky Way. But on Thursday NASA announced the discovery of a new exoplanet orbiting a distant star some 2,500 light years away from here called Kepler 90, bringing that system’s total to eight planets as well.

The new planet, known as Kepler-90i, is rocky and hot. It orbits its star about once every 14 days. The finding was made using data collected by NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, a planet hunter that has spotted more than 2,500 confirmed exoplanets since its launch in 2009. Unlike those previous discoveries, the new exoplanet was detected with the help of an artificial intelligence researcher at Google using a machine learning technique called neural networking.

“This is the first time a neural network specifically has been used to identify a new exoplanet,” said Christopher Shallue, a software engineer at Google who helped make the finding. The technology, which is loosely inspired by the human brain, is designed to recognize patterns and classify images. It can learn to tell the difference between something simple like a cat and a dog, and also to distinguish exoplanets from cosmic noise.

For the project, the computer looked at a small chunk of data gathered by Kepler from 2009 to 2013. Of the 150,000 stars represented in Kepler’s collection, the computer combed through 670 star systems for signs of exoplanets. Astronomers spot exoplanets when the celestial bodies move, or transit, in front of their stars. The interaction causes a dip in brightness that creates a detectable signal.

So far, the data set has about 35,000 such signals. The astronomers trained the program on a set of about 15,000 signals, and it identified planets correctly 96 percent of the time. The neural network learned what was a planet and what was not a planet and was able to find the exoplanet Kepler-90i, as well as a second exoplanet named Kepler-80g around a different star system.

Next, the researchers plan to explore more star systems studied by Kepler. “We plan to search all 150,000 stars in the Kepler data system,” said Mr. Shallue.

Andrew Vanderburg, an astronomer at the University of Texas, Austin, said that Kepler-90i is about 30 percent larger than Earth and about as hot as the planet Mercury, reaching about 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Like the other seven planets in its system, it is packed close to its star. It resembles a miniature version of our solar system, he said, where the most distant known planet is about as far away from its star as the Earth is from our sun. But there could be additional, more distant planets not yet detected because planets close to their stars may be easier for astronomers to find.

Seth Shostak an astronomer with the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif., who was not involved in the project said the finding that Kepler 90 has eight planets shows that our solar system is “just another duck in a row.” “The bad news is we’re not quite as special as we thought we were,” he said. “But the good news is we may have a lot of cosmic company.”

It’s possible that the two systems may not be tied for long as astronomers search the outer reaches of our solar system for the elusive Planet Nine. It sets the stage for a new space race: Which team will break the intragalactic deadlock? Will artificial intelligence first detect another planet in the Kepler-90 system, or will astronomers find a distant ninth planet orbiting our sun? “It’s kind of cool to see which one will be proven next,” said Jessie Dotson, Kepler’s project scientist at NASA.

AI時代的職場生存條件

林建甫》AI時代的職場生存條件

2017年12月11日

林建甫

最近人工智慧AI的發展，一日千里。現代人的一個痛點，恐怕都要擔心未來的工作會不會被取代掉。國內電子零組件大廠正崴日前表示將強化生產技術，建立自動化產線，提升產品生產良率，預估5年內人力減半。不約而同地，統一企業也證實7-ELEVEN將應用新科技開設第1家無人超商，最快明年上半年就會問世。而全世界金融機構的分行都在裁撤，因為電子轉帳、支付都不再臨櫃，理財真的交給機器人就可以了。他們不收佣金、誠實、沒有情緒，完全理性，表現可能更值得信賴。

AI議題真正引起大家重視的是在1997年時，IBM的深藍（DeepBlue）戰勝西洋棋世界冠軍後，當時的《時代》（Times）雜誌還認為電腦要在更複雜的圍棋上戰勝人類，可能還要再過100年，甚至更長的時間。未料，谷歌的深智（DeepMind）團隊開發的AI圍棋程式AlphaGo，利用深度學習與強化學習，自2016年起擊敗多位世界級的職業圍棋棋士，只用了原本《時代》雜誌預估100年的1/5時間。稍後再度進化的AlphaGo Zero不依靠人類玩家的數據創建，僅透過自我對弈，幾天之內它就發展出擊敗人類頂尖棋手的技能，對比AlphaGo要達到同等水平則需要數月的訓練。

