Robotics and artificial intelligence (R+ AI) solutions: Displacing or augmenting professional capabilities?

Until the moment the impact of R+AI on the quality and quantity of human employment has been estimated using different methods and its results creates big controversy because they are contradictory and not conclusive. R+AI is a set of disruptive technologies (Christensen, 2015) that are passing from the laboratory to commercial products, organizational settings, and business models (Bagnoli, Dal Mas, and Massaro, 2019). This travel requires strong innovation capabilities from the companies that offer those R+AI solutions but also enormous organizational innovation from the firms and individuals that become its users. Along this innovation process different kind of products and solutions are emerging, with a great diversity of goals and possible impacts in employment. In this paper we put the focus in the identification of the different types of R+AI solutions being developed and implemented by companies, instead of concentrating in the general possibilities of the R+AI technologies. Using a specific questionnaire and analyzing a sample of Spanish companies working on R+AI solutions, we show that the expected impact in employment will be radically different depending on the innovation strategies applied by companies. We conclude reflecting about the implications this can have for further research and decision-makers.