As 2022 comes to a close, it is safe to say that this past year was an incredibly disruptive one for technology. We experienced some familiar trends with cybersecurity becoming more challenging to defend against, cloud offerings expanding, and the same top five programming languages from 2021 continuing to evolve. The year 2022 also brought some very exciting advancements in robotics, artificial intelligence, citizen development, blockchain, product management, and human-centered design. Though we’ve covered some of these topics previously in our Dura Digital blog, in this post we will recap the key advancements in these areas from 2022 and provide some perspective on what to watch for in 2023.
One of the most exciting news to watch in 2022 was in the area of robotics. In our Building the Future series, we previously provided an overview of the robotic industry, and also took deep dives into different types of robots that were already making an impact in 2022. We covered cobots, humanoids, telepresence robots, and the Robot Operating System (ROS). With all of that in mind, we believe the biggest advancement in robotics is the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) into teleoperated and autonomous robots. Robots are using Computer Vision (CV) to interpret and understand the visual world, making robots more effective at navigating challenging environments. With this hybrid approach (autonomous and teleoperated), robots are able to leverage CV to understand when a remote operator should be notified to take over. This is leading to fewer issues and more efficient robotic operations.
In 2023 we expect robotics to continue to benefit from advancements in AI and ML. We also expect robotics solutions to begin adopting best practices from other design disciplines, such as user experience (UX) and animation. UX will be especially important as teleoperated robot usage grows in production environments and the number of required operators grows. UX and animation disciplines will be critical in consumer-facing robots, to improve adoption. This will also help avoid running into a scenario where robots have a negative impact on customers; a good case study on this was the launch of “Marty” the grocery store robot, that created a negative experience for Stop & Shop customers at a cost of $35,000 per robot.
It was likely impossible to get through 2022 without hearing about advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Machine Learning (ML). In the past year, we covered LiDAR, DALL-E 2, GPT-3, and the AI services provided by AWS and Azure in our Building the Future blog series. Since those blog posts, the AI space has continued to advance at a rapid pace. GPT-3 was initially released in 2020 and in 2022 we have seen the foundation for additional advancements with an almost immediate impact on AI, including DALL-E 2 and ChatGPT. ChatGPT itself reached over 1 million users in less than a week since its launch, and despite its current weaknesses, it has been heralded as a disruptor for Google and Stack Overflow. It is also worth pointing out that OpenAI, the creators of GPT-3, DALL-E 2, and Chat GPT, also began an open partnership with Microsoft which led to the launch of GitHub Co-Pilot, focused on increasing software engineering efficiency.
We at Dura Digital believe that 2022 set the stage for OpenAI to continue building in 2023 on its existing foundations as well as its partnership with Microsoft. We fully expect DALL-E 3 to be released and there are also rumors that GPT-4 could be released early in 2023. Our biggest takeaway from these trends in 2022, is that AI has very quickly matured to a state where it would be negligent for organizations not to include or at least consider its components in their short-term strategies. AI is no longer a futuristic or cutting-edge concept, it is becoming simple to adopt into existing business processes and is already redefining how people work across many industries throughout the world.
Product Management in 2022 felt a lot like devops did in 2015, with many organizations realizing that dedicated product managers were necessary to enable strong and impactful product development. But finding strong product managers was tough for many organizations and the resources required to set them up for success still seems to be catching up to the need. These factors led to Dura Digital increasing our investment in building our Product Management studio, to allow us to help our clients with current product management needs, and also enable them establish their own product management practices. 2022 was a great indicator of just how positive the impact of strong product management will have on product success moving forward.
In 2023, we expect product management to continue to evolve and become even more critical for products to succeed. It will also continue to demand meaningful data to drive decisions and organizations will have to be supportive in ensuring they can take on the continuous increase in available digital data. We expect that we will also see a continued evolution of toolkits focused on product management, including cloud-based tools to assist with hybrid product collaboration, experimentation, product roadmaps, and more.
In 2022, our team delved into the value Microsoft Power Platform offers to businesses. Leveraging a point and click approach, Microsoft’s Power Platform operates using low code to analyze and automate workflows and processes, generate business solutions, and achieve insight using data and data visualization. Power Platform has five key components and features: Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI, Power Virtual Agents, and Power Pages.
Power Apps allow for users to build and deploy custom applications both on mobile and the web. Users can build these apps connected to data sources using canvas apps, use relational data models and business processes to create model-driven apps, or portals. Power Automate can be used to help integrate and automate simple to complex business processes across apps and services. Power BI allows users to analyze and visualize data. Businesses can connect and consolidate data into live dashboards that can be used for analysis, reports and help make informed, data driven decisions. Power Virtual Agents, such as chatbots, allow for users to create virtual agents by guiding users using a no code graphical interface. Power Platform allows for virtual agents to take actions via custom workflows. Lastly, Power Pages allow for professionals to build websites using low code.
