Explore IdeasThat Shape the Future.

“Experience of the future” initiative is taken by McDonalds announced their plans to launch digital ordering kiosks by replacing cashiers in their about 2500 of locations. Company is about to extend their services in about 14,000 locations by deploying mobile ordering system, ultimately extending customer self-service. Now the question arises, where does the future lies in the age of robotics and automation. Well its nowhere near what we see in science fiction. We might picture robots as human like (credits to transformers) but they are actually different and look more related to functions or tasks they performs. In early stage, they were more of like big machines, with significant brawn and little else. They were dull, dirty and dangerous. But with passing time, they have became more portable and easy to handle. For instance, in 1980, robots transformed from being hydraulically powered to electrically driven.

Industrial robots currently at work

Currently there are about 1,000,000 functional unit of robots in the world and 50% of the number can be found in Japan alone, whereas US acquires 15% of them. In early stages, 90% of these robots are functioning in car manufacturing for the dirty work, typically in assembly line. But today, the ratio has slipped to 50% of robots in automobile plants, as it is spreading its roots in various other sectors including laboratories, energy plants, warehouse, factories, hospitals and other industries. Currently, robots are handling all the dirty and dangerous work including assembling products, spray painting, handling dangerous materials, cutting and polishing and inspection of products. Robots are also being used for most critical and dangerous tasks including cleaning sewers, detecting bombs, performing intricate surgeries etc. By observing the criticality of the tasks and productivity offered by robots, it has the potential to turn the technology upside down.

Attaining competitive advantage  `

Robots and automation not only increases the productivity but can also help organizations to gain competitive advantage. Take the example of websites with chatbots enabled. They can keep their clients engaged with the help of chatbots by offering them 24x7 services. It overcomes the communication barrier and tend to bring more business to the organization. General motors, with ability to bring more intelligence, is currently acquiring about 40-50k robots for utilizing and developing new utilities. Robots are offering them with significant new strategies to improve their productivity and manufacturing. The focus of robotic manufacturing technology is to minimize the capital investment by increasing flexibility. New robot applications are being found for operations that are already automated with dedicated equipment.

Envisioning future

Although experts envisions robots in human form by emulating human appearance with machine intelligence but it is not that simple and is not happening anytime soon. Despite a small number of industrial robots are integrated with machine vision systems, robot industry still has to cover a very long distance to reach that level. Industrial robots are currently integrated with machine vision, which is why they are called machine vision rather than robot vision. Today, simple pattern matching vision sensors can be purchased for under $2,000 from Cognex, Omron and others. The price reductions reflect today's reduced computing costs, and the focused development of vision systems for specific jobs such as inspection.

Process of executing the application or software to locate a bug or error is known as software testing. Programs are checked for the errors and mistakes in the system. It is possible that the syntax and grammar for the program is correct but the logic isn’t which may open doors for security vulnerabilities. With the software validation and verification of the program can be done using several tools by any human and the errors can be detected easily. It might seem like a single activity but rather a continuous process. It’s good to introduce software testing in the initial stage to make it error and mistake free.

Static testing

In static testing, the procedure identifies the error or mistake in the verification process and rectifies them without needing to execute any extra code. Usually static testing includes reviewing the documents and source code and static analysis. Walkthrough, reviewing, inspection etc are some common examples of static testing.

Dynamic testing

Dynamic testing is conducted to check the errors in the running program and rectifying the coding issue in the running process. It is conducted during the validation process. Integration testing, unit testing, system testing etc are its example.

Testing is important and after reading some of the historic failures, you’ll realize the importance of software testing:

• On April 26, 1994, 264 innocents were killed in China Airline Airbus A300 crash due to a software bug.
• Once, some of the Amazon third party retailers experienced 1p reduction in their product and they faced heavy losses just because of a software glitch.
• Due to software glitch in air bag sensory system, Nissan have to recall over 1 million cars from market. Two accidents were reported due to this failure.
• Bloomberg terminal in London crashed glitch in April 2015, which affected about 300,000 traders.
• In May 1996, nearly about bank accounts of 823 customers were credited with 920 million US dollars, courtesy to software glitch.

Benefits of testing

1. Software testing can be helpful in learning about reliability of the developed program or application.
2. Testing is required for offering various available facilities to users like delivering high quality software or program along with lower maintenance costs and reliable results in most accurate manner possible.
3. Testing is conducted to assure the clients or end users regarding the reliability and satisfaction of the system.
4. Testing is required as it is included n project plan, which helps in staying in business.
5. Testing is majorly conducted to understand the fault errors in software during the development phases.

