Answer

Analysis of Google’s Five Technologies that are currently under Research and Development

            Google Inc. happens to be among the organizations that boast a culture of innovation. According to Indonesia (2014), Google Inc. encourages employee innovation and risk taking. This paper aims to analyze Google’s five technologies that are currently under research and development including self-driving automobile, Google Home, Google’s Assistant, Duo, and DayDream. The paper analyzes each of these technologies in relation to four dimensions including technology description, challenges that Google could encounter with the technology’s implementation, suggestions for addressing some of the potential obstacles and challenges, and assessment of the technology’s negative and positive impact on society, as shown in the subsequent sub-headings.

Google’s Self-Driving Automobile

Google’s self-driving automobile is a wholly self-driving technology. The company’s self-driving vehicles possess software and sensors developed to detect road work, vehicles, cyclists, and pedestrians among others from a distance, which is approximately two fields of football away within all directions (Waymo, 2017; Bailey, 2014). It is also significant to note that these vehicles lack pedals or steering wheels (Davies, 2017). Waymo (2017) adds that the vehicles’ software and sensors have the ability to sense and predict the mannerism of cyclists and other road users.

Despite the company’s self-driving technology being a promising one, Google is likely to encounter certain challenges in its implementation. For instance, Davies (2017) argues that this technology presents safety threats to consumers given that the safety drivers are absent at the wheel to ensure that everything remains on track. The company is also likely to experience implementation issues related to hacking of the system, the size of the territory to be covered by self-driving cars, hours these vehicles will run, and passengers’ charges for rides (Davies, 2017). Another area that could pose a significant challenge when implementing this technology is lack of clarity on whether there exists a mechanism for preventing a freaked-out passenger against scrambling to the seat of the driver and taking control of the vehicle, or how the issue of insurance can be addressed when such a self-driving car causes a crash.

Even though Google may face issues with the implementation of its technology, the company’s management can address such challenges by embracing certain measures. For example, Davies (2017) proposes enhancing efficiency of the vehicle’s system to almost 100 percent to address the issue of passenger safety even in the absence of safety drivers. The company should also invest in robust security systems to safeguard their vehicles against cybercrimes. The firm’s management should also liaise with stakeholders, government, legislators, and lobby groups for the development of an insurance policy cover for self-driving vehicles and policy outlining the territory of self-driving automobiles. Moreover, the area around the driver’s seat should be shielded from passengers to safeguard the it against scared passengers.

The development of Google’s self-driving automobile possess negative and positive impacts on society. With the development of self-driving vehicles, most drivers could lose their jobs and this may lead worsening unemployment rates. The new technology may also lead to the collapse or loses in some industries, especially those dealing with oil (Dallegro, 2017). Besides, such experiences may negatively impact the economies of oil producing nations. Despite having negative effects, Google’s self-driving technology can also impact the environment in a positive manner in several ways. By limiting or eliminating the use of oil or fuel dependent vehicles, this technology could impact the environment in a positive manner by reducing air, land, and water pollutions arising from oil. Dallegro (2017) argues that over 90 percent of accidents result from driver error associated with overspeeding, drunk driving, and taking of unnecessary risks. The introduction of self-driving automobiles will reduce the severity and frequency of accidents, which in turn will lead to a fall of insurance cost (Dallegro, 2017). Considering the number of lives that this technology will save, its implementation is of significant moral imperative in that all human-driven vehicles should be replaced by self-driving automobiles. Apart from leading to the creation of novel limousine and taxi industries, the self-driving cars could result into a drop in the cost of boarding a taxi from between $4 and $6 per mile to 40 cent per mile (Dallegro, 2017). The self-driving technology will have a significant impact on the future of managers in that managers will have to invest in developing robust information technology skills and knowledge critical for the management of such vehicles, as opposed to drivers. Some of the management areas that will be impacted are office automation systems, knowledge management systems (KMS), decision support systems (DSS), management information systems (MIS), and transaction processing systems (TIPS).    

Google Home

            Google Home is a home assistant that comprises a small speaker having always-listening microphones that assimilates a range of services. Brandom et al. (2016) add that Google home is a small cylinder having a speaker fitted at the base and a rounded top. Resembling Amazon’s Echo, this device executes commands and answers questions in a similar manner, depending on Google’s Assistant technology in making sense of question.

Even though Google Home bears a great potential for excellence, its implementation will come with certain challenges. Townsend (2017) asserts that Google will have to overcome certain hurdles prior to gaining power with voice and generating profits from it.  First, the company has not invested adequately in hardware that can support its voice technology (Townsend, 2017). Moreover, the firm still exercises limited control over whether mobile networks and manufacturers ensure its sound devices receive the update required for the sound software to function. Second, the Google Home technology also faces issues when it comes to the recognition of accents and various forms of voice. Third, the system does not guarantee privacy since one has to speak loudly for it to interpret the voice in an effective manner.

