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The impact of autonomous vehicles
The age of the autonomous vehicle is here- no longer a figment of an engineer’ s imagination. Apple has announced it is developing an autonomous car, Uber just made its first driverless truck delivery of beers in Colorado and Elon Musk wants to change the role of the truck driver from operating a vehicle to something more like fleet management.
There are questions being raised about truck driver job losses, safety when driverless trucks are in operation and increased costs associated with putting essentially very sophisticated computers on 16 wheels on the roads
So what does this mean if you are in the supply chain and logistics business?
In a perfect world, these driverless vehicles will assist with eradicating driver fatigue, speeding up delivery times and improving road safety. Families could sit chatting, or be resting or eating on long road trips, arriving at their holiday destinations refreshed. Truck drivers could sleep during overnight long haul trips, only taking the wheel again to navigate more tricky urban roads. But as with most new innovations there are also the proverbial road bumps which will have to be overcome.
There are questions being raised about truck driver job losses, safety when driverless trucks are in operation and increased costs associated with putting essentially very sophisticated computers on 16 wheels on the roads. Security of these vehicles would take on a whole new meaning as hackers would increasingly become interested in logistics. Deliveries could be rerouted and updated at the click of a few buttons. There are also concerns around the safety of autonomous vehicles in heavy weather conditions.
Even more importantly, the introduction of driverless vehicles will very likely involve radical changes in technology, resources, infrastructure and human capital across the supply chain.
We have to ask ourselves how we can ensure we don’ t become redundant in this new revolution of change. It will start with our attitude to the changes- being able to work while travelling, support products around things like autonomous vehicles, tracking and security.
I do think though, that humans want and need to interact with humans and the need for many products revolves around our human desires and needs. It will not help to have the broader population either jobless or on welfare. Idle hands and disempowerment leads to crime and revolts. At the end of the day fully automated processes without creating jobs for people means you and me, the target customer can’ t afford to buy the product. The age old balance of supply and demand comes back into tension and companies are going to have to be wary of this while making businesses very lean and effi cient so that potential customers are not taken out of the market.
As we head into the future it will be the marriage of sustainability and job creation with technology and innovation that will be the master stroke.
34 LIFE TODAY MAGAZINE Issue 2, No. 003 / 17 / March 2017