ROYAL OAK – Most trends focus on the year ahead, but truly transformative technology takes time to take hold.  In Airfoil Group’s Tech Trends Report, the strategic communications company shares insights on the emerging and maturing technologies that will transform businesses and markets in the years to come. 

Highlights include:

  • The Battle Between “Smart” & Security
  • How AI will transform the Healthcare Industry
  • The Democratization of AI
  • Electrification Gets Eclectic

As these tech trends carve out larger and larger spheres of influence in our world, they’ll define the ‘new normal’ for consumers and businesses alike.  With the help of an expert marketing team, businesses will need to consider how to best position themselves in this evolving landscape. 

What’s all the mean for Michigan?

With all the media streaming to vehicles, cars are becoming the new advertising medium. Auto companies will become the new publishers and broadcasters.

Artificial Intelligence and Applications will transform healthcare. The biggest benefit will be cost reduction in a Michigan healthcare industry that is super overbuilt for the exiting population. Technology will create more competition for fewer customers in this region, but is also will create more opportunities for the healthcare system to start up technology.

Lisa Vallee Smith

More Venture Capital dollars will flow to Michigan for auto manufacturing, but the future is less certain for other industry sectors.

Technology makes states and regions compete for STEM education graduates. Unfortunately, Michigan does not stack up well visa-vie other states.

Data privacy policy changes are coming. The question is who owns my data? Who owns the data collected on me by the auto companies, and the healthcare industry. Europe is way ahead of the United States in data privacy protection, with the exception of California.

“As these tech trends carve out larger and larger spheres of influence in our world, they’ll define the new normal for consumers and businesses alike,” said Lisa Vallee Smith, CEO of Airfoil Group. “With the help of an expert marketing team,  businesses will need to consider how to best position themselves in this evolving landscape.”

What Airfoil Group hopes its self-generated report will do is explain what’s coming next, said Tim Moynihan Editorial Services & Media Strategist.

For instance, the golden era of smart phones and wearables is morphing because of the advent of AI and machine learning, he said. Take manufacturing, still a core sector in the Michigan economy. Increasingly manufacturing is becoming the Industrial Internet of Things.

“You add sensors and computers to manufacturing facilities to collect more data,” Moynihan said. “Then AI and machine learning helps you turn that data into actionable revenue streams.”

Anther big example is the healthcare industry, he said.

“There are so many apps that can save time and money better than humans,” Moynihan said. “Computer vision (AI and Machine Learning) pinpoint medical imaging and radiology. Robotic surgery more mainstream for intricate micro-level procedures. Human hands just can’t do it. Then there are virtual nursing assistants. Call it Alexa for hospitals. They provide customized advice for patients. Also new wearables with AI sensors for patients. There is a lot of movement in healthcare in AI adoption. Just in the past several years, there has been $4.3 billion in AI startups.”

Still another example is electric vehicles that will gradually become more autonomous over the next 10 years or so. AI and machine learning will help lead us into the electric vehicle future, Moynihan said.

While the connected future will usher in a brave new world, it also opens a back door to cyber hackers that want to steal your data and do worse, he said. That’s why it is so important to employ smart security techniques. For instance, in California, by the end of 2020, new laws proscribe that any IoT device sold in the Golden State has to have basic security measure built into it that allow the owner to change the password from the default.

“IoT security will become a big issue in the coming years,” he said.

To read the full Airfoil Group Tech Report, click on https://hub.airfoilgroup.com/2019-tech-trends-report