Technology is witnessed to from on a rapid pace in recent years and it will continue to grow. From artificial intelligence to augmented reality, there are dozens of emerging technologies making their way towards successful future. In 2018, disruptive technologies like cloud computing, Big data analytic, artificial intelligence, machine learning etc are maturing and going to be the game-changing ideas to foundational tools for business. Lets find out some of the disruptive technologies turning the business upside down.

Health and Smart Telehealth tech

Amazon recently announced a smart healthcare technology as “simplified, high-quality and transparent healthcare at a reasonable cost.” They joint a venture with a focus on delivering smart healthcare system to the patients and their family for making the healthcare sector better. It will mainly include IoT technology with connected monitoring system to monitor the patients even in remote areas. Chronically ill patients can be monitored 24x7 by healthcare experts even when they’re not around. Data regarding them will be collected and used for research and analysis, so develop new medication. Tech market reports that business will widely adopt 18 million wearables incorporated into corporate wellness programs.

IoT and smart offices

With the emergence of IoT, it is determined that IoT devices are helping to reduce the costs and improving the technologies. Organizations are now capable of attaining many benefits from adding connectivity and intelligence to their physical infrastructure. They are increasing their productivity and enhancing the work culture by automating the annoying and time-consuming work such as copying and printing document. Smart offices and factories are equipping their infrastructure with sensors and other smart devices. Equipping such devices are proved to be result in reduction in process waste, energy consumption in waste and equipment downtime.

Voice controls and voice assistants

In early days, it was just about digging the depth of technology but now voice-activated assistants have begun permeating the business setting. With the discovery of Alexa by Amazon, rise in demand of voice activated assistants has been observed. To power today’s evolving business setting, we need to propel these businesses with trainable digital assistant technologies that are smart, predictive, have the capability to learn, and can quickly adapt to the new and changing environment.

3D Printing and Smart manufacturing

With the emergence in IoT, automation and 3d printing technology, manufacturing is also improving. In early days, it was considered as a dangerous job but with automation and robotics, this sectors has turned upside down. Various organizations are taking advantage of robotics, automation and 3D printing to improve their manufacturing, productivity and reduce wastage. Technology-driven manufacturing, lean manufacturing innovation is greater than the sum of its parts for players in industrial end markets, which are generally large, with a set of well-understood needs and slim margin.

Video conferencing and VR

Investment in video is increasing as employees determine that videos make a great impact over their employees. It is determined that investing in video will lead to tremendous innovation and will improve collaboration as well. Dery predicts that video tech will continue to simulate and improve face-to-face communication with new features, like virtual reality (VR) and other immersive tech (see below), especially as organizations work to fill the skills gap with distributed teams.  

In the competitive market customers are attracted towards unique but simplified applications. It is essential for the business, whether it is small, medium or large, to offer customized application for increasing their productivity. Majority of businesses confessed that opting for customized application has helped them earning additional business revenues and also increased their consumer base. Customized applications are basically altered according to the core requirement of business to fit their basic requirements. It addresses a particular audience rather than offering a solution which caters to a large group by fulfilling their varying requirements. It makes the customized mobile application development a feasible and attractive option to the business.

Reports state that about 7.5 hours are saved by per employee per week by using customized application and 82% of businesses opt for customized mobile application

Greater elasticity

Developers develops an application according to a limited audience by allocating limited number of resources. With the increase in business, audience can also increase which might need increased number of resources and can make the current application useless. But customised application can enable you with the capability of increasing resources as they are built accordingly and the resources can be increased as per the requirement.

Improved efficiency

Customized applications are built from scratch to meet the core requirements of your business. Customized application will act like a comprehensive app performing wide range of diverse actions and eliminates the need of multiple applications. It ultimately eliminates the need of switching from one application to another and increases the efficiency. It will enhance the working style and productivity of employees ultimately increasing the business ROI.

Efficient integration

It is possible that general applications are working smoothly with the existing software. But custom built applications are designed to work with you current business efficiently. Hence, dodging every possible integration error and function efficiently.

