Robots are additionally getting used for customer-facing duties, with greater than 30 metro stations set to have robots making espresso for commuters.
Robots are additionally getting used for customer-facing duties, with greater than 30 metro stations set to have robots making espresso for commuters.
After struggling to seek out workers through the pandemic, companies in Singapore have more and more turned to deploying robots to assist perform a variety of duties, from surveying building websites to scanning library bookshelves.
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Town-state depends on international employees, however their quantity fell by 235,700 between December 2019 and September 2021, in line with the manpower ministry, which notes how COVID-19 curbs have sped up “the tempo of know-how adoption and automation” by corporations.
At a Singapore building web site, a four-legged robotic referred to as “Spot”, constructed by U.S. firm Boston Dynamics, scans sections of mud and gravel to verify on work progress, with information fed again to building firm Gammon’s management room.
Gammon’s normal supervisor, Michael O’Connell, mentioned utilizing Spot required just one human worker as a substitute of the 2 beforehand wanted to do the job manually.
“Changing the necessity for manpower on-site with autonomous options is gaining actual traction,” mentioned O’Connell, who believes trade labour shortages made worse by the pandemic are right here to remain.
In the meantime, Singapore’s Nationwide Library has launched two shelf-reading robots that may scan labels on 100,000 books, or about 30 p.c of its assortment, per day.
“Workers needn’t learn the decision numbers one after the other on the shelf, and this reduces the routine and labour-intensive elements,” mentioned Lee Yee Fuang, assistant director on the Nationwide Library Board.
Singapore has 605 robots put in per 10,000 workers within the manufacturing trade, the second-highest quantity globally, after South Korea’s 932, in line with a 2021 report by the Worldwide Federation of Robotics.
Robots are additionally getting used for customer-facing duties, with greater than 30 metro stations set to have robots making espresso for commuters.
Keith Tan, chief govt of Crown Digital, which created the barista robotic, mentioned it was serving to remedy the “greatest pain-point” in meals and beverage – discovering workers – whereas additionally creating well-paid positions to assist automate the sector.
Nevertheless, some folks making an attempt the service nonetheless yearned for human interplay.
“We all the time wish to have some sort of human contact,” mentioned commuter Ashish Kumar, whereas sipping on a robot-brewed drink.