The beauty of all five features in the Power Platform is their ability to connect with Microsoft’s Dataverse. The Dataverse is a cloud based data storage that allows users to store and manage their data. Key features of the Dataverse include its built-in security, built-in cognitive services and business logic, and integration capabilities with Dynamics 365, Office 365, and Azure. Lastly, Power Platform has exceptional data connectors that allow for end-to-end capabilities that work well within Microsoft's ecosystem.
Based on our experience this year, we are confident Power Platform will continue to produce high value outcomes and build customized solutions to help businesses improve efficiencies through workflow automation, data visualization and insights. In 2023, we expect the Power Platform to continue supporting organizations to launch effective low-code solutions at a rapid pace. This will also lead to organizations establishing dedicated "Citizen Development" teams to focus on these solutions. At Dura Digital, we will continue assisting organizations in growing their use of the Power Platform by providing guidance on delivery, change management, governance, and integration across the Power Platform.
Business intelligence is essential for organizations to make informed decisions, and data visualization tools can help achieve this. By transforming data into clear insights, businesses can operate to their full potential. Over the years data visualization tools have evolved in terms of ease of use and functionality, and this trend has continued through 2022.
One of the best tools used for data visualization and data insights is Microsoft Power BI. Power BI consumes a company’s data, leverages built-in artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable users to quickly create data visualizations. These visualizations can be organized into dashboards and reports that can be shared in ways that best fit an organization's workflow. They can be accessed on a web browser, desktop or mobile app, integrated into websites, or exported as PDFs or images.
Some of the magic of Power BI comes from its advanced AI and machine learning capabilities, which it uses to create “AI Insights.” These are pre-trained models that help with the data preparation and creation of graphics. AI is able to scan imported data, identify key metrics, and help get these metrics into easily understandable graphics.
Undertaking a digital transformation and becoming a data-informed organization can be a daunting task, but it is a goal that can completely revolutionize your business in 2023. Our team at Dura Digital continues to enable organizations to handle data and data visualization to guide them in their business needs.
Interest in Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) began to rise quickly in early 2021 with them continuing to gain popularity well into 2022. The market for NFTs changed quickly largely because of the dip in the cryptocurrency market. Through the ups and downs of the NFT market, there have been some innovative ideas around how NFTs can be used. One of these ideas is to use them for fundraising. Nonprofit organizations realized there is huge opportunity to connect with a younger, affluent, and global audience by tapping into the NFT market. Nonprofits like The Red Cross, Make-A-Wish foundation, and UNICEF have started some very successful campaigns that have raised millions of dollars.
Dura Digital published an NFT Fundraising Guide for Nonprofits that provides a comprehensive guide on how to launch a successful NFT campaign. This guide covers the key considerations and steps involved in creating and promoting NFTs. As the use of NFTs for fundraising is a rapidly evolving space, in 2023 Dura Digital will be closely following the opportunities and roadblocks that any organization should keep in mind when considering starting an NFT project.
Technology continued to be a disruptive and transformative force in 2022. With developments in robotics and AI, we can expect to see more automation and intelligent decision-making across various industries. Advancements in Computer Vision and Large Language Models will help drive these solutions forward throughout 2023.
Data Visualization and Business Intelligence (BI) will also continue to drive transformation across organizations, as data is better leveraged to inform and drive decisions. Microsoft’s Power Platform will continue to power “Citizen Development” in organizations adopting rapid digital transformation, enabling processes to be analyzed, automated, and shared at a faster pace. We also anticipate NFTs will gain mainstream adoption for non-profits, especially when fundraising efforts are partnered with the creation of art or other digital assets. We also expect Product Management to continue to evolve and mature in both the execution and education of the product management practice. In 2023, effective and flexible product management will be absolutely essential for the development, release, and continuous evolution of products. The great thing about all of these changes is that they are completely complementary to each other. AI will be an enabler for advancements in robotics, data, and the Power Platform, and will influence how we approach product management. The challenges we anticipate organizations to face in these areas will be related to ensuring these technologies are adopted and developed effectively. This will depend on ensuring the right practices, governance, and change management processes are in place. This is where Dura Digital excels. We continuously strive to help our clients throughout their digital transformation journeys, helping them navigate new technologies, implement the right processes, and build the future. If you would like to discuss any of these topics or to better understand how Dura Digital can help you in your digital innovation efforts, reach out to meet one of our experts today. We’d love to chat.
As 2022 comes to a close, it is safe to say that this past year was an incredibly disruptive one for technology. We experienced some familiar trends with cybersecurity becoming more challenging to defend against, cloud offerings expanding, and the same top five programming languages from 2021 continuing to evolve. The year 2022 also brought some very exciting advancements in robotics, artificial intelligence, citizen development, blockchain, product management, and human-centered design. Though we’ve covered some of these topics previously in our Dura Digital blog, in this post we will recap the key advancements in these areas from 2022 and provide some perspective on what to watch for in 2023.
