Business confidence in the potential of robotics has risen to its highest level for two years, a survey has found.
According to GlobalData’s Tech Sentiment Polls Q4 2024 report, 40% of 356 respondents to the question: “How much will the following technologies disrupt your industry?” believe that the technology will significantly disrupt their industry. The last time the figure was that high was in the first quarter of 2023 when 43% of respondents indicated as much.
The survey, carried out across GlobalData’s network of B2B websites during the last quarter of last year, revealed a trending shift among respondents towards less equivocal views, from “no disruption” and “slight disruption” to “significant disruption”. While that shift has taken place over around the last 12 months, a slight quarter-on-quarter uptick in respondents believing there would be no disruption to their industry was also revealed in Q4 2024.
Notably, there has also been a slight rising trend of uncertainty about the potential of the technology over the past two years. The percentage of respondents indicating that they “don’t know” how much robotics will disrupt their industry had gradually risen from 6% in Q2 2023 to 12% by the end of last year.
Despite this, business confidence in robotics remains high, with the proportion of those who feel the technology’s disruption will be either significant or at the very least slight totalling 61%. Of the seven major technologies considered as part of the survey, this placed robotics behind only artificial intelligence (AI) at 78% and cybersecurity at 64%. The same two technologies topped the proportions of respondents who believe that they will significantly disrupt their industries, at 55% for AI (around the same as in Q3 2024) and 41% for cybersecurity.
The growing confidence in the potential of robotics comes at a time when a growing number of use cases of the technology being paired with AI are emerging. In recent weeks along, AI powerhouse Nvidia has revealed a major play in robotics and AI-robotics firms Neura, RoboForce and Sereact have all announced funding raises.
In December, meanwhile, economic advisory firm Oxford Economics claimed that “the robotics revolution we predicted has arrived”, stating “robotic innovation has surpassed our expectations in speed, complexity, and impact—fuelled by advances in AI, particularly generative models …”
It added: “This fusion of generative AI and robots has radically expanded the potential application in business, challenging the assumptions many analysts have long held about the kinds of jobs at risk from automation. ‘Safe’ jobs in finance, journalism, and healthcare diagnostics, are no longer so.”
Story Continues
“Business confidence in robotics strengthens as AI pairing for automation emerges” was originally created and published by Verdict, a GlobalData owned brand.
The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.
