Keysight Imagine 2021

What new moves will Keysight make in 2021? From artificial intelligence and 5G to quantum technology, healthcare and driverless cars...Keysight Chief Technology Officer Jay Alexander gives his predictions for this year.

The impact of a hybrid workforce on technology development, design, and deployment will be addressed by software: A hybrid workforce, social distancing, and other dilutions to historical work will accelerate the software implementation of product design and development. Jay Alexander said software dominance will play a huge role in 2021.

Product design, R&D, testing, manufacturing and troubleshooting will be done remotely through software-led solutions, and companies will rely on software to support the remote workforce by using the cloud and providing advanced computing power.

In addition, software will also be key to digital transformation, and the pace of innovation will accelerate in 2021. The adoption of digital tools, processes, and software-led solutions will change the speed at which companies can innovate, grow, support customers, and conduct business.

Companies will accelerate transformation by collecting and capturing digital information and using advanced analytics and data visualization to gain the insights needed to accelerate innovation, thereby improving productivity, efficiency, accuracy, security, and time to market. This will place greater emphasis on new software solutions for design, testing, and validation, as well as the analysis and interpretation of these results, particularly in:

R&D measurement and analysis As more experiments and iterations need to be tested, engineers need to conduct in-depth analysis of the data, which will require richer automation capabilities.

As electronic packaging environments become more complex, sophisticated design and simulation are required to measure power flow, thermal and assembly while validating prototypes to ensure the design works as expected.

Safety

In 2021, security will take on new meaning. Developers will address potential security issues earlier in the design cycle, including security testing. More emphasis will be placed on how products are deployed, using contactless technology, eliminating human intervention, and fully automated self-healing networks.

User experience will become increasingly important to both customers and vendors of all types of software solutions as these solutions play a critical role in both professional and personal contexts, and the demands and high expectations for the experience will continue to increase.

5G

Alexander said that by 2021, 5G will remain a strategic necessity for businesses and governments. Although the pandemic slowed deployment progress in 2020, it can be expected that by 2021, 5G will become the focus of international attention as it drives improvements in power, energy and financial infrastructure. However, the cellular base station issue and related policies will become a bigger issue for national and local governments.

5G will also go beyond smartphones into industrial use cases and enable virtualized healthcare delivery and processes. Manufacturing and network rollouts will catch up with device launches in 2020, and 5G devices will become more diverse and available at a wider range of prices.

As accessibility to user devices grows, 5G deployment will be driven by dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS) and new spectrum policies to address current coverage issues and the cost of deploying mid-band spectrum.

IoT

In 2021, we will increase investment in infrastructure to support the Internet of Things and Industrial Internet of Things, including distributed cloud and hyperconnectivity, with a focus on private 5G for industrial enterprises, which will facilitate remote operations and management.

The growing remote workforce will drive the growth of the Industrial Internet of Things, which will require companies to continue to deploy smart devices to effectively manage manufacturing and factory operations remotely. As a result, we expect to increase investments in automation, using robotics and machine learning to manage facilities and cloud computing to automate production lines. As cars and other facilities increase, all parts will need to be automated for manufacturing, testing, and analysis.

There will also be more investment in the Industrial Internet of Things to enable real-time, predictive control, which will require an increase in the number of machines and sensors, as well as a network infrastructure capable of managing the multitude of devices.

Quantum Technology

Although it is still early days for quantum technology, investment levels in quantum computing are expected to accelerate, and in 2021, quantum will enter a strong research phase, and participants will continue to experiment and invest in future quantum research.

There are many competing qubit technologies today, including superconducting, trapped ion, silicon spin, and photonic implementations. These technologies will continue to evolve in 2021.

The field of quantum materials research will also heat up in 2021. It will also be supported by a strong investment pipeline, some of which will be provided by major governments, as they play a key role in the geopolitical and economic advantages of quantum computing.

By 2021, more and more customers will have access to quantum computers in the cloud to run new algorithms that seek quantum advantage. And more companies will enter the field, offering quantum computers and cloud services, while expanding the power of computers available to users.

unmanned

Development of autonomous vehicles will continue to move forward: The automotive industry has experienced headwinds due to the pandemic, but production and manufacturing will ease. As the number of sensors continues to increase, the Internet of Vehicles will also need to keep up with this trend.

As for electric vehicles, sales will continue to grow, but they only account for a small percentage of total vehicle manufacturing (3%). While the manufacturing of traditional vehicles stagnates, interest in electric vehicles will increase as countries face stricter emissions standards. Investment in autonomous vehicles may be modest in the first half of 2021, but will pick up in the second half. This is more aggressive in Greater China, as the region is committed to phasing out traditional fuel vehicles by 2035. The United States will pay more attention to electric vehicles and electric vehicle development in 2021.

Remote work

Distributed and remote workers will gain access to new technologies, which will lead to a blend of remote and onsite work environments that have become the norm. Technology companies will gradually form and organize mission-critical innovation teams that will be managed remotely. Engineers and other innovators will need to return to the field, but they will be more purposeful and strategic about when to collaborate.

Enterprise sales organizations will undergo a significant transformation as hybrid sales forces (in-person + virtual) apply new approaches to relationship building and learning objectives, as well as delivering product and solution demonstrations remotely.

STEM and Technology Talent

STEM will help drive the talent pipeline: With the increased emphasis on diversity and inclusion, we will see an extremely fierce competition for technical talent. New ways to provide virtual learning opportunities are being explored and implemented, leveling the playing field.

Businesses and governments will address equity issues in the “digital divide” (lack of access to resources such as computers, smartphones, Wi-Fi and broadband) that the pandemic has exacerbated.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) will become more important in business: CSR will no longer be an exclusive concern, but an ethical and business imperative that aligns with a company’s value creation strategy. Shareholders, in addition to employees and customers, will recognize that companies with a tangible commitment to social responsibility generate better long-term returns and achieve more sustainable practices.

Ethical supply chains, inventory and material suppliers will review a company’s CSR program before entering into a working relationship with an organization.

Climate change will continue to cause supply chain disruptions around the world, so business continuity planning and supply chain resilience strategies are critical to the success of businesses. This will emphasize the assessment of potential risks, as well as mitigation strategies and plans covering the end-to-end supply chain process, and flexible procurement strategies involving multiple alternative parts, part redesign, and part standardization. This will require new approaches to deal with the financial implications.