CIM No.

38445020 | Emerging
Themes

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes

Declaration
Emerging Themes
November 2014
CIM Membership Number: 38445020
Chartered Postgraduate Diploma in Marketing
Chartered Institute of Marketing
I confirm that in forwarding this assessment for marking, I understand and have applied the CIM
policies relating to word count, plagiarism and collusion for all tasks. This project is a result of my
own independent work except where otherwise stated. Other sources are acknowledged in the body
of the text, a bibliography is appended and Harvard referencing has been used. I have not shared my
work with other candidates. I further confirm that I have submitted an electronic copy of this
assessment to CIM in accordance to the regulations.
Task 01 546 Words
Task 02 Words (LIMIT 2700)
Task 03 Words

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes

SOCIALLY ASSISTIVE ROBOTS:

FUTURE OF THE AGEING POPULATION
Revolutionizing the Healthcare Industry for Ageing Population,
Through Assistive Robotic Caretakers

TASK ONE
Sources of Search
Word Count - 546 without headings

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging Themes

Credibilit
y

INDUSTRY ACADEMIC JOURNALS

Source

Reliabili
ty

Home-Assistant Robot for an Ageing

Society (2012)

The
worlds
largest
profession association for
technology.

Yamazaki, K., Ueda, R., Nozawa, S., Kojima, M., Okada, K.,
Matsumoto, K., Ishikawa, M., Shimoyama, I. and Inaba, M.

Credible
Japan.

Acceptance of an assistive robot in

older adults (2014)

Dedicated
academic
publisher of open access
peer-reviewed
scientific

and medical journals.

Wu, Y., Wrobel, J., Cornuet, M., Kerherv, H., Damne, S. and Rigaud,
A

authors

from

Written by industry
experts,
entailing
a
thorough analysis.
Solid understanding on
Robotics & Ageing
society.

Journal was viewed

1,653 since 08/05/2014.
Written based on solid
research conducted.

Merit
Discusses about humanoid
robot that performs various
daily household tasks such as
& looking after the elder
persons are presented in this
paper.

1 month direct experience

was done with Robots and
elderly people.

Research was done with

assistive robots for a
month.

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging Themes

Use of social commitment robots in the

care of elderly people with dementia
(2012)

PUBLICATIONS ACADEMIC JOURNALS

Mordoch, E., Osterreicher, A., Guse, L., Roger, K. and Thompson, G.

An assistive household robot doing

more than just cleaning (2014)

Authors are from Manitoba

a well-known University
from Canada.

ELSEVIER is a wellknown publishing that

publishes
medical
&
scientific literature.

Written by
exports

Written by senior scientists

of
Information
and
Communication
Technology, Finland.

In depth research on robotics

to provide safety services to
older generation.

Thorough peer review.

The research work has

been performed in scope
of ITEA GUARANTEE
project
funded
by
Finnish
National
Technology Agency.

Written
authors
research.

Highly devoted publisher

for robotic research &
development.

A published book on
social
robotics
by
researchers & developers
in the field of robotic.

Discusses of attitudes towards

robots and perceptions of
robot mind, against the
objective measure of robot
use

Kantorovitch, J., Vre, J., Pehkonen, V., Laikari, A. and Seppl, H.

Does the Robot Have a Mind? (2013)

Stafford, R., MacDonald, B., Jayawardena, C., Wegner, D. and
Broadbent, E.

by
in

renowned
robotics

industry

Discusses the use of social

commitment
robots
for
elderly people with dementia.

Backed with a lot of

research on ageing and
robotics.

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging Themes

Robot Interface Design of Domestic

and Condominium Robot for Ageing
Population (2013)
Niccol Casiddu, Filippo Cavallo, Alessandro Divano, Irene
Mannari

Written by industry experts

by designing two robots for
research.

A published book on
robotic.
Highly credible
publisher.

Discusses about a couple of

robots, designed to assist
senior citizens 65+ in
domestic and public space.

INDUSTRY REPORT

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging Themes

NEWS

Healthcare Robotics (rbr) : 2014

Emmet Cole

rbr
provides
research
reports with regards to
Robotics
in
various

industries.

