Smart Industry 1/2016

News
Retail
Showroom
Chatbot App
Can chatbots reduce app overload?
Executives of both Microsoft and Facebook think users
suffer from app overload, and that chatbots are the
answer. “Bots” are stripped-down software agents that
understand what you type or say and respond by answering
questions or executing tasks. Microsoft CEO Satya
Nadella unveiled his version at the Build 2016 developer
conference in San Francisco, Mark Zuckerberg announced
the new Facebook Messenger. They join a growing host
of intelligent personal assistants such as Apple’s Siri,
Amazon’s Alexa or Google Now. Zuckerberg is excited
about the marriage of popular text-messaging programs
and burgeoning artificial-intelligence techniques, and
analysts expect the new bot to boost Facebook’s bottom
line. Bots will know what you like, remember what you’ve
told them and cooperate to make your life easier.
Connected wine
Smart bottle keeps wine fresh
The Boston startup Kuvée has launched
what they call the “world’s first
connected wine bottle” – an intelligent
flask equipped with Wi-Fi and a touchscreen
that they claim will keep an
opened wine fresh for 30 days. The system
is expected to open up the benefits
of a good restaurant-wine for home
use. Currently only available in the U.S.,
the world’s first connected wine bottle
comes with a selection of four wines
from leading California growers including
the famous estate owned by film
director Francis Ford Coppola.
French Retail
French retail facing big change
At a conference in Lyon, France, professionals
and industry experts were
askied to give their estimates of how
new technologies will impact retail.
Their answers: Connected devices are
Answer me!
Chatbots, or
„bots“ for short,
will know what
you like and
remember what
you‘ve told them
even if you can‘t
Connect or not?
Lighting systems
and watches will
lead the way to
IoT, many professionals
believe.
changing not only business models
ibut how sales are handlied in stores.
These products, they believe, are part
of a disruptive trend that will see the
emergence of new sales techniques
or challenge existing models. Some
atendees said they were thinking
about production-based valuation
opportunities as well as ways to offer
additional services to improve the
perceived value of the products themselves.
Connected
Doubts about connecting
everyday objects
Lamps, watches and washing machines
that connect to the Internet are
fine, refrigerators, toasters and coffee
machines maybe not so much. In a recent
survey the German technology
and innovation consulting company
Ivensity asked professionals worldwide
to choose which everyday objects
they believe are best suited to be part
of the Internet of Things. Almost twothirds
say lighting systems and watches
will lead the way. Only two percent
believe in connected toasters.
Talking Machine
Talking to the operating machines
Thanks to networked medical devices,
surgeons can communicate
with a hospital’s IT infrastructure in
real time while performing an operation.
Or.net, a project developed under
the auspices of the German Ministry
of Education and Research (BMBF),
provides interfaces for data exchange
between medical devices from different
manufacturers. „For complicated
surgical procedures it is important
that doctors work fast and accurately
and can fully concentrate on the patient.
All necessary information must
be available at a glance and directly
at the operating table”, says Johanna
Wanka, the German research minister.
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