就在前幾天，深智團隊再將AlphaGo中代表圍棋的Go去掉，成為AlphaZero，標榜是通用棋類的人工智慧程式，可以從零自學任何棋藝：圍棋、西洋棋、日本將棋…，其表現已經擊敗AlphaGo Zero。舉世現在希望利用AlphaZero來研究重大疾病，盼治癒人類數百年來找不到療法的疾病，包括阿茲海默症、帕金森氏症、囊狀纖維症等。

AI發展到今天，最基本的就是電腦的運算跟儲存的進步。近幾年移動裝置本身的儲存、運算與聯網的雲端資訊已經徹底改變我們的生活。這裡面的一個關鍵是演算法的改良及大數據的分析。演算法是利用電腦算數學的學問，是求解的利器，它近年利用類神經網路的原理，產生更有效的輸入跟輸出，得到仿人類的學習，因此可以很快得到準確的結果；而大數據的獲得是利用日益發展的感測裝置與物聯網，收集源源不絕傳統的數字，或非傳統的影像、聲音再萃取其特徵值，有的甚至進入雲端進行儲存及後繼的運算分析。

最新手機的刷臉，視覺辨識燈光打下偵測臉部3D形體的數據，一次就高達上萬筆做立即的計算。而無人自動駕駛車，靠前後左右的鏡頭來感應周遭環境及聯網取得道路資訊，綜合迅速運算來控制行車。

人類輸了棋，其實也不用覺得沮喪。因為人不可能跑贏馬，這是人類天生的限制。我們不可能比電腦記憶容量更大、運算速度更快，也沒有永遠不出錯的精準與不衰退的記憶。人類重要的是要懂得駕馭電腦，人機能協作，還有做好決策與發展創意，精進對美的欣賞與情感的表達，這都是機器所沒辦法取代的。

回到工作的問題。《日本經濟新聞》和英國《金融時報》（Financial Times）今年7月的共同調查指出，在820種職業、2069項工作中，約有34%（約710項工作）的工作可被機器人替代。以勞工為例，製造業77項工作中，高達75%可以自動化；食品加工業則是很有危機，所有工作都可由機械技術代替。至於金融業60項工作中，包括建立檔案與整理數據等，65%工作可自動化。另外，公司高層需處理的63項工作任務中，管理決策與領導魅力無法被取代，只有22%如製作業績報告可由機器代替。至於畫家、演員、音樂家及其他藝術相關職業，65項工作中，只有17%可以應用機械人技術。

總之，在人工智慧AI時代，我們不要再期望「安穩」的工作。因為「安穩」意味著簡單、重複，這些僅靠記憶與練習就可以掌握的工作，將最沒有價值，最快被機器取代。我們要選擇那些具有「不穩定且多變化」的工作。這些工作的背後是人性，是需要創造或管理能力。因此培養創造力、經常學習新知，能旁徵博引、綜合分析與正確下決策是不被淘汰的不二法門。

（作者為台灣經濟研究院院長、國立台灣大學經濟系教授）

抓住大陸豪打AI牌的商機

抓住大陸豪打AI牌的商機

陸將主導全球AI 對美威脅超朝核

2017年11月26日

言論部

人工智慧（AI）被稱為「全面的知識戰爭」。大陸將AI提升為「彎道超車」的國家戰略之一，官產學研商一齊發力，展現趕超美國、助推中華民族復興的強烈企圖心。

本月15日大陸科技部在北京召開「新一代人工智慧發展規畫暨重大科技專案啟動會」，宣布成立由15個部門構成的新一代人工智慧發展規畫推進辦公室，以及27名專家組成的新一代人工智慧戰略諮詢委員會。同時公布首批4家國家新一代人工智慧開放創新平台名單，包括依託百度公司建設自動駕駛平台、依託阿里雲公司建設城市大腦平台、依託騰訊公司建設醫療影像平台、依託科大訊飛公司建設智慧語音平台。