Industry
information

relevant

Most current updates and

information
about

robotics.

Authors articles published

on BBC, Economist, the
Irish Times etc.

'A robot is my friend': Can machines

care for elderly? (2013)

Investigative journalism

by Alex Hudson

Recent
news
under
technology innovations.

Talks about the topic.

Articles by journalists from

REUTERS

Recent Article (2014).

SoftBank to start selling personal

robots next year by Teppei Kasai & Yoshiyasu Shida

(2014)

Presents relevant industry

developments and notable
acheivements.
Valuable information with
regards to Health Care
Robotics.

Recent
advances
and
applications of the theme

Highly relevant to industry.

Talks about the emotional

robot Pepper.

Updated, unbiased views

with latest technology
updates.

Presents relevant industry

developments
and
noteworthy achievements

Recent Article (2013).

Journalist views.

WEBSITE INDUSTRY

Toyotas Healthcare Robots Are Ready

to Help You With Absolutely Everything
(2011)

Site devoted to innovative

science-driven research,
technology.

by Evan Ackerman

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes

SOCIALLY ASSISTIVE ROBOTS:

FUTURE OF THE AGEING POPULATION
Revolutionizing the Healthcare Industry for Ageing Population,
Through Assistive Robotic Caretakers

TASK TWO
Discussion Paper
Word Count 2700 (maxx)
(Excluding executive summary, references and appendices as specified in the assignment brief)

CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes

Executive Summary

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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Future Direction of Health Care

Industry
Favorable demography trumps economic
worries for the health-care industry. Rapidly
ageing populations will boost treatments in
developed markets (Yamazaki et al, 2012).
As per OECD report (2013) on ageing
population, you can see the majority of the
developed countrys ageing population is
increasing rapidly. By 2050, more than 32
million Americans will be over the age of 80,
and the share of the 80-plus generation will
have doubled to 7.4%. Across the 34 OECD
countries, the share of people over the age of
80 is projected to grow even faster, from 4%
today to almost 10% in the same time period
You can see that Japan's has major aging
problem, it became serious in 2007 when 20%
of its population was 65 years and older. If its
birthrates do not improve dramatically, 34% of
Japan's population will be 65 years or older by
2055, higher than France, Germany, Sweden,
United Kingdom, United States, China, India,
Korea and Singapore.
According to the report of Global health care
outlook (2014) in the developing world, rising
incomes and fast-growing populations will
lead to greater spending on health and wellbeing (appendix 1).

Spending rose by an estimated 1.9% in 2012,

it is expected to pick up again, with total
spending rising by 2.6% in nominal terms in
2013 and by an annual average of 5.3% until
2017. Given population growth, this means
that spending per head is anticipated to rise by
an average of 4.4% year from 2014-2017.
This growth will place enormous pressure on
governments, health care delivery systems,
insurers, and consumers in both developed and
emerging markets to deal with issues such as
an aging population, the rising prevalence of
numerous chronic diseases, soaring costs,
uneven quality, imbalanced access to care due
to
workforce
shortages,
infrastructure
limitations and patient locations, an disruptive
technologies.

Robots: What are they?

A robot is a mechanical or virtual agent,
usually an electro-mechanical machine that is
guided by a computer program or electronic
circuitry. Robots can be autonomous or semiautonomous and range from humanoids such
as Honda's Advanced Robot stepped in
Innovative Mobility (ASIMO) and Tosy's
TOSY Ping Pong Playing Robot (TOPIO) to
industrial robots, collectively programmed
'swarm' robots, and even microscopic nano
robots (Charles, 2014). Detailed information
of Assistive robots is discussed in the next
section.

