ERVA sponsored and participated in developing newest roadmap with recommendations related to artificial intelligence, workforce needs, and sustainability themes.
The Roadmap for U.S. Robotics has been updated every four years since it was first published in 2009. The initial roadmap
resulted in the National Robotics Initiative, a cross agency program to promote R&D in robotics. Each edition since has had a theme to ensure its findings are relevant to address current challenges. For 2024, key considerations in the roadmap are
related to the use of advances in artificial intelligence, how to address the workforce shortage, and a more explicit emphasis on sustainability.
The Engineering Research Visioning Alliance was pleased to sponsor and contribute to the Robotics Roadmap with distinguished co-sponsors: the University of California, San Diego; the Computing Community Consortium; the University of Pennsylvania; the University of Texas, Austin; and Arizona State University. ERVA had representatives at all the Robotics Roadmap meetings and would like to thank Vijay Kumar, Roger Bonnecaze, Edl Schamiloglu, and Pramod Khargonekar for their active participation.
Key recommendations from the 2024 Robotics Roadmap:
Robotics technology will transform society and is likely to become as ubiquitous within the next decade as computing technology is today. As it stands, this development will not occur in the United States. As such, robotics ought to be a national government priority (again)
There should be cross-agency coordination for R&D, innovation and utilization of robot technology. The need for a holistic vision across industry, academic and government is critical to the nation.
● The Congressional Robotics Caucus should be reinvigorated to ensure appropriate prioritization at all levels.
● There is a need to unify funding programs across agencies to make it easier for researchers, developers, and entrepreneurs to access these opportunities.
● There is a need to consider mechanisms to support the U.S. industry to be competitive across regions and nations.
● Increased attention is needed on workforce training to address the shortage and to ensure adaptation to new technology.
The Robotics Roadmap includes discussion of megatrends, opportunities, and challenges, research directions, and workforce development discussion, as well as societal considerations on safety, security, ethics, and inclusion. The ERVA community is encouraged to download the Robotics Roadmap, share it with colleagues, and leverage the learnings.