這次啟動會，距離大陸國務院印發《新一代人工智慧發展規畫》只有4個月，距離舉世矚目的中共十九大不到1個月。體現出大陸發展人工智慧「動真格」，欲在「新時代」有「新氣象」、「新作為」。綜觀內外情勢，大陸豪打AI牌，時機好、有章法、成算大。

其一，目標明確。北京已提出AI「三步走」戰略：2020年，人工智慧總體技術和應用要與世界先進水準同步；到2025年，人工智慧基礎理論實現重大突破，技術與應用部分達到世界領先水準，在重點應用領域初步形成自主的新一代人工智慧應用技術體系；到2030年，人工智慧理論、技術及應用總體達到世界領先水準，建立系統的新一代人工智慧理論與技術體系，占據人工智慧技術制高點，成為世界主要人工智慧創新中心。

其二，先發優勢。AI不是新事物，從概念的提出至今已有60餘年，目前進入新階段。大陸雄厚的經濟、科技實力，「集中力量辦大事」的體制優勢，可以助其搶抓重大戰略機遇，構築AI發展的先發優勢。

其三，融合共用。大陸發展AI，固然有提升國家競爭力、維護國家安全的戰略考慮，也有藉此打造經濟發展新引擎、服務社會惠及民眾的目的。首次入選「國家隊」的4家企業，均是響噹噹的業界翹楚，取其公司第一個字母，大陸業界稱之為「BATX」。它們在AI領域各有所長，百度與金龍汽車合作生產一款無人駕駛的小巴車，最快在2018年實現量產；馬雲創辦的阿里雲公司，打造出全球最大規模的人工智慧公共系統，不斷以智慧「造城」；騰訊發布一款AI醫學影像產品──騰訊覓影，食道癌篩檢的準確率超過90%，在肺結核方面可以檢測出3毫米及以上的微小結節，準確率逾95%；科大訊飛開發的語音辨識系統，稱雄天下。

其四，商機無限。根據陸方發布的《新一代人工智慧發展規畫》，2020年大陸人工智慧核心產業規模料將超過1500億元（人民幣，下同），帶動相關產業規模超過1兆元；2025年，人工智慧核心產業規模超過4000億元，帶動相關產業規模超過5兆元；2030年人工智慧核心產業規模超過1兆元，帶動相關產業規模超過10兆元。AI前景廣闊，必帶來龐大商機，台商亦可從中獲益，兩岸找尋到合作空間。

未來並不遙遠，顛覆已在路上。日本經濟新聞和學術出版巨頭愛思唯爾（Elsevier）共同分析各國研究機構及大學等有關AI的論文被引用次數，結果發現大陸以大學為中心被引用數迅速增加。AI相關論文被引用數居首的是擁有語音辨識技術等的美國微軟，居次是新加坡的南洋理工大學，第3則是中國科學院。在前100名中，美國的機構達到30家，大陸也占其中15家，日本只有東京大學排在第64名。大趨勢很明顯，中美正爭鋒人工智慧研究，日本被遠遠甩在後面。

事實上，大陸的國際科技論文發表量和發明專利授權量已居世界第二，部分領域核心關鍵技術實現重要突破，高鐵、支付寶、共用單車、網購、無人機等令世人稱羨。

大陸AI強勢成軍，必會加速縮小與美國在基礎演算法、理論研究、企業數量、產業布局、人才隊伍等方面的差距，趕超美國不再遙不可及。

How Evil Is Tech?

How Evil Is Tech?