Figure 1
Source: United Nations (2013)

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How Will Human Care Robotics

Revolutionize the Health Care
Industry for Ageing Population
A recent study to understand the effects of
human care robotics on ageing population (Wu
et al., 2014) mentioned that the modern use of
socially human care robotics in health care for
ageing population is currently being explored
with the majority of these robotics designed to
provide companionship, improve mental
health & affect and also to monitor safety of
the elderly people. In fact the interaction
between humans and robotics is a current
interest which is being developed /examined in
socially assistive robotics (Kantorovitch et al.,
2014).
The article on Use of social commitment
robots in the care of elderly people with
dementia (Mordoch et al, 2012) stipulated that
the latest researches were done on the
compatibility of robots and people in
emotional, cognitive and social areas.
Interactive engaging robots, caring robots
respond to people through touch, voice, and
within a social context and provide
companionship.

mood. This class of robot is capable of

soliciting personal interaction between human
and robot (Mordoch et al., 2013).

FRIEND (Functional Robot arm with

user-friendly interface for Disabled
people)
During the recent past years home automation
for the elderly and disable robots have
developed over time from a simple basic
robotic assistants as the handy, through to
semi-autonomous robots, such as FRIEND
(Functional Robot arm with user-friendly
interface for Disabled people) which can
assist the elderly and disabled with common
task (figure 2).
FRIEND is a semi-autonomous robot designed
by
Institute
of
Automation
(IAT) of University of Bremen to support
disabled and elderly people in their daily life
activities, like preparing and serving a meal.
FRIEND make it possible for patients who are
paraplegic, have muscle diseases or serious
paralysis (due to strokes etc.), to perform tasks
without help from other people like therapists
or nursing staff.

There are four types of interactive robots

namely; performance robots, tele-operated
performance
robots,
and
building,
programming and controlling robots of which
all three are designed for entertainment and
creativity. The fourth type is the interactive
autonomous robots, inclusive of the mental
commitment robot which is intended to be
interactive and improve social interaction and

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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Figure 2 - The
Care-Providing
Robot FRIEND
& work flow

The potential of Human Care Robotics

Overall, theres positive attitude towards
human care robots for elderly people.
However, some issues clearly need to be
considered. The force field analysis (appendix
4) indicates the resistors such as safety and
reliability of robots, higher purchase cost, and
a reluctance to use them for highly personal
tasks, such as showering.
Concerns need to be explored and resolved
before and during the deployment of a healthcare robot for the ageing population in the
future, particularly caregivers concerns about
losing their jobs and relatives concerns over
caretakers being replaced. However, the
overall score of 23 proves that drivers
outweigh the resistors, and Robotic Assistants
for Ageing Population in the health care
industry will create a revolution around the
globe while the ageing population is
increasing year by year.

Figure 5 - Actor Frank Langella in a scene

from the movie, Robot & Frank (a movie based
on health care robot name Frank and an elderly
father).

Robotic Care Takers for Ageing

Population Consumer Reaction
It is vital to understand how the consumers
would react to the Care Taking Robotics for
Ageing Population which will replace the
human care takers in the future. Henceforth,
it is a must for us to understand complexities
of Care Taking Robotics (appendix 5) and
how these would affect the consumer
behaviour in the near future.

What
Factors
Would
Consumer Behaviour?

Influence
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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Organizations use various marketing efforts to
influence the decision of consumers but it is
difficult to know how consumers respond to
them. Marketing stimuli comprises the Four
Ps: product, price, place and promotion.
Besides these, there are other stimuli that act
as the major forces in the buyers
environment:
economic
technological,
political and cultural. All these stimuli enter
into the buyer black box and depending upon
the influence of buyers characteristics, the
buyer come up with the observable buyer
response: product choice, brand choice, dealer
choice, purchase timing and purchase amount.
(Kotler et al. 2008 p 239)
External Stimuli
Marketing

Environmental

Product
Price
Place
Promotion

Economic
Technological
Political
Socia-Cultural

Buyers
Black Box

Buyers
responses

Buyer
Characterist
ics

Product choice
Brand choice
Dealer choice
Purchase timing
Purchase amount

Buyer
Decision
Process

Figure 6 Black Box Model (Kotler and Armstrong,

2012).

External Stimuli
Robotic Caretakers are quite a new product to
the market, hence the external marketing has
to be done accordingly in order to give the
necessary awareness to the consumers
(appendix 2).
External environment factors such as
economical, socio cultural and more
importantly technological factors indicate that,
according to Moors Law Robotic Caretakers
will be an essential product in the future in
order to replace the human care takers with
robotic caretakers to look after the elderly
people.

