Written by: Hilmi Rifai, Head of Technology Department at Majid Al Futtaim Holding Company
Technology has become an integral part of our lives.Most of us have smartphones or digital assistants.According to the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority, the rate of spread of smartphones in the UAE is almost every person.We also use applications to explore and see weather forecast, buy various goods, and pay bills.According to Statista.com, the average number of applications that are launched daily on the Apple store reached 1434 applications, which allows many options for users who seek to obtain assistance in their daily tasks.
However, how do we use applications to improve our lives?Are these applications smart enough to achieve this goal?
What if the various technologies such as the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence can predict our needs based on the previous behavior, declared preferences, specific habits, the data we have, our location and the environment in which we live, to provide a series solutions to our daily requirements in real time?According to the McKinsey Foundation, the Internet of Things will be one of the three most influential technologies on our lives by 2030, and this can guarantee the presence of smart technologies everywhere throughout the day.
The technologies we have today can be classified in two ways. The first focuses on us - our environment on the Internet, in fact, our activities and behaviors in it. These technologies collect data that is absorbed, analyzed and retrieved to expect our needs at any time. As for the second method, it focuses on instilling intelligence in systems to develop its capabilities to interact with each other without human intervention, and to use data to take measures to serve us and make us happy. Dr. Curt Van Mensfurt describes this, using the term "the following nature", which revolves around the idea that our technological environment has become very complicated, present everywhere and self -independent, so that it is viewed as a special nature.
How can we take advantage of the "next nature" to improve our lives?Currently, these technologies are not just interconnected as they should, they are still used independently of each other in many cases.
Imagine a scenario in which these technologies are completely interconnected. Like you wear your smart watch that helps you to monitor certain aspects of your health, but what if the device not only provides useful information, but also takes measures to improve your lifestyle, and positively affect your health and even alert doctors to help you if the need arises? Through IoT technologies and artificial intelligence, your wearable device can be connected to your shopping basket in the grocery store, and suggest options that improve your diet or remind you of your medications. Moreover, if the device notes any serious problem that may threaten life, it can alert emergency services, inform them of your site accurately and save your life in every sense of the word.
In light of expectations indicating the high number of wearable devices from 526 million devices in 2016 to more than 1.1 billion devices in 2022, there will be huge opportunities to help humans.
Technology can also make our daily life more comfortable. When you go to one of the shopping centers, you will find a lot of things that you can do, such as eating, shopping, watching movies, or even just wandering between different stores. The entire shopping center can be digitized, so that you can recognize you as soon as you enter and give you a specially designed experience for you. Parking can be booked for your car. You can also get a special discount code at the Magic Planet Center so that your children enjoy playing as you buy gifts for them. The personal assistant can remind you of buying food for your pet or buying a Wi -Fi network support device that you have searched for seven times through the Google engine. The personal assistant can also inform you that the movie I wanted to watch will start after 15 minutes and end with the end of your children's play, which is great! You can also book your cinema ticket via the smart application, so that one of the assistants will meet you at the entrance to the cinema to take your shopping facts and put it in your car, they already know what you bought and how they carry and store it in addition to the place where your car is standing. The cinema knows that you love popcorn with a salted caramel flavor, which you can request in advance and be connected to your seat in the cinema. All of this can occur intuitively.
This is how technology can be integrated into our lives.This merger should be unobtrusive and smooth so that we start to rely on it intuitively.The experiences that we consider at the present time must become just normal things.This is something that companies - especially those who focus on customers - should give it priority if they want to win the loyalty of customers.Such experiences must extend across all different systems to be within the reach of the customer wherever he goes.
Network -related technologies have tremendous potential not only to make our lives easier and better, but also to help us work to achieve the greatest interests.Given that the Internet of Things revolves around communications and controlled things that are not previously connected, the applications of this technology are almost endless.Governments and companies should continue to explore new ways to use technology to make the world safer, prosperous and sustainable, while we must - consumes - look forward to the future where we do what we love and leave work behind the scenes for smart technologies.