David Brooks NOV. 20, 2017

Not long ago, tech was the coolest industry. Everybody wanted to work at Google, Facebook and Apple. But over the past year the mood has shifted. Some now believe tech is like the tobacco industry — corporations that make billions of dollars peddling a destructive addiction. Some believe it is like the N.F.L. — something millions of people love, but which everybody knows leaves a trail of human wreckage in its wake. Surely the people in tech — who generally want to make the world a better place — don’t want to go down this road. It will be interesting to see if they can take the actions necessary to prevent their companies from becoming social pariahs.

There are three main critiques of big tech. The first is that it is destroying the young. Social media promises an end to loneliness but actually produces an increase in solitude and an intense awareness of social exclusion. Texting and other technologies give you more control over your social interactions but also lead to thinner interactions and less real engagement with the world.

As Jean Twenge has demonstrated in book and essay, since the spread of the smartphone, teens are much less likely to hang out with friends, they are less likely to date, they are less likely to work. Eighth graders who spend 10 or more hours a week on social media are 56 percent more likely to say they are unhappy than those who spend less time. Eighth graders who are heavy users of social media increase their risk of depression by 27 percent. Teens who spend three or more hours a day on electronic devices are 35 percent more likely to have a risk factor for suicide, like making a plan for how to do it. Girls, especially hard hit, have experienced a 50 percent rise in depressive symptoms.

The second critique of the tech industry is that it is causing this addiction on purpose, to make money. Tech companies understand what causes dopamine surges in the brain and they lace their products with “hijacking techniques” that lure us in and create “compulsion loops.” Snapchat has Snapstreak, which rewards friends who snap each other every single day, thus encouraging addictive behavior. News feeds are structured as “bottomless bowls” so that one page view leads down to another and another and so on forever. Most social media sites create irregularly timed rewards; you have to check your device compulsively because you never know when a burst of social affirmation from a Facebook like may come.

The third critique is that Apple, Amazon, Google and Facebook are near monopolies that use their market power to invade the private lives of their users and impose unfair conditions on content creators and smaller competitors. The political assault on this front is gaining steam. The left is attacking tech companies because they are mammoth corporations; the right is attacking them because they are culturally progressive. Tech will have few defenders on the national scene. Obviously, the smart play would be for the tech industry to get out in front and clean up its own pollution.

There are activists like Tristan Harris of Time Well Spent, who is trying to move the tech world in the right directions. There are even some good engineering responses. I use an app called Moment to track and control my phone usage. The big breakthrough will come when tech executives clearly acknowledge the central truth: Their technologies are extremely useful for the tasks and pleasures that require shallower forms of consciousness, but they often crowd out and destroy the deeper forms of consciousness people need to thrive.

Online is a place for human contact but not intimacy. Online is a place for information but not reflection. It gives you the first stereotypical thought about a person or a situation, but it’s hard to carve out time and space for the third, 15th and 43rd thought. Online is a place for exploration but discourages cohesion. It grabs control of your attention and scatters it across a vast range of diverting things. But we are happiest when we have brought our lives to a point, when we have focused attention and will on one thing, wholeheartedly with all our might.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote that we take a break from the distractions of the world not as a rest to give us more strength to dive back in, but as the climax of living. “The seventh day is a palace in time which we build. It is made of soul, joy and reticence,” he said. By cutting off work and technology we enter a different state of consciousness, a different dimension of time and a different atmosphere, a “mine where the spirit’s precious metal can be found.”

Imagine if instead of claiming to offer us the best things in life, tech merely saw itself as providing efficiency devices. Its innovations can save us time on lower-level tasks so we can get offline and there experience the best things in life. Imagine if tech pitched itself that way. That would be an amazing show of realism and, especially, humility, which these days is the ultimate and most disruptive technology.

