Doing the robot

While robots have already revolutionised industries such as manufacturing, these machines are essentially dumb. They're typically built and programmed for a particular task – to fit components or welcome visitors – and require human intervention for any adjustments or improvements. The next and more exciting stage in the robot revolution is artificial intelligence (AI) and its subset, machine learning. Here, robots are not only given a certain degree of ability to "think" for themselves, but are also designed to learn from situations and adjust their processes and actions accordingly, taking the need for human involvement out of the equation. Machine learning can be applied to almost every industry, and for many small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) it is key to streamlining business processes.