Secured application data

General application cannot guarantee you the greatest security features and may put you business data on security risks. From the security aspects, customized applications are always recommended as they are solely developed according to your business. Custom built applications can reinforce data security system depending upon the relevant security measure required by the type of data you’re using for your business.

Improved relations with customers

As customized application allows you to send personalized updates associated with your services and products to your existing consumers in real-time. Furthermore, it allows business to gain access to your client’s data including feedback and personal information, which can be utilized to improve long-term consumer-business relationship.

Ease of new client data retrieval

For instance, you want to make your application even more effective, there comes custom applications. It will allow you to add forms and questionnaires to conduct surveys by collecting data to acknowledge their preferences. Acknowledging the preferences of the consumers are the best way to keep the engaged and happy. Plus it saves your time and resources as it saves you from collecting data physically using documentations.

Real-time project maintenance  

Customized applications can proved to be very useful as it offers easy access. For instance, if you’re travelling you can have access to the documents in portable manner. You can easily synchronize your phone with your device and can have access to your calendar, files, documents etc.

If you have any kind of custom mobile app development requirement, feel free to reach us by filling the contact form or contact one of our representative.

Cloud computing has been the integral part of web for years now, but people are still not familiar with the optimised use of it. Cloud can be the game changes in web development, only if the developers are capable of seeking the potential benefits from cloud. Main thing about cloud is that it is still a new concept for some new technologies. There are uncountable aspects of cloud computing which are to be associate by experts but are still hidden. There are various benefits of using cloud for web development but developers are still not familiar with them. Web developers can turn the web development upside down by making effective use of cloud computing. Take a look on various benefits that has been offered by cloud computing, associated with web development.

Reliable Development

Cloud computing can offer sheer reliability in terms of excellent backup and recovery services. Cloud computing is not the most perfect technology but it tends to offer more reliable services as compared to other. Cloud computing services couldn’t if its not capable of offering reliability in terms of backup and availability. Reliability of cloud also varies network to network. For instance, if the network you’re using is overpopulated then you might face trouble in accomplishing even the very basic tasks. If you opt for private cloud network, you will pretty much be isolated from slow operating speeds and viruses and can have better web development experience.

Easy Collaboration

Cloud computing can offer ease of collaboration as there are various in-built tools to provide collaboration facility. Developers can have the simplified collaboration tool in isolated manner. For instance, if you’re working on roadmap for project or setting shared goal for the project, you can share it with your fellow team members and it will simultaneously offer you an isolated environment for concentrated development. Plus, it come with the benefit of integrating various tools with task management and analytics. Team members can have real-time updates and access to the analytics associated with current project.

Additional Security

Although there is a myth that cloud is less safe as compared to traditional data storage mechanism, private cloud can actually offer the most secured network. It is necessary for the developers to feel confident from security aspects and having a private cloud can offer you the most secure private network for their cloud services. Also, effective auto backup and recovery option can do the heavy lifting for you. Plus encrypted third-party in-built tools and application can be borrowed and released on requirement and can ease up the complex development.

Increased Productivity

Real-time working tools can really change the manner of designing and development dramatically. Take the instance of Dropbox, there’s no need to shuffle through client contracts and proposals when you can upload them to Dropbox and see them sync up in real time. Developers can be focused on developing rather than reverting the calls and emails. Impervious characteristic of cloud based tools towards major bugs and global blackout can save your company from major disadvantages.

Some of the other benefits of using cloud development:

1. Pay as you go: you can borrow and release the cloud instances depending upon your requirements and the bill rates will be accordingly.
2. Simpler and faster access to the services in centralized manner (TFS/VSTS) for your company, stakeholders and consumers as well.
3. Greater availability of cloud instances can remove bottlenecks from gaining access to the cloud services.
4. You can grow your environment as your growing requirements. Resources can be acquired and released according to your needs due to the rich elasticity capability.

IoT is a technology which interconnects object with different specification in order to create a highly inter-operable connection to offer automation. It is a broad term which is spreading its roots in various industries including automobile, textiles, finance, law, healthcare and industry-specific usecases. With the growing popularity, its investment is also increasing at a rapid pace as in 2013 it was about $1.8 billion and increased to $2.9 billion in 2015. Investment is likely to increase by 24% every year in IoT technology.

“IoT is not an industry but rather a technology acquiring potential to change the work culture and environment for betterment.”

