This post is part of Robohub’s Jobs Focus.

Bottom line, a multibillion commercial market will quickly emerge in the United States with applications ranging from precision agriculture to precision medicine delivery, creating over 100,000 jobs by 2025 just in manufacturing of these new products.

Why UAS?
In the most basic sense, UAS allow for similar capabilities of manned aircraft except without the added weight and size of the pilot and related pilot protection equipment. Once that weight and space (up to several hundred pounds) is stripped, suddenly the platform can be operated in new safer, more accurate ways. For hobbyists, these vehicles are an end unto themselves. For commercial use the vehicles must justify their use through making existing operations cheaper, more effective or less risky. In the report, we focused on markets that have existing data (agriculture and public safety) and made our projections from this data. However, when it comes to new applications, soon the sky will no longer be the limit.

Legislative Barriers
Though the FAA will find safe, effective ways to integrate UAS in the nation’s airspace, lifting what is the only current hurdle to mass commercial adoption, new legislation is under development that will may hinder commercial adoption of UAS. Michael Toscano, President and CEO of AUVSI, recently testified before the US Senate on the matter. Looking purely at the economic implications, states or municipalities that limit UAS use will miss out on the benefits of such systems and will likely quickly change their ways after other states prove the potential of UAS and alleviate current concerns. However, it may be too late for states that adapt slowly, as companies will likely already be established in states without excess restrictions.

Get Ready
Once current FAA restrictions are safely lifted, expect companies to move quickly to capture a piece of the multibillion dollar market. We’re two and half years away and companies in the defense market are already developing new commercial vehicles and new companies are springing up, cutting their teeth in other countries waiting for the right time to enter the U.S. market. These are exciting times and I cannot wait until I don’t have to leave my doorstep to catch a piece of the action.

See all the posts in Robohub’s Jobs Focus.

Study the past if you would define the future. – Confucius

War will always have a human element. Robots will be tools in future conflicts, just as they (and other technologies) have been in the past. To understand how robot use will evolve militarily, it is healthy to look back at history.

Change is hard for militaries. Billy Mitchell showed the vulnerability of battleships to aircraft, but militaries were still building battleships decades later. Tanks were used as infantry support in World War I. In WW II, some countries adapted better than others. As the US military began developing missiles, pilots believed they should drive the missiles, others thought differently (see Sidewinder for a great background of the difficulties in military acquisition — it’s only gotten worse since then).

Mobile robots represent another potential revolutionary change in warfare technology.

For change to happen in any organization, its leaders must embrace it. Moffett did with aircraft carriers, Eisenhower and Patten did it with maneuver warfare, and Rickover did it with nuclear submarines. So where is the US military with robotics (my background is limited to USA and mainly maritime)? Who are the leaders?

Despite over 100 years of research and development and decades of use in military situations, the US has not had a strong senior leader fully embrace robots. ADM Roughead did a good job, but he only pushed for air and underwater, not replacements for the Navy’s most sacred cows: surface warships. The Air Force hasn’t embraced UAS easily and looks to be going down a bad path. The DARPA LS3 program, “Big Dog”, makes for great video clips, but what’s it used for? Infantry support. Déjà vu?

Recent combat experience has offered a large number of service men and women firsthand experience of robot capabilities, but it will be another five to ten years before any are senior leaders. Bottom line: don’t expect mobile robots to revolutionize warfare in the foreseeable future unless an adversary adapts quickly.

How could a robotic military future look? On the maritime side, the DARPA TEMP and ACTUV programs are a good start. Navy UCLASS is a step towards aircraft carrier obsolescence, and Admiral Moffett would be proud.

And the Navy LDUUV is a good step forward in undersea warfare. Between these programs and similar future investments, the entire US Navy could be unmanned in 25 years.

The inevitable conflict?
The effect that robots will have as tools of war is minimal compared to the effect robots will have on society and how these societal changes will change the nature or need for war. Predicting these effects would make a great topic for a future Robotics By Invitation discussion. I tend to agree with Dr. Susan Calvin, Isaac Asimov‘s chief robopsychologist at US Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc. about the Inevitable Conflict between man and machine. Want to know more? Read the book! Continued learning may be the only thing keeping you ahead in the race against the machine.

(Photo credit: Ross Huggett)