One of the most exciting news to watch in 2022 was in the area of robotics. In our Building the Future series, we previously provided an overview of the robotic industry, and also took deep dives into different types of robots that were already making an impact in 2022. We covered cobots, humanoids, telepresence robots, and the Robot Operating System (ROS). With all of that in mind, we believe the biggest advancement in robotics is the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) into teleoperated and autonomous robots. Robots are using Computer Vision (CV) to interpret and understand the visual world, making robots more effective at navigating challenging environments. With this hybrid approach (autonomous and teleoperated), robots are able to leverage CV to understand when a remote operator should be notified to take over. This is leading to fewer issues and more efficient robotic operations.
In 2023 we expect robotics to continue to benefit from advancements in AI and ML. We also expect robotics solutions to begin adopting best practices from other design disciplines, such as user experience (UX) and animation. UX will be especially important as teleoperated robot usage grows in production environments and the number of required operators grows. UX and animation disciplines will be critical in consumer-facing robots, to improve adoption. This will also help avoid running into a scenario where robots have a negative impact on customers; a good case study on this was the launch of “Marty” the grocery store robot, that created a negative experience for Stop & Shop customers at a cost of $35,000 per robot.
It was likely impossible to get through 2022 without hearing about advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Machine Learning (ML). In the past year, we covered LiDAR, DALL-E 2, GPT-3, and the AI services provided by AWS and Azure in our Building the Future blog series. Since those blog posts, the AI space has continued to advance at a rapid pace. GPT-3 was initially released in 2020 and in 2022 we have seen the foundation for additional advancements with an almost immediate impact on AI, including DALL-E 2 and ChatGPT. ChatGPT itself reached over 1 million users in less than a week since its launch, and despite its current weaknesses, it has been heralded as a disruptor for Google and Stack Overflow. It is also worth pointing out that OpenAI, the creators of GPT-3, DALL-E 2, and Chat GPT, also began an open partnership with Microsoft which led to the launch of GitHub Co-Pilot, focused on increasing software engineering efficiency.
We at Dura Digital believe that 2022 set the stage for OpenAI to continue building in 2023 on its existing foundations as well as its partnership with Microsoft. We fully expect DALL-E 3 to be released and there are also rumors that GPT-4 could be released early in 2023. Our biggest takeaway from these trends in 2022, is that AI has very quickly matured to a state where it would be negligent for organizations not to include or at least consider its components in their short-term strategies. AI is no longer a futuristic or cutting-edge concept, it is becoming simple to adopt into existing business processes and is already redefining how people work across many industries throughout the world.
Product Management in 2022 felt a lot like devops did in 2015, with many organizations realizing that dedicated product managers were necessary to enable strong and impactful product development. But finding strong product managers was tough for many organizations and the resources required to set them up for success still seems to be catching up to the need. These factors led to Dura Digital increasing our investment in building our Product Management studio, to allow us to help our clients with current product management needs, and also enable them establish their own product management practices. 2022 was a great indicator of just how positive the impact of strong product management will have on product success moving forward.
In 2023, we expect product management to continue to evolve and become even more critical for products to succeed. It will also continue to demand meaningful data to drive decisions and organizations will have to be supportive in ensuring they can take on the continuous increase in available digital data. We expect that we will also see a continued evolution of toolkits focused on product management, including cloud-based tools to assist with hybrid product collaboration, experimentation, product roadmaps, and more.
In 2022, our team delved into the value Microsoft Power Platform offers to businesses. Leveraging a point and click approach, Microsoft’s Power Platform operates using low code to analyze and automate workflows and processes, generate business solutions, and achieve insight using data and data visualization. Power Platform has five key components and features: Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI, Power Virtual Agents, and Power Pages.
Power Apps allow for users to build and deploy custom applications both on mobile and the web. Users can build these apps connected to data sources using canvas apps, use relational data models and business processes to create model-driven apps, or portals. Power Automate can be used to help integrate and automate simple to complex business processes across apps and services. Power BI allows users to analyze and visualize data. Businesses can connect and consolidate data into live dashboards that can be used for analysis, reports and help make informed, data driven decisions. Power Virtual Agents, such as chatbots, allow for users to create virtual agents by guiding users using a no code graphical interface. Power Platform allows for virtual agents to take actions via custom workflows. Lastly, Power Pages allow for professionals to build websites using low code.
The beauty of all five features in the Power Platform is their ability to connect with Microsoft’s Dataverse. The Dataverse is a cloud based data storage that allows users to store and manage their data. Key features of the Dataverse include its built-in security, built-in cognitive services and business logic, and integration capabilities with Dynamics 365, Office 365, and Azure. Lastly, Power Platform has exceptional data connectors that allow for end-to-end capabilities that work well within Microsoft's ecosystem.
