OpenAI’s Charlotte L Robinson On The Future of Robotics Over the Next Few Years

An Interview With David Leichner

Practical experience with regarding to data, coding and AI — stuff like bootcamps, hackathons, student chapters of professional associations, etc.

With the shortage of labor, companies are now looking at how robots can replace some of the lost labor force. See here for example. The truth is that this is not really a novel idea, as companies like Amazon have been using robots for a while now. What can we expect to see in the robotics industry over the next few years? How will robots be used? What kinds of robots are being produced? To what extent can robots help address the shortage of labor? Which jobs can robots replace, and which jobs need humans? In our series called “The Future of Robotics Over the Next Few Years” we are talking to leaders of Robotics companies, AI companies, and Hi-Tech Manufacturing companies who can address these questions and share insights from their experience. As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Charlotte Robinson.

Charlotte Robinson is a senior software engineer and blogger based in Chicago. She been working as an AI engineer for her employer since 2014 and in that period, she has worked with innumerable clients regarding robotics and machine learning.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

The most interesting story I’ve had in this career is post-pandemic when I was entrusted with creating the orientation programme for new employees in AI who were working from home. I had to create a programme that effectively spelt out what the expectations of our employer are and what all each employee is expected to do during the course of work. I was in charge of employing real-time assessment and analytical tools to gauge how employees respond. This was very interesting to me as it was the first time I was given work relating to a managerial role.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My favorite life lesson is to always learn how to leave behind your work inside your office. Set boundaries for where work ends and your personal life begins. This was very important to me after suffering a burnout in 2017.

Ok wonderful. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Can you tell our readers about the most interesting projects you are working on now?

I am currently working with an agricultural technology firm working on transforming agriculture to make it more sustainable for the ecosystem and safer for the health of individuals. Machine learning and AI working in tandem with robotics can provide a steady stream of data (both collection and analysis) and decision-making processes to better optimize farming practices.

How do you think this might change the world?

Monitoring of large regions using AI tools such as drones or UAVs can help in protecting areas larger than just farms — forest ecosystems and natural habitats all across the world can greatly benefit. Better detection of plant diseases, predicting poaching, monitoring soil erosion, identifying species, and tracking migration are all easier with AI.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?

In relation to AI in agriculture, no. The primary threat to AI systems is leakage of personal information and information of that sort is never included in the data sets we analyze when working with agri-tech firms.

What are the three things that most excite you about the robotics industry? Why?

• E-waste is one area where I feel enough focus has not been given to the transformational effect AI is capable of having. Major organizations can use AI, machine learning, and IoT to improve environmental sustainability of their products along with creating long-lasting hardware so that generation of e-waste is greatly reduced. With a proper legal regime in place for this, devices which have been discarded can be refurbished, saving money in manufacturing of new devices. Such types of efficient and sustainable IoT based AI systems can greatly help in decreasing carbon footprints.
• I’ve also worked on adoption of AI in warehouses. Warehouse employees are likely to handle the same product multiple times due to the way in which labour is divided within warehouses. While sometimes necessary, this is mostly time-consuming and labour intensive. Irrespective of the growth of tech, there is still an inertia among those in the logistics business — an inability to leave behind the familiar. The massive computational power of advanced systems plus the sheer number of devices that can be connected by an IOT system using 5G can greatly reduce this redundancy.
• And finally, coming to the issue of clean water and its supply — through the use of consumer level interventions like smart household meters and business side infrastructure like better treatment facilities, AI can play a huge role in improving watershed management systems. This will make it easier to control quality, manage extent of use, reduce wastage and predict when maintenance will be needed. In the long run, AI, IoT, machine learning and blockchain when combined will have the capability to create a truly decentralized system of watershed management that operates on a foundation created by efficient recycling of local water resources.

What are the three things that concern you about the robotics industry? Why?