Google’s management can embrace three measures to ensure that it handles the challenges faced in the implementation of Google Home technology. First, the company should sell Pixel phones and Home devices that run the Google’s Al software with the aim of addressing the hardware issue (Townsend, 2017). Second, Google should invest heavily in training its systems on recognizing accent and voice data via its services. Third, the company should fine-tune its voice recognition systems to increase their capability to detect voice even when spoken silently (Townsend, 2017). In situations where the systems cannot recognize silently spoken voices, typing capabilities should be integrated in the system. These measures will contribute significantly to addressing the issue of privacy.

Google Home can impact society both negatively and positively. This technology has been noted to create privacy issues, which could be problematic within troubled households (Townsend, 2017). The worst instances are power relationships between children and parents or abusive relationships, where privacy is an issue of great concern (Townsend, 2017). The aspect of privacy raises an ethical issue concerning the adoption of this technology. Nevertheless, considering its numerous benefits, Google Home should be adopted, but with added features such as typing capabilities where privacy is needed. This technology is convenient to use in that a user only needs to speak, as the system executes the command. With no defined impact on the environment, Google Home is more customizable relative to other options such as Dot and Amazon Echo, which are simply manufactured in white or Black. Google Home allows for customizations into various colors. The development of Google Home will have significant impact on the practice of managers in the future. For instance, managers will have to invest more in managing the development of voice systems with high sound recognition capabilities, as opposed to focusing on systems that execute functions based on typed words. Brandom et al. (2016) assert that Google Home is established on Chromecast standard that allows it to push media to other related cast-compatible screens and speakers, integrate with services such as Spotify, and change lighting or temperature via Nest devices. With this technology, the management practice will have to focus majorly on office automation systems and transaction processing systems (TPS).

Google’s Assistant

            Google Assistant is considered a next-generation assistant technology (Brandom et al., 2016). Contrary to the search-based Google technology, Google Assistant is more of a chat application. Google Assistant has the ability to analyze context by enquiring from it what the user needs such as movies and buying tickets all without abandoning the app (Brandon et al., 2016).

Despite the technology being a promising one, implementing Google’s Assistant could be accompanied by certain challenges. Googe Assistant functions on iPhone Operating System (iOS), which makes it vulnerable to the inherent limitations associated with iOS. As such, Assistant resides within the Assistant application, which limits its accessibility on various platforms. The application has limited capability when it comes to executing tasks for users such as inability to summon an Uber (Gartenberg, 2017). The system also lacks developer support functionality, and this could impact its performance in a negative manner (Gartenberg, 2017). These limitations could lead to the technology facing resistance from consumers or users, who could shift to other options such as Siri.

Google can address the implementation challenges faced by its technology by focusing on the inclusion of the absent features. Gartenberg (2017) asserts that the Siri app, which serves the same purpose as Google’s Assistant, integrates additional features enabling users book Uber taxi service, looking up movie times, and looking up restaurant reservations among others. The company should also consider the involvement of a third-party app developers to create extensions for Google’s Assistant on both phones and Home (Google Home) (Gartenberg, 2017). Embracing these measures will contribute significantly to a successful implementation of the technology.

As in the case of other Google technologies, Google Assistant possesses negative and positive impacts on society. According to Waddel (2016), digital assistants often presents privacy problem in that the user’s query is sent to headquarters for parsing and answering, and then returned to the user’s device. As a result, the user’s privacy is compromised by the trail of breadcrumbs left on the internet. The inability to preserve users’ privacy subjects digital assistant technologies to ethical issues concerning their adoption. Besides, these technologies lead to unemployment, as systems are employed to execute tasks that could be performed by humans such as listening to user’s queries and responding to them online. Nevertheless, the benefits that these technologies present to users and society makes their adoption inevitable provided the relevant safety measures are embraced by service providers. Apart from facilitating immediate feedback, these technologies enhances convenience of use as they execute commands in relation to what the user request. This technology also impacts the environment in a positive manner, as it eliminates the need to for the employment of more paper work or manual documents. Moreover, employment of these technologies also saves costs in that the company does not have to employ several employees. The development of Google Assistant will inform the practice of managers in the future in relation to the management of information systems and ensuring privacy of data. Extra effort will be directed towards the management of information systems, as opposed to managing human employees.  

Duo

            Duo is a video chatting application that resembles Apple, which splits up FaceTime and iMessage. This technology is fully committed to a video-only experience. The app is simple to use in that it presents a selfie-cam video preview of the user when opened (Brandom et al., 2016). The Duo app is mobile only, and is available for iOS and Android.

The implementation of the Duo app can be marred with one key challenge. Brandom et al., (2016) inform that this app is mobile only. As such, the app cannot be accessed on other gadgets such as desktops, thereby limiting the number of users that can be captured by this app. This shortcoming presents a significant threat when this technology is compared to other related technologies such as FaceTime, which is not mobile-only.

Addressing the challenge face by Duo app calls for the adoption of the strategy employed by FaceTime. Currently, Duo has the user’s mobile number tied to the app, and this makes it mobile only (Brandom et al., 2016).  Contrary to the Duo app, the FaceTime app is not mobile only, and this makes the app operable in several gadgets such as desktops or public computers (PCs). For instance, iLife Geeks (2017) asserts that FaceTime allows users to have video calls between devices that employ the IOS and Macs that run FaceTime. As such, Google’s management should consider eliminating the mobile-only functionality of the Duo app to make it accessible on a range of gadgets and devices including Windows.

