The digital disruption conversation has been dominated by how technology will replace humans - but what if we prioritize augmenting the human over automation? This presentation will explore new strategies to empower the 21st century industrial workforce to increase efficiency, productivity, safety and competency. How? By using machine learning to deliver information to the blue-collar worker on their wearable device.

Carl Byers is the chief strategy officer of contextere, an industrial software company creating AI-powered solutions focused on human performance. He has spent over thirty years helping businesses increase knowledge capture, decision-making and individual performance using simulation, augmented and virtual reality, and machine learning. He is the past president and current treasurer of the Augmented Reality for Enterprise Alliance (AREA), a member-based organization dedicated to accelerating the adoption of augmented reality in the enterprise. He is an active contributor to World Economic Forum (WEF) initiatives on the future of work through contextere's membership in the Center for the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Byers is also a co-founder of United World Voices, a charity dedicated to improving the lives of vulnerable persons and communities in Canada, India, and Africa through skills development and entrepreneurship. Byers holds an MBA, a Master's in Human Security & Peacebuilding, and a Bachelor's in Engineering Physics.

contextere is an industrial software company creating AI-powered solutions focused on human performance, helping companies capture value through increased productivity and safety while reducing equipment downtime. contextere sees a future driven not by more job losses due to automation, but by more job opportunities created with technology. The company is making sense of the overwhelming amount of data and information generated from smart machines and enterprise analytics to help workers perform better, to increase their competencies and skills, and to close the global gap in skilled workers.