Impact of Robotic Caretakers on

consumer
behavior
(buyer
characteristics)
As per the Black box model, the basic buyer
characteristics of consumers such as Culture,
Social, Psychological, and Personal factors,
will have definite impact on consumer
purchases and adaptability on Robotic
Caretakers by understanding the external
stimuli.
Therefore, the below discussion presents the
main characteristics of the buyer that will
change consumer behavior which ultimately
influences the elderly people to make the
purchasing decision on robotic caretakers.
Buyer Characteristics
Cultural factors include a consumers culture,
subculture and social class. These factors are
often inherent in consumers values and
decision processes. For example Japan will
adapt to the robotic care takers much faster
than the others since their culture welcomes
such new products into their lives.
Social factors include groups (reference
groups, aspiration groups and member
groups), family, roles and status. This explains
the outside influences of others can influence
on the consumers purchase decisions either
directly or indirectly when an older person is
thinking of purchasing a robotic care taker to
look after him.
Personal factors of the buyer include such as
age and life-cycle stage, occupation, lifestyle,
economic circumstances, personality and selfconcept also affects the buyers decision.
These explain the consumers preferences
often change as their situation changes.
Psychological factors are mainly the ones that
affect our purchase decision include
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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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motivation perception, learning, beliefs and
attitudes.

other countries will have the consumers as

innovators (figure 8) who will be utilizing
the innovation of care taking Robotics.

In conclusion, the advanced technology,

improved literacy rate, and cultural factors
make the consumers seek for Robotic Care
Takers to look after them when they are old.
As previously mentioned, with elderly people
(consumers) having difficulties in taking care
of themselves and the decline in the number of
people to take care of them have made
something really necessary as Robotic Care
Takers.
"People describe others as being
robots because they have no
emotions, no heart. For the first
time in human history, we're
giving a robot a heart," SoftBank
CEO Masayoshi Son said at a news
conference.

(The Independent, 2014).

Figure 8: Rogers Diffusion Curve

When analyzing the adaptability of human

care Robots using Rogers diffusion of
innovation theory, there are five key
characteristics that will affect the rate of
adoption:
Relative Advantage: Health care robots
would be able to pay the role of human and
take care of the elderly people effectively and
efficiently.

Figure 7 Pepper the world's first personal robot with

emotions - Pepper uses a cloud-based AI system so that
units learn from one another (The Independent, 2014)

Replacing Human Care Takers with

Robotic Care Takers
Taking care of the older generation physically,
emotionally and mentally will be an enormous
challenge, and as mentioned in the report,
there will be a shortage of professionals
trained and willing to take on the job.
Therefore the Robot Care Taker which is
designed to take care of them would be a
definite popular device in the near future in
order to take care of the elderly people.
Countries like Japan and EU countries which
have a major proportion of elders amongst the

Compatibility: Human care robots will take

the elders in an efficient and effective way
probably much better than the human caretakers (eg: reminding elderly patients to visit
the bathroom, take medicine, drink, or see the
doctor).
Complexity: Clear instructions will be given
by the manufacturers on the health care robots
so that it can be used u easily by the elderly
people. In fact, rapid growth in technology
will help the older people to understand about
the Human care robots quite easily without
much hassle.
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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Trialability: Initially the health care robots
will be costly but due to increasing potential
demand for health care robots will help to
reduce the cost of human care robot.

Communicability: Due to major shortage in

human care takers and hospitals there will be a
greater demand for Human robot care takers in
the future.

Robotic Care Takers and the

Generation Map

This is contrast to 62 million people between

35-54 years old having a computer and 80% of
people age 30-49 years of old using the
internet. This information demonstrates the
shift of technology users and their comfort
levels with devices, technology, gadgets etc.

