The Promising Rise of Robotics
No longer relegated to the realm of sci-fi, robotics and automation play an important role in more and more industries. The technology is advancing rapidly, transforming how our society will operate in the future.
Technology futurist Dr Jordan Nguyen facilitated a panel with industry experts exploring the latest innovations in robotics that are transforming how we live and work, and the promising future of human and robot interactions.
Featuring Dor Skuler, CEO and Co-Founder of Intuition Robotics, recently announced as a partner with the state of New York providing robot companions to older adults. Intuition Robotics, based in Israel, is on the forefront of AI technology supporting human interaction and companionship, with robots designed to combat loneliness and isolation. Dr Nicole Robinson from Monash Robotics, the newly announced world-class robotics research facility in Melbourne, who shared the latest developments in the world-leading robotics precinct, including advancements in AI knowledge and human-centred robotics innovations, and Professor Mary-Anne Williams, the Michael J Crouch Chair in Innovation at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Business School.
Moderator
Dr Jordan Nguyen
Inventor & Technology Futurist
Dr Jordan Nguyen is a leading inventor and technology futurist in Australia, with a background in electrical and biomedical engineering, robotics, artificial intelligence, and extended reality technologies. Jordan is founder and CEO of Psykinetic, a social business creating futuristic, inclusive and empowering technologies to improve independence and quality of life for people with disability and the elderly. He is also an award-winning documentary maker and presenter with numerous films on the ABC (including Becoming Superhuman and Meet The Avatars) and Discovery Channel (including Smart China: Startup Revolutions, Vietnam: Connecting East Africa, and Frontiers of Science).
Dr Jordan has a recent book. A Human's Guide to the Future, on how humanity can thrive through our ever-evolving technology, published with Pan Macmillan. He is now working on his own technology lab / production house, aiming to continue creating world-changing content on how we can shape a better tomorrow harnessing advancements in science and technology.
Speakers
Dor Skuler
Co-Founder and CEO, Intuition Robotics
A serial entrepreneur Dor Skuler has co-founded five ventures, the most recent being Intuition Robotics, following his passion to develop artificial intelligence-driven robotics that address major social issues of the 21st century. Intuition Robotics builds digital companions that create a relationship between humans and machines such as ElliQ – ‘the sidekick for happier aging’. Intuition Robotics recently announced a partnership with the New York State Office for the Aging to put ElliQ in the homes of more than 800 older adults.
Dr Nicole Robinson
Research Fellow, Monash Robotics, Monash University
Dr Nicole Robinson is a Research Fellow at Monash University and an Adjunct Lecturer with QUT Centre for Robotics. She is affiliated with Monash Robotics, Department of Electrical & Computer Systems Engineering, Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health, and the School of Psychological Sciences. She leads an interdisciplinary research team that specialises across both scientific methods and novel engineering. Her research focus is to evaluate and improve the quality and success of human-robot teamwork, putting humans first in the push towards creating human-robot societies. She is also a co-founder of LYRO Robotics, a robotics and AI company that creates intelligent robots.
Professor Mary-Anne Williams
Michael J Crouch Chair in Innovation, University of New South Wales Business School
Mary-Anne Williams is the Michael J Crouch Chair in Innovation at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Business School. She has spent more than 30 years blending AI and robotics. Mary-Anne worked with the robotics Willow Garage in California and bought the first and only PR2 to Australia. She led her team to become International Social Robotics World Champions at RoboCup 2019 and broke new ground by leading Australia's largest Social Robotics project with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
Mary-Anne has received multiple awards including the 2019 Australasian Distinguished Artificial Intelligence Contribution Award from the Australian Computer Society; two Google Faculty Machine Learning Awards; an IBM Faculty Award in 2008. She serves on the International Journal of Social Robotics and was Conference Chair for the International Conference on Social Robotics, 2021 Australasian Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence and was invited to speak at World Expo in Dubai in 2022.