1. Automatic Teller Machine (ATMs) are the first ever IoT object which went online, back in 1974. basically, they are the first generation objects and currently are almost un-hackable due to the outdated operating system.
2. After ATM machines, first actual IoT enable machine was internet-connected vending machine installed at Carnegie Mellon University equipped with sensors. It enabled students to check the availability of stocks and whether the drinks are cold or not.
3. IoT technology is majorly used in jet engines for improving the jet engine technology by General Electric by making use of sensors. Complex sensors installed on airplanes generates up to 14 GB of data per flight. Engineers can make use of that data for making improvements in plane’s structure and other systems.
4. As predicted by Intel, there will be about 300 Billion connected devices by 2020. IHS reported that there were 15.42 million IoT enable connected devices. And the count is expected to reach 75 billion by 2020. Moreover, wearable technology is contributing highly in the increasing popularity of IoT. In 2016, there were about 28 million connected wearable were shipped by retailers. And it is expected to reach the count of 90 million units by 2020.
5. With the increasing number of connected devices investments and money in the certain market is also increasing. Business insider predicts that in next 5 years, there will be about $6 trillion investment in IoT. With the smart technology, IoT has the potential to offer cost-effective services. Take City of Barcelona as instance which is currently saving about $37 million annually by installing IoT enabled smart lighting system. Further, city claims that with this initiative they created about 40,000 new jobs. IoT is also revolutionizing the healthcare sector by making the delivery of healthcare services even better.
6. IoT is not only influencing IT sector but is also being embed in government and public sector. Connected vehicles are also setting trend and is expected to reach 75% of new built-in IoT enabled vehicles, as predicted by business insider. SAP reported that great changes will occur with the implementation of IoT in terms of productivity and supply chain performance. Emerging wearable including headbands, baby monitors, movement sensors, heart rate straps etc are also expected to increase the IoT trends.

 

AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) is an open-source initiative enabling the creation of ads and websites in a faster and effective manner to make the web better for all. Experts can make high-performing and beautiful ads and websites across various devices and distribution devices. The best part about AMP is its ability to publish results according to the advertisers and publishers for improving KPI (Key Performance Indicators). Following are the main reasons, amp for ecommerce is seeking the limelight in 2018 mobile trends.

• eCommerce giants like eBay are seeking services from AMP, which influence other eCommerce businesses to make use of AMP and make improved conversions.
• Apart from hosting conversions, there are other advantages of using AMP- decreasing bounce rate, increase in pageviews, increasing traffic, increasing conversions, and average time on site.
• Google has also been supported for AMP by extending AMP support rather than just sticking to online journals and publishing websites which helped it gain prominence. They show their support for mobile applications and also update their algorithm according to mobile friendliness.
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• A Quick Guide To AMP for ecommerce
  

Working of AMP

Basically, amp for ecommerce supports mobile friendliness and loads the web pages faster than “typical” web pages. The fundamental idea behind this is to strip away the additional clunks from HTML code to make the web page load faster. For using AMP, you need to use an updated streamlined version of CSS and strip out the JavaScript entirely. So main idea behind AMP is to make the HTML light weighted and strip away the traditional HTML chunks. You might get confused between mobile-optimized pages and AMP as Mobile-optimized pages are loadable and viewable in mobile devices, but AMPs are designed to load much faster, providing users with instantly available content.

AMP in a Nutshell

Dedicated mobile development will become even efficient with amp for ecommerce and would suffice the basic requirements of mobile application development. Mobile apps are here to stay and AMP will be there to fulfill the basic requirements of mobile application development. With the relatively new development in AMP by Google and the interest shown by other tech giants, it can be predicted that investing in AMP can be beneficial. Plus smartphones are the major gateway for the users which makes it necessary for start-ups to develop mobile applications. AMP can be the next major step towards success for start-ups and you must seek the opportunity.

Augmented reality is taking everyone with surprise especially after launch of Apple’s AR kit and Google AR-core SDKs. IoT is been in the game for years now which didn’t stop AR to make space in the list of latest trending technologies. Mobile application development is a well established and growing market. Moreover, it is successfully rebuilding and strengthening the expertise in various technologies to support ever-evolving marketplace challenges. To keep up with the pace of changing technologies, it is essential to keep updated with newer technologies.

What is Augmented Reality (AR)?