Our Love Affair With Digital Is Over

Our Love Affair With Digital Is Over

By DAVID SAX NOV. 18, 2017

A decade ago I bought my first smartphone, a clunky little BlackBerry 8830 that came in a sleek black leather sheath. I loved that phone. I loved the way it effortlessly slid in and out of its case, loved the soft purr it emitted when an email came in, loved the silent whoosh of its trackball as I played Brick Breaker on the subway and the feel of its baby keys clicking under my fat thumbs. It was the world in my hands, and when I had to turn it off, I felt anxious and alone.

Like most relationships we plunge into with hearts aflutter, our love affair with digital technology promised us the world: more friends, money and democracy! Free music, news and same-day shipping of paper towels! A laugh a minute, and a constant party at our fingertips. Many of us bought into the fantasy that digital made everything better. We surrendered to this idea, and mistook our dependence for romance, until it was too late.

Today, when my phone is on, I feel anxious and count down the hours to when I am able to turn it off and truly relax. The love affair I once enjoyed with digital technology is over — and I know I’m not alone. Ten years after the iPhone first swept us off our feet, the growing mistrust of computers in both our personal lives and the greater society we live in is inescapable.

This publishing season is flush with books raising alarms about digital technology’s pernicious effects on our lives: what smartphones are doing to our children; how Facebook and Twitter are eroding our democratic institutions; and the economic effects of tech monopolies. A recent Pew Research Center survey noted that more than 70 percent of Americans were worried about automation’s impact on jobs, while just 21 percent of respondents to a Quartz survey said they trust Facebook with their personal information. Nearly half of millennials worry about the negative effects of social media on their mental and physical health, according to the American Psychiatric Association. So what now?

As much as we might fantasize about it, we probably won’t delete our social media accounts and toss our phones in the nearest body of water. What we can do is to restore some sense of balance over our relationship with digital technology, and the best way to do that is with analog: the ying to digital’s yang. Thankfully, the analog world is still here, and not only is it surviving but, in many cases, it is thriving. Sales of old-fashioned print books are up for the third year in a row, according to the Association of American Publishers, while ebook sales have been declining. Independent bookstores have been steadily expanding for several years. Vinyl records have witnessed a decade-long boom in popularity (more than 200,000 newly pressed records are sold each week in the United States), while sales of instant-film cameras, paper notebooks, board games and Broadway tickets are all growing again.

This surprising reversal of fortune for these apparently “obsolete” analog technologies is too often written off as nostalgia for a predigital time. But younger consumers who never owned a turntable and have few memories of life before the internet drive most of the current interest in analog, and often include those who work in Silicon Valley’s most powerful companies.

Analog, although more cumbersome and costly than its digital equivalents, provides a richness of experience that is unparalleled with anything delivered through a screen. People are buying books because a book engages nearly all of their senses, from the smell of the paper and glue to the sight of the cover design and weight of the pages read, the sound of those sheets turning, and even the subtle taste of the ink on your fingertips. A book can be bought and sold, given and received, and displayed on a shelf for anyone to see. It can start conversations and cultivate romances. The limits of analog, which were once seen as a disadvantage, are increasingly one of the benefits people are turning to as a counterweight to the easy manipulation of digital.

Though a page of paper is limited by its physical size and the permanence of the ink that marks it, there is a powerful efficiency in that simplicity. The person holding the pen above that notebook page is free to write, doodle or scribble her idea however she wishes between those borders, without the restrictions or distractions imposed by software. In a world of endless email chains, group chats, pop-up messages or endlessly tweaked documents and images, the walled garden of analog saves both time and inspires creativity.

Web designers at Google have been required to use pen and paper as a first step when brainstorming new projects for the past several years, because it leads to better ideas than those begun on a screen. In contrast with the virtual “communities” we have built online, analog actually contributes to the real places where we live.