• Hackers and malware are slowly trying to increase their capability in compromising firmware, such as UEFI, which are used by almost all computers. Firmware operates even below the OS and has full control over your machine. Firmware security will be the battlefront in the future of data security. The easiest way to tackle such threats would be to ensure that debug ports remain disabled for release builds and to completely avoid unencrypted/unsigned firmware updates.
• Potential vulnerabilities in cloud storage and related architecture are a major threat. Although cloud applications are generally quite secure, user ends act as a gateway for phishing attacks and ransomware. The solution to such challenges would be to implement data classification in many levels such as public, password protected, sensitive, etc. and automatically disable access/transport when suspicious activity is observed. Cloud data encryption is highly recommended, along with self-owned data recovery software.
• Code injection attacks are gaining in popularity among hackers. When acquiring advanced robotics and AI, ask about the last time a complete, independent code review was done, the schedule for regular audits of code and a list of servers and ports that the software would need. Use ZNTA or VDI to reduce the risk by allowing access without fully connecting networks between your company and your customers.

As you know, there is an ongoing debate between prominent scientists, (personified as a debate between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg,) about whether advanced AI has the potential to pose a danger to humanity in the future. What is your position about this?

I think it’s a bit exaggerated, but there will be an increased threat to personal data and its privacy, and creating deepfakes and false propaganda will become easier.

My expertise is in product security, so I’m particularly interested in this question. In today’s environment, hackers break into the software running the robotics, for ransomware, to damage brands or for other malicious purposes. Based on your experience, what should manufacturing companies do to uncover vulnerabilities in the development process to safeguard their robotics?

Fully map out the software supply chain. This can consist of cloud servers, software vendors, open-source assignments, etc. This will help you discover which software dependencies are hiding inside your software and then scan them for security and licensing. Data pipelines are another emerging field. Each customer will have a unique data requirement and this will inevitably lead to a wide variety of access permissions. This problem gets amplified in data pipelines due to the sheer amount of data sources there are. Anonymizing data is pretty much the only effective solution in this regard, but that will greatly hamper any future data analytics you wish to execute.

Fantastic. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Robotics Industry?

• Practical experience with regarding to data, coding and AI — stuff like bootcamps, hackathons, student chapters of professional associations, etc.
• Become less knowledge oriented and a lot more result-oriented — for example, how would you help in developing certain products to help the business improve its presence in a specific emerging market.
• AI and robotics employees must be comfortable working with a data analyst and data security engineers.
• Innumerable decisions to be made regarding operations, infra, outsourcing or hiring freelancers, cloud vs local storage, creating secure data protection, data analytics, portfolio management, digital architecture, legal compliance, service management, and even sometimes customer service. Being a jack of all trades is an invaluable skill.
• Customers do not just directly deal with you. They go through multiple checkpoints, each requiring their own specific process. In order to make this run as smoothly as possible, your digital and technical strategy needs to account for all this variability.

As you know, there are not that many women in this industry. Can you advise what is needed to engage more women in the robotics industry?

More women need to take admissions in STEM-related courses. There is a huge gender imbalance in the applications we receive. And women who have carved a niche for themselves in robotics need to come forward and address other women who are hesitating to choosing this career path.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

I would encourage all organizations to identify gaps in skills between employees. This is an important aspect of employee engagement that does not get enough attention. Everyone will work a bit differently, especially in this age of online/hybrid work. Some may display improved efficiency whereas some might slack off a bit. Make sure to talk to the employees who have improved, figure out what steps they have undertaken to achieve it, and effectively relay these suggestions to employees who find remote work a bit harder to do.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Follow my blogs https://www.zeebox.com/ (Zeebox) and https://www.robotpoweredhome.com/ (Robot Powered Home).

Thank you so much for the time you spent doing this interview. This was very inspirational, and we wish you continued success.

About The Interviewer: David Leichner is a veteran of the Israeli high-tech industry with significant experience in the areas of cyber and security, enterprise software and communications. At Cybellum, a leading provider of Product Security Lifecycle Management, David is responsible for creating and executing the marketing strategy and managing the global marketing team that forms the foundation for Cybellum’s product and market penetration. Prior to Cybellum, David was CMO at SQream and VP Sales and Marketing at endpoint protection vendor, Cynet. David is the Chairman of the Friends of Israel and Member of the Board of Trustees of the Jerusalem Technology College. He holds a BA in Information Systems Management and an MBA in International Business from the City University of New York.