Here’s a heretical thought to sign off with.

Some day, and perhaps not in the very far future, robots will become the low cost producers in global manufacturing. Displacing and replacing a high percentage of human workers, whether in the developed or the emerging world.

Will that mean triumph or disaster? Mass unemployment or a Marxian state of grace in which we can all share in the prosperity these smart machines and systems may one day create?

There’s a very long way to go before robots transform our world the way the PC did, but the writing is already on the wall in our view.

When Google steers a car through California without a driver, Dr. Robot performs ultra-delicate kidney surgery or Sharp builds its latest LCD factory in Japan (not in China!) and there is not a single worker on the floor, it shows how far automation has advanced – and hints at how far it will eventually go.

At least a couple of other thoughts spring to mind about that kind of world:

Surely factories will be built close to where the consumers and best qualified workers are, not where the cheap workers live.

Or will it be taxes, good regulation and the rule of law that determine where the robots do their work?

And what about inflation if the cost of making things really does go through a robot revolution?

For more on robots these links are all interesting.

• Google’s Robot Driver

• Sharp Sakai Plant

• Smart Sensors

• Dr. Robot

• Kurzweil

• Global Robotics Trends

This entry was posted by Guest writer on Wednesday, December 1st, 2010 at 17:55 and is filed under Capital markets, People. Tagged with china, google, Jonathan wilmot, LCD, robotics. Edit this entry.