SYS-CON Events announced today that Technologic Systems Inc., an embedded systems solutions company, will exhibit at SYS-CON's @ThingsExpo, which will take place on June 6-8, 2017, at the Javits Center in New York City, NY. Technologic Systems is an embedded systems company with headquarters in Fountain Hills, Arizona. They have been in business for 32 years, helping more than 8,000 OEM customers and building over a hundred COTS products that have never been discontinued. Technologic Systems' product base consists of a wide variety of off-the-shelf PC/104 single board computers, computer-on-modules, touch panel computers, peripherals and industrial controllers. They also offer custom configurations and design services.

Past civilizations built grand libraries to organize the world's knowledge. These repositories of information focused on cataloging, aggregating, organizing and making information accessible so that others could focus on learning and creating new knowledge. AI and machine learning systems also need repositories of information from which to learn -- and right now everyone is building their own. If different groups of people focus on organizing data versus building AI, the progress of intelligent computers will massively accelerate. Despite all the progress in machine learning (ML), most of our computers (and their applications) leave much to be desired.

No, it's Ford's latest self-driving development car, which the company unveiled Wednesday ahead of what's expected to be a crush of autonomous competitors at the CES trade show next week in Las Vegas. That luggage rack and antlers hold state-of-the-art camera and sensor technology that Ford hopes will keep it ahead of the increasingly crowded pack. For instance, compared to the company's prior autonomous research vehicle (going on three years old), the new model has a much faster computer and more powerful LiDAR sensors. The dual LiDAR extend from the sides of the car, mounted on antlerlike arms attached on the A-pillars, above the sideview mirrors. Where the prior research vehicle needed four such sensors, the latest generation needs only two.

The computing industry progresses in two mostly independent cycles: financial and product cycles. There has been a lot of handwringing lately about where we are in the financial cycle. Financial markets get a lot of attention. They tend to fluctuate unpredictably and sometimes wildly. The product cycle by comparison gets relatively little attention, even though it is what actually drives the computing industry forward.

Though it's been around for a few years, voice artificial intelligence systems are slowly becoming a staple of the automated household. While there are still many holdouts, resistance to this technology is fading and more people are buying it to explore the possibilities. Not only do these systems understand your vocal commands, but they also respond and are starting to mimic human speech. Who knew that a talking computer could make things so much easier, but let's see what these products can do and where the technology is heading. Most of these products are "smart speakers."

Aircraft fuel is without a doubt the biggest cost for any airline and often receives widespread attention, especially when airlines hedge their bets the wrong way. Cathay Pacific reported a HK$4.49 billion fuel-hedging loss in the first half of 2016, which has hurt the airline's profitability. The second biggest expense for an airline is human capital, and researchers from Hong Kong Polytechnic University and University of Nottingham Ningbo China Business School may have found a solution to ease some of Cathays financial woes through an unlikely source – Machine Learning and Data Science. The researchers say that a "poorly designed airline crew schedule can result in unreliable flight schedules, significantly jeopardizing airline operations and profitability if insufficient crew members are available or other glitches occur. For that reason, managing airline crew scheduling and costs are one of the most crucial topics for airlines because it yields enormous economic benefits and ranks as the second highest expenditure after fuel costs."

Facebook and Google are two of Silicon Valley's leaders in artificial intelligence. They have both invested heavily in AI, hiring loads of top researchers to develop projects like the Facebook Messenger "smart" assistant M, or Google's in-the-works AI-powered chatbot. While Facebook and Google are duking it out in international competitions, the two companies are far from alone in their efforts to dominate the space. As for the rest of Silicon Valley, research firm CB Insights recently published a report on the AI investments the tech industry is making.

A year ago, a researcher tested Samsung's S Voice digital assistant by telling it he was depressed. "Maybe it's time for you to take a break and get a change of scenery." Researchers found Apple's Siri and Microsoft's Cortana couldn't understand queries involving abuse or sexual assault, according to a study published in March in JAMA Internal Medicine. Next week's Consumer Electronics Show will show off digital assistants' abilities to make our lives a little easier by adding more voice-powered smarts into our lights, appliances and door locks. While these smart-home ideas are likely to gain plenty of attention at CES, the JAMA study highlights the need to improve digital helpers' responses to more critical health and wellness issues, as well.

From car accidents to bridge collapses, 1.25 million road fatalities occur across the world annually. Another 20 to 50 million people suffer road injuries per year, some resulting in lifetime disabilities. Road incidents are also the source of economic damage to the victims, their families and nations themselves as they generate medical treatment expenses and repair costs as well as reduce productivity. There's fear that without noticeable action, roads will become the seventh leading cause of death across the world by 2030. However, there's hope that with the help of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and Internet of Things, we can make our roads and bridges much more safer, save hundreds of thousands of lives, and spare billions of dollars in maintenance and repairs costs.

A technology incubator in the company, called Jigsaw--formerly known as Google Ideas--says it intends to spot and remove digital harassment with an automated program called Conversation AI. So if Conversation AI or similar tools make it easier and more efficient to exercise such control, it's a reminder that "solving" the abuse problem, whether through human or automated means, requires moving away from maximal inclusivity as the highest ideal online. The Wild West nature of those sites will become only more apparent if tools like Conversation AI make moderated sites function even better. While Jigsaw efforts like Project Shield aim to provide defenses for politically sensitive websites, Conversation AI makes it easier to filter out unwanted speech--but the question is, unwanted by whom?