I have become friendly with Ian Cheung, the appropriately opinionated owner of June Records, up the street from my home in Toronto. I benefit not only from the tax revenues that June Records contributes as a local business (paving the roads, paying my daughter’s teachers) but also from living nearby. Like the hardware store, Italian grocer and butcher on the same block, the brick and mortar presence of June adds to my neighborhood’s sense of place (i.e., a place with a killer selection of Cannonball Adderley and local indie albums) and gives me a feeling of belonging.

I also have no doubts that, unlike Twitter, Ian would immediately kick out any Nazi or raving misogynist who started ranting inside his store. Analog excels particularly well at encouraging human interaction, which is crucial to our physical and mental well-being.

The dynamic of a teacher working in a classroom full of students has not only proven resilient, but has outperformed digital learning experiments time and again. Digital may be extremely efficient in transferring pure information, but learning happens best when we build upon the relationships between students, teachers and their peers. We do not face a simple choice of digital or analog. That is the false logic of the binary code that computers are programmed with, which ignores the complexity of life in the real world. Instead, we are faced with a decision of how to strike the right balance between the two. If we keep that in mind, we are taking the first step toward a healthy relationship with all technology, and, most important, one another.

David Sax is the author of “The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter.”

新科技的美麗與哀愁：AI是阻力還是助力？

新科技的美麗與哀愁：AI是阻力還是助力？

【吳碧娥╱北美智權報 編輯部】

1997 年5 月11 日，由IBM開發的超級電腦「深藍」（Deep Blue）第一次打敗了當時世界西洋棋冠軍加里·卡斯帕洛夫（Garry Kasparov），成為人工智慧的歷史性事件。台灣IBM公司全球企業諮詢服務事業群總經理賈景光在「眺望2018產業發展趨勢研討會」中指出，只要持續輸入所有棋譜資料，透過人工智慧演算，「電腦或人工智慧打敗人類」這個結果，可說是「回不去了」。不過也不用太悲觀，這只不過是「所有的數據」打敗「一個人」的智慧，未來並不是電腦與人的競爭，人工智慧與人類的關係將發展成「有用AI的人打敗沒有使用AI的人」，主體終究還是「人」。

而身為第一個被人工智慧打敗的西洋棋棋王，卡斯帕洛夫在時隔20年後出版的新書《Deep Thinking: Where Machine Intelligence Ends and Human Creativity Begins》中也呼籲，人們應該更樂觀看待人工智慧，並停止把機器當作對手看待。

在未來五到十年中，IBM 提出的AI AI (Augmented Intelligence) 是以「擴增智慧」為主力發展，賈景光強調，人工智慧是協助人們將工作的一部分自動化，而不是取代人類，透過人工智慧的決策輔助，人們可將其餘的工作做得更好。

在兩三年前，IBM人工智慧品牌華生 (WATSON) 投入試用時，第一個選擇的行業就是醫療產業，當IBM帶著WATSON到醫院請醫生試用時，卻引起醫生大怒，認為是在挑戰醫生的專業和經驗。其實WATSON使用的情境和醫生所想像的並不一樣，WATSON並不是代替醫生下診斷，而是透過事實和證據為基礎的判斷，做為醫生下最後診斷前的第二意見(second opinion)。

由於WATSON可以在短短數秒內大量閱讀醫療期刊文獻，這是人類所做不到的。透過資料庫當中巨量的病例資料，WATSON針對病人症狀分析出各種可能的病因，可降低醫生誤診的機率；或是參考其他國家類似病例的用藥結果，提升醫生「用對藥」的機率。經一段時間試用後，超過八成的醫生都願意使用WATSON作為助手，讓病人得到更好的診治。賈景光解釋，AI並不是跟人搶飯碗，電腦的功能就是彙整資料，若人和電腦能各自針對高價值的項目相互協作，才是AI的價值所在。

