Market pull for better factory automation and the ever-increasing relevance of software in every domain are triggering a rethink in how we develop software for robotics. Techniques such as Model Driven Engineering (MDE), proven effective in businesses like automotive and aerospace, can be used to this end. Practices such as collaborative development through Open-Source Software (OSS) can also be used. Two projects funded by the European Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme are exploring these opportunities, in a common foundational effort for an EU Digital Industrial Platform for Robotics. RobMoSys, coordinated by the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission, envisions a composition-oriented approach to system-of-system integration which is independent of the current code-centric robotic platforms, yet can build on top of them.

Vlad Lata is Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder of KONUX the Industrial IOT company specialised in creating customised sensor and AI-based analytics solutions for the industrial world. Founded in 2014 in Munich, KONUX combines Silicon Valley digital thinking with German engineering, and focuses on improving asset availability, network capacity and reducing maintenance costs for their clients; namely rail operators and industrial companies. Heading up the product development for KONUX with a focus on AI and Big Data, Vlad Lata and his engineering department have made huge strides in predictive analytics, smart sensors and offering a complete end-to-end solution for their clients. We're thrilled to hear more during Lata's talk at AI With the Best online conference April 29–30th, and are pleased to have had a chance to interview the KONUX CTO ahead of this event. Q Konux is famed for the highly accurate smart motion sensors paired with AI data analytics -- what skills sets you apart from other engineering firms?

Growth in the first industrial revolution was driven by engineering, the second through electricity and production lines, and the third by technology and information. The modern economies that will undergo a fourth industrial revolution will not be those that worship machines, but those that support human creativity. When we understand how people think and work best, we will be compelled to put our workers' well-being first in the name of both health and economic productivity. For centuries, human health has been systematically traded for economic growth. The word labor originated in medieval Europe during a decline in slavery and widespread adoption of money, and symbolizes the monetization of human skill: "productive work, especially physical toil done for wages."

Google has been forced to open up Android to rival search engines and applications in Russia, after settling a two-year battle with competition authorities for 439m roubles (£6.2m). The deal sets a new precedent for Google, which until now has resisted permitting the pre-installation of rival search engines and certain applications on to the world's most popular operating system. In 2015, Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) ruled that the Android-maker was breaking the law and abusing its dominant position through restrictions on third-party manufacturers, fining Google 438m rubles (£6.2m) in August 2016. The FAS said that Google will no longer demand exclusivity of its applications on Android devices sold in Russia and will not restrict the pre-installation of rival search engines and other applications. Google will also develop a tool allowing users to choose the default search engine on new and existing Android devices, a similar measure put in place by Microsoft for browser choice on Windows following antitrust action by the European Commission.

Google has today launched a re-imagined version of its free Earth mapping service, weaving in storytelling and artificial intelligence. The new programme lets people get a close-up look of the planet from the comfort of their computers, smartphones or tablets. The new-look Google Earth enables its users to learn about far-flung corners of the globe under the guidance of scientists from Nasa and prestigious research institutions. Google Earth's new start-up screen offers a global view of the Earth. 'This is our gift to the world,' Google Earth director Rebecca Moore said.

AMSTERDAM– On March 25, the European Union celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, which gave birth to the European Economic Community and set the stage for the EU's creation. Like any birthday, it was an opportunity not just to celebrate, but also to consider what has been achieved – and what must change. At a time when member countries are increasingly pulling away from the EU – and the United Kingdom is actually leaving – the need for reform is clear. Discussions about how to bring the European Council, Commission, and Parliament closer to EU citizens, thereby closing Europe's "democratic deficit," are frequent and animated. But another institution that could benefit from more input from EU citizens is often left out of these discussions: the European Court of Justice.

Dr. Walid el Abed presented the Data Excellence Science to optimize Artificial Intelligence for Business Excellence automation and the human-computer dialogue at the Het Limburgs ICT Event in Maastricht on March 21st 2017.

Some 70 years ago, computer scientist Alan Turing famously set the bar for artificial intelligence: a computer that could convince a human conversation partner that it was a person. On a recent spring afternoon in the Flow Machines laboratory, located on a quiet street in the Fifth Arrondissement of Paris, senior researcher Pierre Roy was more concerned with his music-making AI software's ability to create a convincingly catchy song. "So far, from the technical standpoint, no one knows how to do a proper song, to tell a story," he said. "It's a hot topic in AI." Flow Machines, a project of Sony Computer Science Laboratories in Paris that receives funding from the European Research Council, is developing an AI program that can compose compelling, professional-quality music -- an aim shared by similar ventures such as Jukedeck in the UK and Google's Magenta project. Ever since Turing defined his test, popular culture has fixated on the idea of sentient AI, both benign and catastrophically malign. But AI today has become something of a catch-all term for software that augments human intelligence, usually by mining vast troves of data.

In a soft-furnished studio space behind a warehouse in west Berlin, a group of international scientists are debating our robot future. An engineer from a major European carmaker is just finishing a cautiously optimistic progress report on self-driving vehicles. Increasingly, he explains, robot cars are learning to differentiate cars from more vulnerable moving objects such as pedestrians or cyclists. Some are already better than humans at telling apart different breeds of dog. "But of course," he says, "these are small steps."

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are surging in popularity as these technologies become the foundation for making networks smarter, faster, and more intuitive. Today machine learning and AI are being touted as key elements to making the Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G a success. In fact at the recent Mobile World Congress conference in Barcelona, Spain, carriers like SK Telecom and Reliance talked about using machine learning by feeding it with analytics from network monitoring. Plus, big name companies like IBM are incorporating AI into well-known projects like Watson, which is being used for everything from security to IoT to the cloud. They are based upon deep learning neural networks, a technology first conceived more than 70 years ago.