According to Internationalization, design and

global development (Aykin, 2009) most of the
generation X population (i.e. people born
between 1965 and 1980), use technology to
assist in accomplishing tasks and to provide
some form of communication and entrainment
in their everyday use. According to the future
projections, many people from this future
population would have attained higher levels
of education than the previous generations and
would also have more computer skills than the
previous generations (figure 10). The
projections explain that more than 32 million
of older adults have a computer at home and
26% are internet users.

Characterist
ics

Maturists
(Pre -1945)

Baby
Boomers
(1945 1960)

Therefore, as per the global median age map

shown below (figure 11) it is predicted that
generation X & early Y generation will be
above 50+ in another 2 decades time. In fact,
the elders from these generations will be the
first ones to get their hands on human care
robots to look after them since they may
demonstrate an easier transition to depend on
technology since they are already familiar with
the high tech products (i.e. such as PC, Tabs,
email etc).

Generation X
(1961 1980)

Generation Y
(1981-1995)

Generation Z
(Born after
1995)
Google glass,
Robotics, nano
computing,
graphene, 3D Car

Signature
Product

Handheld
or integrated into
clothing
communication
devices

Communicati
on Media

Communicati
on
Preference
Figure 10 - attributes of the various generations

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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Source : McCrindle research (2012)

A Glimpse into the Future

We are at the threshold of change in the care of
high elderly population due to global
demographics, specifically the ageing society
with subsequent decreases in the caregiver
demographic, particularly in developed
countries. At this time, innovative new ways of
managing health care situations for this
population are needed.

An expanding elderly population is

likely to lead to significantly higher
demand for high-tech health care than
past trends suggest says Jeremy
Sammut an author of CIS Papers (2008).

Social assistive robots may provide important

and feasible alternatives to some of the care
demands. These alternatives must be balanced
with cautions to provide quality human contact
in this care and to not unnecessarily dilute the
important aspect of human compassion in the
care of vulnerable populations (Mordoch et al.,
2013).In conclusion, with the changing
demographic conditions healthcare providers
need to make customers understand why
Robotic Human Care Taker is the best
solution available to the elder people,
considering the fact that human care takers are
decreasing dramatically day by day.
In Japan, which has the world's oldest
population, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe
has allocated 2.39bn yen (14.3m) in
the 2013 budget to develop robots to
help with care (BBC, 2013).
One quarter of Japans 127 million
population age 65 and older, and that
percentage is expected to rise
to approximately 35 percent by 2025.
In 2010, according to the Health Labor
and Welfare Ministry of Japan, the
nation needed around 2 million nursing
care workers, but this need went
unmetonly 1.33 million workers were
employed in 2010. That need will rise
to 4 million by 2025, the ministry
predicted, and require 1 million mostly
foreign elderly care workers (the
speaker, 2014).

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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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How should Organizations

strategically respond?
According to the Porters five forces analysis
(appendix 3) the buyer power is very low due
limited robotic suppliers in the healthcare
market and due to various other reasons as
well.
According to the Japan Robotics Association,
in the future the consumer robotics market is
projected to reach 24 billion this year, and
expand to 66 billion by 2025. Bill Gates has
predicted that human care robots will be as
common as computers are today.
Therefore, the organizations have to do the
some critical changes, in order to adapt to grab
the opportunities in the healthcare industry,
which we will discuss further in this section.

Bowmans Strategy Clock and Strategic

Repsonse
Bowmans Strategy Clock is a famous model
which is used in the analysis of
competitiveness of a business in relation to its
competitors. Bowman considers competitive
advantage in relation to cost advantage or
differentiation advantage. The clock is
represented with the help of perceived value
(high, moderate or low) and price.

Figure 12: Bowmans Strategy Clock

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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Nowadays, with the increasing ageing
population healthcare labours/homes are
reducing dramatically and due to an increase
in demand for them the labour is positioned in
the market at high prices. In order, to look
after the elderly people the healthcare robotics
is a fine solution in the healthcare industry.
Therefore, this paper recommends that
marketers of Robotic Care Takers in
healthcare industry should use focused
differentiation (figure 12) during the initial
stage of product innovation. Focused
differentiation is often used for targeting
specific marketing niches and differentiation is
used with a combination of high value at high
prices.