國內發展AI 仍有「五缺」

國際研究暨顧問機構Gartner發現，從2016年到2017年間，與AI相關的問題諮詢多達4,353件，年成長高達五倍。根據Gartner調查，雖然多數企業都對AI有興趣，但近六成企業仍停留在「資訊蒐集」階段，真正採取行動的目前僅占12％。工研院IEK也在2016年至2017年調查國內六大產業共20家業者發現，業者對於引入人工智慧升級產業有強烈需求，但有許多執行上的共通問題，包括：缺乏對AI的應用、缺乏AI專業人才、缺乏performance認證場域、缺乏個資處理經驗、以及國內市場太小等產業「五缺」。

工研院IEK政府業務服務辦公室計畫副組長楊瑞臨指出，AI最具看好的應用是在「客戶關係與業務行銷管理」，像是客戶關係管理、強化客戶行為預測，不論是B2B或者是B2C都具相當發展潛力；此外，以AI結合IoT的AIoT，未來在資源管理以及提升企業的生產力與競爭力上，將是各產業領域的重要發展方向。

楊瑞臨認為，AI將會取代許多人工作的說法應是言過其實，但A支援並協助許多職業提升整體工作成效則可預見。Gartner在今年8月的調查結果顯示，「人才缺乏」是目前人工智慧遇到最大的挑戰，不只影響企業導入AI的時程，甚至是「連人都找不到」。由於AI專業人才不足，導致人才競逐以及磁吸效應所帶來的人才分布不均，供需失衡之下，AI人才價碼水漲船高，也會直接影響AI的應用與改善人類生活及工作的進展期程。企業若能運用線上AI課程及多元的open-source資源，一點一滴逐步導入AI，可降低相當成本與縮短學習曲線。

2020年AI機器人市場規模達800億美元

而導入人工智慧，最大目的是降低因應外界變化所需的成本，特別是用在生產製造的機器人上，未來機器人的產業地圖將會因AI而有顯著的改變。IEK預期，涵蓋人工智慧技術的機器人相關產品將以等比級數成長，全球市場規模將在2020年超過至800億美元。工研院IEK機械組機械部分析師黃仲宏指出，隨著人工智慧生態系的不斷擴大，當機器人可透過物聯網(IoT)與網路連結，再加上人工智慧的溝通功能，讓我們看見服務型機器人走向普及的曙光。目前全球主要IT公司產品幾乎都已經與AI脫離不了關係，加上Google、Microsoft、FB、Apple、IBM等大廠陸續推出與AI相關的產品，積極搶當人工智慧的龍頭，接著就是要讓AI的價值被機器人彰顯；未來機器人的產業地圖將會因人工智慧而有顯著的改變，而新創公司亦扮演重要角色。

台商不能只做製造和加工

面對新科技，最大的贏家不是加倍複製成功的過去，而是能引導人們轉向成長產業的社會和企業，機器人產業就是其中之一。黃仲宏認為，工業機器人製造者有強者恆強、大者恆大的趨勢，台灣廠商不應只專注於製造和銷售機械手臂產品，儘管CP值高，卻是與德國Kuka、日本Fanuc等現有高市占率的工業機器人製造商硬碰硬，台廠要聚焦於已有的機器人製造發展經驗，與資通訊系統整合，進而運用人工智慧技術讓機器人產品發展後發先至，才能成為未來的優勢產品。

工研院IEK主任蘇孟宗認為，由人工智慧所引領的第四波科技創新正在發生，不論是既有產業的轉型升級，或是新創企業的突破創新，人工智慧都將是發展關鍵，如果能有效運用人工智慧，產業就能提升競爭力。過去台灣在高科技產業的國際分工體系中，扮演製造加工的代工角色，面對AIOT時代來臨，台灣的AI優勢在於製造業的終端資料、各類型資料庫(先進製造、健康醫療等)、及半導體核心運算技術等，應運用優勢扮演垂直整合或生態系領導者的關鍵伙伴，同時透過智慧系統與服務，可望提升製造業附加價值創造，強化供應鏈管理與帶動新需求，也能提高服務業勞動生產力，創造新型態科技服務模式。