AI / Robotics in China; CRE professionals take note

Dear Fellow CRE professionals.  We tend to be resistant to change and new tech, but for the physical AI wave, please embrace it early.

I’ve spent a few weeks in Asia (Taipei, Hong Kong, Guangzhou).  AI is seen more positively.  The major shopping malls have at least one “AI store.”  The mall at Canton Tower had like three.  

One was geared towards kids: AI enabled tablets for kids kind of like LeapFrog; they had a chess and Go board game machine (really cool, where the robot plays chess with you - we beat the robot! I can see this being everywhere in 5 years).

The other was a luggage on wheels that turned into a scooter.  That cost $400 US dollars. The store had the words robotics in the name which caught my eye.

The third store was actually a showcase store near the Tower.  It was set up like an Apple Store.  3D printer in the corner. Robot pet dog that talks to you.  A dancing robot that was center stage.  News camera crew interviewing foreign tourist on their impression. And the chess robot that we paid 20 RMB ($3) to play against for 20 mins. We beat the robot, but playing it was very enjoyable. 

I can see robots creeping into our lives.  The Hilton hotel we were staying at had food delivery robots.  They look similar to the robots you see at some sushi restaurants that deliver waters and utensils to tables.  They go up elevators to the secure hotel guest floors to deliver take out (delivery guy just leaves in lobby).  These robots don’t really wait for you to get out of the elevator.  They barge rigtt by in.  They are on a mission. 

While we debate about LLMs and all that, we are missing the point that this tech is coming, especially obvious to me on the physical AI side.  

And this is very exciting for CRE professionals because we understand location, space planning for humans and in the future robots, there are new industries coming.  

I write this because in the West, we are villainizing AI and robots.  My kids have a negative reaction to AI.  Meanwhile in China, kids are being encouraged to use it.  I think for our competitive sakes, we need to have more things like these stores and showcase pop-ups, to show use cases that the future is coming and some of it isn’t so scary. 

I highly, highly recommend you look beyond LLMs for this wave and for our societies to better showcase positive use cases that will encourage use and early adoption for the sake of staying competitive with China. They are kicking our butt right now on that front.  I also believe minds can change quite easily once they experience (same thing with online shopping, ride sharing, vacation rentals, autonomous vehicles).  Keep an open mind.

And for those with career ambitions, the world of asset intensity is getting wider and wider to apply your real estate (asset intensity) skill sets and strategies to new, emerging fields. Now is a very exciting time if you can envision this future.