Based on our experience this year, we are confident Power Platform will continue to produce high value outcomes and build customized solutions to help businesses improve efficiencies through workflow automation, data visualization and insights. In 2023, we expect the Power Platform to continue supporting organizations to launch effective low-code solutions at a rapid pace. This will also lead to organizations establishing dedicated "Citizen Development" teams to focus on these solutions. At Dura Digital, we will continue assisting organizations in growing their use of the Power Platform by providing guidance on delivery, change management, governance, and integration across the Power Platform.
Business intelligence is essential for organizations to make informed decisions, and data visualization tools can help achieve this. By transforming data into clear insights, businesses can operate to their full potential. Over the years data visualization tools have evolved in terms of ease of use and functionality, and this trend has continued through 2022.
One of the best tools used for data visualization and data insights is Microsoft Power BI. Power BI consumes a company’s data, leverages built-in artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable users to quickly create data visualizations. These visualizations can be organized into dashboards and reports that can be shared in ways that best fit an organization's workflow. They can be accessed on a web browser, desktop or mobile app, integrated into websites, or exported as PDFs or images.
Some of the magic of Power BI comes from its advanced AI and machine learning capabilities, which it uses to create “AI Insights.” These are pre-trained models that help with the data preparation and creation of graphics. AI is able to scan imported data, identify key metrics, and help get these metrics into easily understandable graphics.
Undertaking a digital transformation and becoming a data-informed organization can be a daunting task, but it is a goal that can completely revolutionize your business in 2023. Our team at Dura Digital continues to enable organizations to handle data and data visualization to guide them in their business needs.
Interest in Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) began to rise quickly in early 2021 with them continuing to gain popularity well into 2022. The market for NFTs changed quickly largely because of the dip in the cryptocurrency market. Through the ups and downs of the NFT market, there have been some innovative ideas around how NFTs can be used. One of these ideas is to use them for fundraising. Nonprofit organizations realized there is huge opportunity to connect with a younger, affluent, and global audience by tapping into the NFT market. Nonprofits like The Red Cross, Make-A-Wish foundation, and UNICEF have started some very successful campaigns that have raised millions of dollars.
Dura Digital published an NFT Fundraising Guide for Nonprofits that provides a comprehensive guide on how to launch a successful NFT campaign. This guide covers the key considerations and steps involved in creating and promoting NFTs. As the use of NFTs for fundraising is a rapidly evolving space, in 2023 Dura Digital will be closely following the opportunities and roadblocks that any organization should keep in mind when considering starting an NFT project.
Technology continued to be a disruptive and transformative force in 2022. With developments in robotics and AI, we can expect to see more automation and intelligent decision-making across various industries. Advancements in Computer Vision and Large Language Models will help drive these solutions forward throughout 2023.
Data Visualization and Business Intelligence (BI) will also continue to drive transformation across organizations, as data is better leveraged to inform and drive decisions. Microsoft’s Power Platform will continue to power “Citizen Development” in organizations adopting rapid digital transformation, enabling processes to be analyzed, automated, and shared at a faster pace. We also anticipate NFTs will gain mainstream adoption for non-profits, especially when fundraising efforts are partnered with the creation of art or other digital assets. We also expect Product Management to continue to evolve and mature in both the execution and education of the product management practice. In 2023, effective and flexible product management will be absolutely essential for the development, release, and continuous evolution of products. The great thing about all of these changes is that they are completely complementary to each other. AI will be an enabler for advancements in robotics, data, and the Power Platform, and will influence how we approach product management. The challenges we anticipate organizations to face in these areas will be related to ensuring these technologies are adopted and developed effectively. This will depend on ensuring the right practices, governance, and change management processes are in place. This is where Dura Digital excels. We continuously strive to help our clients throughout their digital transformation journeys, helping them navigate new technologies, implement the right processes, and build the future. If you would like to discuss any of these topics or to better understand how Dura Digital can help you in your digital innovation efforts, reach out to meet one of our experts today. We’d love to chat.
2212 Queen Anne Ave. N #923
Seattle, WA 98109
José Ellauri 938
Montevideo, CP 11300
7630 119th Street NW
Edmonton, AB T6G 1W3
2212 Queen Anne Ave. N #923
Seattle, WA 98109
José Ellauri 938
Montevideo, CP 11300
7630 119th Street NW
Edmonton, AB T6G 1W3
2212 Queen Anne Ave. N #923
Seattle, WA 98109
José Ellauri 938
Montevideo, CP 11300
7630 119th Street NW
Edmonton, AB T6G 1W3
2212 Queen Anne Ave. N #923
Seattle, WA 98109
José Ellauri 938
Montevideo, CP 11300
7630 119th Street NW
Edmonton, AB T6G 1W3