The Duo app has certain negative impacts on society. The negative effects of the Duo app are directly associated with those of social networking. This app can lead to distraction of employee at workplace, thereby resulting into decreased productivity (Jung, 2017). The technology can also promote cyber bullying and a false feeling of connection, as argued by Jung (2017). Despite the negative impacts of Duo on society, this application has several positive impacts linked to the benefits presented by social networking sites. Social networking sites help in the establishment of relationships, exposure of individuals to the world, and enhance speedy communication (Parrack, 2012). According to Brandom (2017), the Duo app employs the two-factor authentication, which contributes to its robust securing of information. As such, the app eliminates the ethical question of privacy of user information. Dosemagen (2017) asserts that social networking sites serve as media for spreading campaigns associated with environmental conservation. As such, this technology also bears a positive impact on the environment in that is offers a suitable platform for conveying information associated with the conservation of the environment via videos. In this manner, positive attitudes towards environmental preservation can be established. The emergence of the Duo app will influence future management practice in a significant manner. For instance, managers can align their information management systems in a way that allows for video interaction with employees and potential candidates. Managers could also focus on interacting with employees in a range of platforms and gadgets, thereby enhancing the communication process.       

Daydream

            Daydream is a platform for mobile virtual reality established on Android N. As such, this technology is more of an Android for Virtual Reality (VR) (Brandom et al., 2016). Daydream serves as a software backbone within the Android N that offers users an entire ecosystem within which to play around (Brandom et al., 2016). It is significant to note that Google already possesses special VR versions related to its apps such as Street View, YouTube, Play Movies, Google Photos, and the Google Play Store (Brandom et al., 2016). For Daydream, other components such as Home Box Office (HBO), The New York Times, Electronic Arts, Netflix, and Ubisoft are already developing (Brandom et al., 2016).

According to Brandom et al. (2011), the implementation of Daydream is associated with one primary challenge in this technology will only function on novel phones that possess special screens and sensors. As such, the technology cannot function on phones without special screens and sensors, thereby eliminating those owning such phones from consuming the services of this technology.

Google should focus on the release of several reference designs for headsets as a mechanism of encouraging companies that produce phones to stay in touch with the Daydream platform (Brandom et al., 2016). Liaising with phone producing firms will ensure that subsequent phones are manufactured with sensors and screen that permit the operation of Daydream. Examples of phone-making companies that demonstrated interest in the production of mobile phones that allow for the operation of Daydream are LG, Huawei, and Samsung (Brandom et al., 2016).

Google’s technology possess both negative and positive effects on the society. The negative and positive impacts of Daydream can be associated with the impacts of virtual reality. Virtual reality presents three primary security threats that raise ethical concern about its ability to ensure the safety and privacy of users including identify theft, state surveillance, and monitoring of third-party influence (Bates, 2016).  According to Kim (2015), when virtual reality transforms into a part of individuals’ daily lives, many individuals will chose to spend a significant portion of their time within virtual space, thereby transforming them into virtual human within virtual environments. As such, this situations raises ethical questions concerning the shifting of the normal social interaction, which is founded on physical association, to a virtual interaction where humans are transformed into robots (that is virtual humans). Besides, this technology also leads to self-imposed social isolation, which is considered unhealthy and dangerous (Kim, 2015). Despite having negative impact, Daydream can impact the society in a positive way, as a virtual reality technology. According to Kim (2015), virtual reality and the internet have the ability to satisfy social needs with ease. For instance, an individual can manage to find belonging and love online, as well as on an immersive 3D platform. Virtual technologies also enable people to substitute their unhappy realities with better ones, that is, virtual realities (Kim, 2015). Fink (2017) argues that VR technology possesses a limitless potential for individuals to comprehend and transform themselves and the world around them. In addition, VR inspire young individuals to employ and experiment with inventive or innovative technology, which in turn prompts them to consider developing their careers in information technology (Fink, 2017). Considering the positive benefits presented by the VR, it can be argued that it is imperative to implement this technology, but with stringent measures on safety and use of such technologies. Such measures will ensure that social arrangements are protected and user safety and privacy are guaranteed. With the implementation of Daydream, the future practice of managers will be impacted greatly as managers will transform into virtual mangers operating within virtual settings and interacting with virtual humans. Some of the forms of information technology that will be impacted by this innovation are decision support systems, knowledge management systems, executive support systems, and management information systems.

Conclusion

            Billy Gates stated, “The advance of technology is based on making it fit in so that you don’t really even notice it, so it’s part of everyday life.”  How can individuals make the technology fit that they do not really even notice it? The answer to this query lies in addressing the implementation challenges, social, environmental, ethical, and practice concerns that new innovations bring. Google’s development of novel innovations such as self-driving automobile, Daydream, Duo app, Google’s Assistant, and Google Home has been accompanied with these concerns and implementation challenges. As such, the company’s management should focus on embracing the measures provided in this paper to move a notch higher with their innovations.