Cybernetic techniques already ensure that computing machines are produced efficiently. Consideration is now given to the case for automating the means of producing computer software. A formal notation to describe software production is outlined and some machine portable systems are introduced. New and powerful techniques for modelling machines and producing ‘program’ generators are described.

After discussing the advent of the Age of Automation, the author considers the number of robots in operation throughout the world and the forecasts of their manufacture for each country. Attention is then drawn to the international exchange of research and technological information, in particular to the frequent symposia on industrial robots (ISIR). In addition to ISIR, international conferences on advanced robotics are also envisaged (ICAR). Finally, some details are given of international cooperation in the realm of industrial research.

Increasing productivity in manufacturing industry leads to a continuing shift in the balance between employment in ‘productive’ and in ‘service’ industries, the latter providing more employment at present in a ratio of about 70:30. This paper is primarily concerned with employment in manufacturing industry. Some have seen automation as a means of de-skilling jobs, but there is evidence of a gradual ‘upward’ shift of skill requirements in manufacturing industry: the unskilled workers are being eliminated and the skilled manual workers replaced by technicians with mental skills. This introduces the need for re-training and raises the question whether one can have a society in which there are no unskilled persons.

It has become a truism that the introduction of modern technology requires new skills from both management and workforce. Yet recent reports confirm that the supply of trained manpower is failing to match present and future demand. Government action may be required, but more important is the need to promote greater liaison between higher education and industry, and to move - at craft and technician level - to a standard of training already being achieved by our competitors overseas. To accomplish these objectives requires a change in our attitude to education and training.

After reviewing the conference topics, the author discusses the technical potential of automation in the wider aspects of technical innovation. The next topic is concerned with automation and the world economy in general, and that in developed countries in particular. Some comments are then made about the manufacturing prospects in the U.K. and their relationships with education and training in the relevant fields. Finally, the inauguration of the Advanced Manufacturing Technology Chair at the University of Salford is described in the context of industry-education problems.

There can be little doubt that we are seeing a rapid acceleration in the pace of technological change as we approach the 1990s. In manufacturing industry this move towards automation is seen as a key element in preserving and improving competitiveness - the ‘fitter’ part of the well-known ‘leaner and fitter’ prescription for the revival of British industry.

It is, however, important to remember that technology is only one term in the equation and that, for the prescription to work, consideration must be made of the social and economic implications of change. This paper explores some of these implications from both a national and a company-level perspective and concludes that the benefits of advanced automation will only be realised if a total systems approach is taken to its implementation.

Some changes have uncomfortable characteristics. Change is inevitable, large, penetrating, unpredictable. There is thus the need to create ‘learning’ organisations capable of coping with change. The following topics are considered:

1. Changes in organisational shape – transition from hierarchical triangular shaped to ‘heterarchical’ diamond shaped organisations – the breakdown hierarchy.

2. Changes in the role of people in manufacturing and services including the public service.

3. ‘Managers’ and new technology – management role enhanced co-ordinating and creating motivation.

4. Three models for change.

5. The productivity of automation is essential. ‘Working’ years are shortening, ‘dependent’ years are lengthening.

6. People as assets.

7. Technology, Human Aspects, Process of change = TRAP.

A simple general model for learning, using a fuzzy set theoretic approach and fuzzy decision in an automaton which has nonfuzzy input/output, is proposed. The process has been modelled somewhat in the fashion of general biological systems, which may be viewed as a fuzzy decision process where learning consists in taking a tentative action and reinforcing the membership values on the basis of the results of that action. The model is tested on an automaton whose sole purpose is to follow the boundary on an object with which it makes contact during its movements. The automaton is simulated by a computer. it has standard 8–neighbourhood configuration with binary sense capability and three action capabilities. The automaton has been found to learn to take correct action in a large number of possible input situations within only a few thousand moves.