Asia In Brief Infosys chairman Nandan Nilekani has said the advent of AI means organizations no longer have any excuse to retain their legacy systems.<\/p>\n
Speaking at Infosys AI Day last week, Nilekani said AI is changing the very nature of work, and used software development as his example.<\/p>\n
\u201cTalent will have to deal with a world where writing code will not be the goal. It will be actually making AI work \u2013 orchestration and those kinds of things,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
But the chair said making AI work means getting rid of legacy systems.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany large companies are spending 60 to 80 percent of their IT spend on maintaining systems,\u201d Nilekani said. \u201cIf you really want a firm to take advantage of AI, you have to fundamentally clean this up.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut the good news is, for the first time, because of AI, we have the tools now to do modernization \u2026 very quickly and in a much more economic way. So we have a huge demand, and we have the ability now to do it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
But he warned AI will also make more legacy systems.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe very fact that you can generate stuff means you can generate slop. In fact, five years from now, there\u2019ll be more AI legacy systems than any other legacy system \u2013 all the kind of stuff that will have been generated \u2013 and we\u2019ll have to clean that up as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also called for organizations adopting AI to ensure it makes their people productive by implementing usage guidelines, quality gates, and explainability rules.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can have this fake productivity,\u201d he said. \u201cLet\u2019s say there are two guys and they are having a fight. One guy will draft an email that is one paragraph. He will give it to AI to make it into a ten-paragraph email because he wants to impress the other guy. The other guy will take the 10-paragraph email and summarize it back to one paragraph.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo both have used AI, but what have we achieved? Nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
AI wrecks work\/life balance at Australian employment tribunal<\/p>\n
Australia\u2019s Fair Work Commission (FWC), the nation\u2019s industrial relations regulator, is struggling to handle a surge of matters lodged using generative AI tools.<\/p>\n
In a speech<\/a> [PDF] delivered last week, FWC president Justice Adam Hatcher observed that the organization\u2019s workload typically varied in sync with labor market cycles.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the previous decade, there was a clear correlation between the number of dismissal-related applications and the state of the labor market,\u201d he said. \u201cBroadly speaking, if retrenchments were going up, dismissal related applications would go up, and they would go down if retrenchments were going down.\u201d<\/p>\n That changed after the November 2022 debut of ChatGPT, when the FWC\u2019s usual ~30,000 cases a year jumped by 10,000 in the following year. Justice Hatcher said the FWC is now on track to receive over 50,000 filings this year. Most of the growth in caseload comes from matters in which employees allege they were unfairly dismissed.<\/p>\n The president said his hypothesis for the rise is that ChatGPT and other generative AI tools advise that applicants will likely succeed if they file a case and make it easy to draft the documents needed to commence an action.<\/p>\n He said the resulting surge in applications \u201chas disrupted the work of the FWC in a number of ways.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, the workload on members and staff has increased significantly, and this is putting stress on everyone,\u201d he said. \u201cSo if you\u2019re offered an appointment to the FWC, don\u2019t accept it on the basis that you think you will have a better work-life balance. You won\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n Justice Hatcher also said the flood of AI-inspired cases is the FWC\u2019s performance cand causing it to miss KPIs.<\/p>\n The organization plans to soon introduce an \u201cAI disclosure requirement\u201d that requires applicants to admit to using AI, and to confirm they have verified the accuracy of AI-generated content in their court filings. It\u2019s hoped those disclosures will result in better quality filings, and speedier processing for FWC staff.<\/p>\n Vietnam opens over-water drone delivery route<\/p>\n The government of Vietnam last week announced<\/a> it has started using drones to deliver parcels between two towns.<\/p>\n Can Gio and Vung Tau are 119km apart by roads that pass through the very congested Ho Chi Minh City, but just 25km apart as the crow flies \u2013 if it passes over the Vinh Ganh Rai Bight.<\/p>\n Ho Chi Minh City\u2019s Department of Science and Technology hailed the first flight on the route as \u201ca pioneering step in smart mobility solutions aimed at boosting the digital economy and easing pressure on road transport infrastructure.\u201d<\/p>\n Vietnam\u2019s government has also approved operations of SpaceX\u2019s Starlink space broadband service within its borders.<\/p>\n India signs Pax Silica<\/p>\n India\u2019s government last week signed up for the Pax Silica<\/a>, a US-led effort to ensure AI and supply chain security, and a Joint Statement on the \u201cIndia-U.S. AI Opportunity Partnership\u201d as a bilateral addendum to the Declaration.<\/p>\n The partnership will see the two nations \u201cpromote pro-innovation regulatory approaches, strengthen the physical AI stack, and advance free enterprise.\u201d<\/p>\n The pact also \u201cenvisions empowering AI developers, startups, and ecosystem enablers; exploring joint research and development; facilitating industry partnerships and investments in next-generation data centers; enhancing cooperation on access to compute and advanced processors; and accelerating innovation in AI models and applications.\u201d<\/p>\n China shows off dancing robots<\/p>\n A belated Kung Hei Fat Choi to Chinese readers after last Tuesday\u2019s New Year\u2019s Day, an occasion state television marks with an annual gala that celebrates Chinese culture.<\/p>\n This year\u2019s show featured dancing humanoid robots.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of the highlights came when humanoid robots brought Kung Fu to the next level, performing vaults and backflips with smooth and precise movements,\u201d according to state media<\/a>, which asserted \u201cThe performance has amazed overseas netizens who expressed their admiration for the development of China’s robotics industry.\u201d<\/p>\n Watch for yourself below, and use the comments to let us know if you are indeed amazed.<\/p>\n