ndtma 2018 annual conference · -facial recognition-learning stock market trends-understand humans...

NDTMA 2018 Annual Conference

§Cognitive Learning and the Future in NDT

Noah Fredette

Senior Sales & Business Development Manager

COMET Technologies

Shelton, CT

Golden Nugget Hotel, Las Vegas, NV February 13-15, 2018


§The Why- Technical Path and Management Path- Want to focus on how technology will change your business, not just equipment /

applications



§Artificial Intelligence- Can be summed up as simply as “intelligence demonstrated by machines”

- Speech recognition- Language translation- Self checkouts - ATM’s- Self ordering kiosks- Etc.



A Brief History

Early Successes:- AI gained momentum in 1956 during a workshop at Dartmouth College- The first algorithms were developed to achieve a specific goal

- Winning a game (chess or checkers)- Making a deduction (getting through a maze)- Simple math

Early Problems:- Common Sense and Reasoning- Moravec’s Paradox – humans know more than we know how to explain- Can only really do what humans can ‘teach’- Decades of boom and bust / funding issues after failures



Cognitive Learning – What is it?

“A cognitive computer combines Artificial Intelligence and machine-learning algorithms to attempt to reproduce behavior of the human brain”

Fundamentally change the way humans and systems interact - Self Driving Cars- Resolve Ambiguity- Interactive Machines (Home Depot Robots)- Facial Recognition- Learning Stock Market Trends- Understand Humans / Customers based on History and Context- Analysis of Unstructured Datasets (not organized / not pre-defined)

- Merrill Lynch cited around 90% of all usable business information is unstructured



Cognitive Learning- Robots can read, see, learn and adapt- Machine learning

- Every day, 2.5 quintillion bytes of data are generated- 90% of existing data has been generated in the last two years- Ability to analyze data and learn from mistakes and trends- Computers are actually significantly better at making decisions than humans- In 46% of studies, humans actually performed SIGNIFICANTLY worse than number and formulas

alone…. Data and computers take emotion out of decisions- Supervised learning is the best / ideally suited for automating many tasks

Example:- 4 people used to do customer invoicing due to intricacies of the project

ú 7-5 every weekú Now, it takes a robot/computer 1.5 hours



Accelerating Robotic Cambrian Explosion- Boom of evolution and speed of technology

- Unprecedented computing power

- Available to corporations and individuals

- Greatly lowers barriers to entry

- IoT - Every ‘robot / drone’ can quickly know what the other is doing / experience. Humans can take decades to learn from one another's experiences… robots connected via IoT can literally learn instantly

- Telsa cars, for example, share data about objects / situations they drive by so other vehicles approaching can adapt



Technology acceleration rate

- IoT – power is actually one of the biggest issues – driving power demand up- Could see more than 99% of power capacity- Sensors… infinite possibilities

Think about it….- 10 years ago, there was no smart phone- 30 years ago, almost no one had a computer- A person’s life from 1700-1800 / 1800-1900 / 1900-2000 / 2000-2100- Just 1 year ago, only 25% of processes could be automated due to limitations in

the adaptation / critical thinking needed…… Now, it’s 65-70%



Use Cases in the NDT World


• Contact Center• Customer service• Support desk• Billing queries, user

administration and updating records

• IT & Infrastructure Support

• Add virtual workers to your IT team and release skilled staff to do things that matter

• Human Resources• Payroll, hiring, candidate

management• Employee turnover process• Connecting each department

applications and operations via a single console

• Project Control• Automatically keep track of

project hours• Project data management• Meter-reading validation for

installed technology• Automated cost controls• Monitoring and controlling

• Healthcare• Reports automation• System reconciliation

• Back Office Admin• Automate administration and

reporting tasks, automate accounts payable, accounts receivable, order management, invoicing, collections


Long Term Implications

- Banks and Financial Services

- Banks could be laying off up to 100-200k people

- Retail / Fast Food

- More Intuitive Self Checkouts

- Home Depot / Big Box Stores

– robots that know location of everything & adapt to changes

- Predictive Maintenance

- Level 3’s / Knowledge Experts

- Cost of Technology

- 30% of the cost of a traditional resource yet available 24/7




Summary:

Adapt…. or Don’t- Landscape changing quicker than ever

- 3-5 year outlook is too long

- Need responsive short term planning to adapt

- Successful companies need to adapt…. Most don’t survive era’s of true transformation

- Successful companies will be those that can accept and adopt new technology… companies that don’t make this transition will essentially be the same as the ones that chose to stick with steam technologies 100+ years ago

- Companies can have computers, even at a base level, to free up people / human energy to make important decisions, exercise judgement and use their creativity and intuition

ndtma 2018 annual conference · -facial recognition-learning stock market trends-understand humans...

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