January 2017 | Business View Magazine

12 13 opening lines The worldwide number of domestic household robots will rise to 31 million between 2016 and 2019. The sales value of robots cleaning floors, mowing lawns, and cleaning swimming pools will grow to about 13 billion US dollars in this period. These forecasts are takes from the 2016 World Robotics Report, “Service Robots”, pub- lished by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR). In the coming years, vacuum and floor cleaning ro- bots will continue to make up the lion’s share of units at work in households. Sales will rise from 3.6 million units (2015) to around 30 million units within the 2016- 2019 forecast period.Vacuum and floor cleaning robots account for 96 percent of domestic robot sales. Robotic mowers and pool cleaning robots rank second and third, respectively. Sales figures for the entertainment sector show a sim- ilar dynamic. In 2015, the total number of toy robots, remote-controlled multi-media robots and personal edutainment robots amounted to 1.7million units.The IFR forecasts that this market will grow to 11 million units between 2016 and 2019.Toy and hobby robots account for 70 percent of the market share in the entertainment segment. Strong growth is reported in sales of handicap assistive robots and for the elderly.At 4,700 units (2015), the sales volume is still comparatively low. But sales figures are ex- pected to rise to 37,500 units from 2016 to 2019.The rise in the value of sales will mirror this development: Sales in 2015 amounted to USD 16.8 million - a year-on-year increase of 34 percent. The total value is forecast to rise to USD 97 million between 2016 and 2019. Survey: 31 Million Robots Helping in Households by 2019 CHRIS CHUTE vice president of Customer Insights and Analysis Group, IDC Millennials have had life-long experiences with consumer technology. When it comes to work, they expect their devices and apps be mobile-first and customizable and meet them on their own terms, regardless of location. consumer technology have been conditioning digital natives to expect the same options when it comes to business IT. Led by IDC analyst Chris Chute, the panel- ists drew on their own research and real-world experiences to illustrate how rapidly companies are responding to this demand for better, faster, and more agile workplaces by expanding their cloud and mobility offerings. For example, Chute’s research shows that U.S. midmarket adoption of Microsoft Office 365 grew over 60 percent in one year, from 30 percent to 50 percent adoption between 2014 to and 2015. In another example of how com- panies are re-prioritizing IT de- cision-making, Chute’s research found that millennial-led firms are 25 percent more likely to be deploying Software as a Service (SaaS) over their peers and over 50 percent more likely to be deploying SaaS versions of travel booking, invoicing, payroll, and financial management software. “Millennials have had life-long experiences with consumer