The 7th Future of Robotics in Finland Seminar was successfully held on Friday 22.11.2019 at Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki, Finland, organized by the IEEE Finland Joint Chapter of the Control System Society, Robotics and Automation Society and Systems, Man and Cybernetics Society and in combination with the European Robotics week. This year the main theme was on Economical and Ethical innovation and AI in robotics.

Start of the Seminar

Opening of the Seminar by Pasi Hurri (BaseN Oy)

The morning and afternoon session included six talks. Pasi Hurri and Prof. Roel Pieters hosted the seminar and introduced the IEEE, the chapter and standing officers, followed by three talks by Kim Nyberg from Trimble, Mikko Valtonen from WallRobotics and Harri Holpainen from Zen Robotics. Topics ranged from heavy mobile machine automation, high-rise robotic facade cleaning and robotic waste sorting, and their economical and ethical perspective. Followin a light lunch, three remaining talks were given by Dr. Tapio Taipalus from GIM ltd., Oscar Nissin from Metropolia and Dr. Caj Södergård from VTT. Topics rangerd from ethical automation of self-driving vehicles and artificial intelligence for economic competitiveness and societal progress.

Harri Holopainen (ZenRobotics)

The seminar ended with a panel discussion, featuring panelists Mikko Valtonen, Harri Holpainen, Tapio Taipalus, Oscar Nissin, Caj Södergård and Roel Pieters. Moderator Pasi Hurri engaged in an active discussion on various aspects of the ethical and economical impact of robotics, with passionate input and opinions from the attendees.

Panel discussion

The standing officers of IEEE Finland Joint Chapter of the Control System Society, Robotics and Automation Society and Systems, Man and Cybernetics Society organizing the event are Prof. Roel Pieters, chair, Pasi Hurri, vice chair, Dr. Peter Jakubik, treasurer, Kshitij Tiwari, secretary and Prof. Simo Särkkä, publicity chair. Prof. Roel Pieters and Pasi Hurri were responsible for the organization of the seminar in general, assisted by the other officers, and with great support from Sonja Schubert.

Reported by Roel Pieters, Email: roel.pieters@tuni.fi
Chair of IEEE Finland Joint Chapter of the Control System Society, Robotics and Automation Society and Systems, Man and Cybernetics Society