• AI aims to replace us, not simply make a specific industry more efficient
• It Impacts every industry, and
• The pace of change is exponential

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

When I was doing my final year project in 1989 at IIT Roorkee, India in a subfield of AI known as neural networks – it was “out of this world.” The grand challenges of the field were a limited memory, slow processing, and lack of training testbeds. Starting around 2010, the field of AI has been re-energized by fast hardware Graphics Processor Units (GPUs), ASICs, ML Accelerators and infinitely large training testbeds (BIG data such as images, IOT, social networks, etc.). This combination has resulted in AI to advance at a breakneck pace.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

By 2025, the needs for traditional compute functionality in the cloud will be so large that it can never be built. Quantum computing's arrival promises to revolutionize the cloud. What quantum computing provides is massively parallel processing, atomic-level storage, and security using the laws of physics rather than external cryptographic methods. If you have not begun looking at it, the time is now. The cloud will 
soon be powered by quantum computing, and software will be written in another way.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

I strongly believe that brainwaves can be used to augment human experience of the Wi-Fi network and eventually, internet. And, another area where AI will help is seamless identity based login and user's control on the policy. AI will help us to create a Wi-Fi network that follows the user, follows the device, and requires no SSID to connect. A Wi-Fi network that is so smart, it will enable the “access” based on who you are, what you are, or what your intentions are and not who the owner of premises is. The concept of SSID as we know today will go away.  This is what I call Augmented WiFi. Artificial intelligence augmented Wi-Fi. Augmented Wi-Fi will not just help with user experience or network operation; it will also enable seamless login and user policy control.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

Apple iBeacon did not exist when I wrote RTLS for Dummies. And, almost four years after Apple announced iBeacon, it has failed to live up to the kind of sky-high expectations Apple's involvement evokes. People often ask me why iBeacon, despite the seductive promise of Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality applications, has not disrupted the indoor location industry.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

In the Augmentation Revolution, the aim is to develop technologies and techniques for overcoming current limitations of human cognitive and physical abilities. No one knows where this revolution will end, but by the end of next decade, I believe that every individual on earth will be using one or more augmented capabilities in their daily lives. We’ll be relying more and more on these enhanced abilities. Our actions will depend upon our “level of augmentation.” We will no longer be able to distinguish between the natural and the augmented.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

Our lives are made up of a complex network of pathways that we can use to move from one phase of life to the next. The first step in determining which "next step" will land us to the most direct route to fulfillment and the realization of our life purpose is taking time to visualize the perfect future and then making a list of ways to manifest that future. And, it is not so different for a technology. 
In this part (here is link to Part 1 of 3), I want to share my view of that perfect future and the opportunities around Wi-Fi.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google

Wi-Fi is 18 now! The journey to now has been a tremendous one.
It started in 1999, yet it seems just like yesterday. Six companies (3Com, Aironet, Harris Semiconductor, Lucent, Nokia and Symbol Technologies) came together to form a global non-profit association Wi-Fi Alliance. The objective of Wi-Fi Alliance was to develop and validate multi-vendor interoperability using a new wireless networking technology (802.11 protocol created in 1997). Shortly after, in year 2000, Wi-Fi alliance delivered the first standard 802.11b (11 Mbps in 2.4GHz band). Wi-Fi was gaining attention by retailers especially as they needed wireless bar code scanners, price verifiers etc.

Ajay Malik

Head Architecture/Engineering, Worldwide Corporate Networking & Services at Google