Points of Parity & Points of Difference

Organizations define their Points of
Difference (POD) as the aspects of the
product offering that are relatively distinct to
the offerings of like competitors. At the same
time Points-of-parity (POP) is defined as
the aspects of the product offering that
are largely similar to the offerings of like
competitors.

Points of Parity
(POPS)

Prospects
Desires

Competitors
features

Points of Difference
(POD)

Organizations
features

Points of Irrelevance
(POIs)
Figure 13 : Points of Parity & Points of Difference

First Mover Advantage

Human Care Robots is a Blue Ocean (Kim and
Mauborgne, 2005), first movers will clearly
have a benefit in attracting the innovators and
early adopters (Rogers, 1962), while
establishing themselves as pioneers of Human
care robotics, giving them a competitive
advantage.

Investing in Research & Development

Numerous organizations will increase the
research and development in Robotic Care
Takers in order to reduce the production cost
as well as introduce a cheaper robot that could
monitor a patients use of medication, robots
that could help the elderly to walk, portable,
motorized, self-cleaning toilet robots, and
robots that could track the location of
dementia patients. According to the-speaker
online news, instead of increasing immigrant
workers, Japan will invest in an expanding
robotics market that is expected to reach $13.6
billion in 2018, and around $90 billion
by 2025.

Intellectual property and Patenting

A robotics company without intellectual
property can appear vulnerable, whereas a
company with the right combination of
intellectual property will convey that it is wellrun and a sound investment.

Strategic alliances, Backward and

Horizontal Integration
Joint venture and Horizontal integration will
be a tremendous advantage for robotics
industries to create the robots successfully in
the market, since the cost of producing
robotics are high, it would be an advantage for
organization have joint ventures with
organizations which can produce the robots for
lower costs and introduce to the market and
have a bigger market share in the health care
industry.

Define Brand Image & Value

Propositions
It is rather important for a robotic health care
organization to build and maintain very good
brand image which gives value for money,
differentiated, high quality etc. Hence,
in
order to be a successful organization its
recommended to follow the above mentioned
strategy.
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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

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Diversification
Organizations ought to enhance into new
market segments s with novel products in
order to increase the market share, by
predicating customer interest and desires
(eg : health care robotics for children).
Product Development & Market
Development
Ansoff Growth matrix is another
marketing planning tool that helps a
business determine its product and
market growth strategy (figure 14).

How Marketers need to change :

Skills, Attitudes and Behaviors

According to the official academic definition

from The Chartered Institute of Marketing
(CIM),"Marketing is the management process
responsible for identifying, anticipating and
satisfying customer requirements profitably."
This means the ideas, the brand, how you
communicate, the design, print process,
measuring effectiveness, market research and
the psychology of consumer behaviour all
count as part of the bigger picture of
marketing.

With the rapid growth in technology and easy

access to information will bring both
opportunities and threats that the marketers
will have to overcome in order to capitalize
the market share. In order to do so marketers
professionals should obtain new skills,
attitudes and behaviours through outstanding
training and valuable experience from the
industry and should have an optimistic attitude
towards the market (figure 15).
Figure 14 : Ansoff Matrix (1957).

It is recommended that organizations which

need to grab the opportunities arising from
health care robotics for ageing population
diversify into to develop the healthcare
robotics as a new segment in the healthcare
industry, since it will be an emerging segment,
product development will be crucial for an
organization. Therefore, developing new
innovative health care robotics will give an
edge over competition for the health care
organization. (Ansoff, 1957).