Basic definition defines augmented reality as an enhanced version of reality created using advanced technologies for overlaying digital information on an image of something being viewed over a digital device. In simpler words, process of creating a quasi-alternate reality via technology, you already have access to, within the current environment is known as AR. Although recently it gained huge popularity but it is not necessarily a new technology as first evidences of AR goes back to 1960s but was officially coined in 1990. till then it’s been making its way through several mainstream industries including eCommerce, entertainment, education, healthcare, travel, manufacturing and the list goes on. Reports state that by 2017, about $3 billion has been invested in AR/VR.

What is contributing in its increasing popularity?

Remember the popular game Pokemon Go started in 2016? Suddenly is the was the most trending game and people were going crazy over it. People actually started exploring new place to explore new pokemons, rather than the place itself. The game was downloaded about 650 millions times. It was the first time people experienced AR and they actually appreciated it. By seeing the crazy popularity of the technologies, there are several new AR based technologies lined up for investing more in the technology.

What are the new developments in technology?

Apple and Android are known for locking horns with the every possible mobility niche and announced investment in Augmented reality as well. Apple is working with AR and soon there will be a lot of iOS and android powered devices and applications, thanks to Google and Apple. AR-Kit launched by apple and AR-Core launched by Google accelerated the AR industrial venture for product visualization. Google also confirmed that AR-Core launched by them is not limited to Pixel 1, Pixel 2 and Samsung Galaxy 8 only but will be supporting more devices in coming future. Furthermore, Google is also working on the issue of device fragmentation by launching ARCore v1.0, by supporting over 100 million Android devices.

Where lies the future of AR?

With the increasing investment and expertise in AR, it is confirmed that AR hardware will be less expensive. Smartphones being the major gateway to AR technology seems to sought out the issue of acquiring additional accessories including glasses and headsets and will become even more accessible to the users. With the increasing popularity, AR is spreading its roots in routine of the users apart from professional and gaming routine only such as improving travel safety, healthcare equipments and much more. Mobile adoption hs turned the technology upside down and has become the best medium to acquire, engage and retain consumers from business perspective.

Everybody must be active user of Twitter and Facebook or at least have heard about it. As the namesake offers, social media is purely intended for social interactions but with the increasing commercial value, marketers are greatly influenced by social media marketing. Despite the plethora of studies, research and statistics, social media campaigns have the potential of building effective positive brand recognition. Most brands are aware about impact of social media but are not aware how to do it.

Studies represent that 85 percent of marketers are not sure about the most suitable social media tool for them.

Following are some facts which will make you aware about the core need for utilizing social media campaigns:

• For extending the width of marketing coverage, majority of brands have their official pages in order to make them accessible to their social media consumers.
• As per studies, 71% of consumers are influenced by recommendation through their friends or family, instead of advertisements. However, social media can be the most suitable platform to spread mouth of word through their friends and family members.
• A 78% of success rate is experienced by business retailers after making use of social media branding.
• 40% of users check reviews over social media before making a purchase.
• 76% of majority is currently making use of social media network for reaching their targeted audiences.
• 88% of consumers trust reviews over social media platforms rather than reviews coming directly from official website of business.

This article is helpful in extracting the bigger picture regarding the impact of social media campaign over the brand marketing.

1. Increased trust level- Let’s say a friend of your shares the review about a product they’re using and the services been really good for them, it will also have an impression on you too. Or a celebrity retweets your blog or article, what will be the impact of it over your brand? For a fact, it is a thumbs up and offers leveraged credibility to promote a brand necessary for their success. Audience feel more comfortable over social media platform to ask for their queries as it is informal and trustworthy. Business can respond faster and can engage in even better manner through podcasts and other posts. At the top of it- consumers eventually start treating you bas their “social-family” if you successfully gain their trust.
2. Easy user navigation- Business can target the focused audience by reaching them over the preferred platform. Lets say if the brand is mostly concerned with age group of 16-50, then Facebook can be the most suitable platform and they can promote their brand over the focused platform. Focusing over the considerate audience will offer the brand with:

• Overall credibility
• Competent content
• Social proof
• Easy user navigation

3. Enhanced brand recognition- it’s a quick logic, more you’re active on social media platform, more your audience is aware about your products and services. With the greater credibility, you can attain effective brand exposure and can become even recognizable by your consumers. Type of publicity offered by social media isn’t available for sale. However, it takes trust and reliability and can have the most effective influence over the brand marketing.

So next time you’re thinking about some effective and reliable marketing, just make an investment in social marketing, without having a second thought.