Robotic care takers will be a new type of

product in the health care industry, with people
having very limited knowledge about the
product. In order to successfully market the
product the marketer should have strong
customer influential skills, writing skills,
excellent communication skills, inter-personal
skills and problem solving skills to sell the
Robotic care takers to the elderly people in the
market.
It is important for the marketers to teach the
customers how to use the product using
various ways such as face to face training,
video training, 24/7 customer care etc. Robotic
care takers being a sophisticated product, the
customers will definitely have various types of
questions which have to be answered by
marketers in order to sell the product
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CIM No. 38445020 | Emerging

Themes
successfully in the market. Besides, the
perception towards robotic care takers also can
be changed using such positive behaviors from
the markets.
In order to understand the market and the
customers better, the marketers should have
very good research and analytical skills. These
skills will help the marketer to understand the
customers black box.
Marketers need to be creative and should have
a positive attitude towards learning new
things. Being pro-active and understanding the
customer needs and in return fulfilling their
right time is absolute necessity obtain
customer royalty and retention.
Robotic health care market will definitely have
major challenges to face in the future, hence
the marketers should be able to work under
pressure, ability to take up challenges and
overcome them by being self-motivated.

Figure 12: ingredients of success for a marketing

professional.

Conclusion
Health care industry for ageing population will
see immense changes when Robotic Care
Takers enter into the market. According, to
recent research, it is predicted that the Robotic
Care Takers will be introduced to the market
much sooner than it is expected to be. Hence,
the organizations and its marketing
professionals need to prepare for this change
and develop new strategies and acquire new
skills to grab the opportunities from robotic
care takers.

21

SOCIALLY ASSISTIVE ROBOTS:

FUTURE OF THE AGEING POPULATION
Revolutionizing the Healthcare Industry for Ageing Population,
Through Assistive Robotic Caretakers

TASK THREE
Memo
Word Count - 546

INTERNAL MEMO
TO:

Senior Management Team

FROM:

Clark Thomas

RE:

Socially Assistive Robots to Serve the Future Ageing Population.

DATE:

22.11.2014

Dear all,
I have attached the research report With the rapidly increasing ageing population and reduction in the
labour and other resources, it is evident; the innovation of Robotic Caretakers will revolutionize the
healthcare industry for the elderly people, and will help to create a better future for the ageing population
around the world.
It is certain that the field of robotics for healthcare brings a future promise. Although some commercial
products are already on the market, this can be considered just the first signal of the potential added value
robotics can bring to solving some of the problems in our present healthcare system for ageing
population. The Da Vinci robot, the most well-known surgical robot, is commercially available, but still
has high potential for an increase in functionalities.
These characteristics are of the early stages in which the development of the domain of robotics for
healthcare is in. At the same time countries and large corporations such as Toyota, are investing
immensely in health care robots, and there have been socially assistive robots such as Pepper, FRIEND &
RIBA already introduced to the market. In fact, it is predicted that the Robotic Caretakers will be fully
developed and commercialized as sooner than it was predicted to be.
In this discussion paper, Future direction of Health care Industry discusses how the consumers will
respond to the robotic care takers, what are some crucial factors that organizations and marketers have to
do in order to make the robotic caretakers as the future of the ageing population.
The discussion will focus on key areas that will be impacted by these macro changes, our consumers, and
the organizations and how marketing will have to adopt and adapt, to these factors. The information has
been gathered from a number of published reports, articles, and trusted sources.
Discussion areas include:

Future direction of Health care Industry

Will Human Care Robotics Revolutionize the Health Care Industry for Ageing Population
Robotic Care Takers for Ageing Population Consumer Reaction
How should Organizations strategically respond?
How Marketers need to change : Skills, Attitudes and Behaviors

It also thoroughly discusses how consumers are changing in the modern hi tech world, their perceptions,
their lifestyles and how marketing professionals can be proactive and respond to them faster by improving
their skills, attitudes and behaviours.
I certainly believe that this paper will be of interest to you and look forward for a positive response from
you.

References

APPENDICES

Appendix 1 Appendix 2 Appendix 3 Appendix 4 Appendix 5 -

Appendix 1: The Global Health Care Industry for ageing population

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU)
estimates that global health care spending as a
percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
will average 10.5% in 2014 (unchanged from
2013), with regional percentages of 17.4% in
North America, 10.7% in Western Europe, 8.0%
in Latin America, 6.6% in Asia/Australasia, and
6.4% in the Middle East/Africa. Among
developed nations, health is the second-largest
category of government spending, after social
protection
(social
assistance,
health/unemployment insurance). Most of the
Source : 2014 Global health care sector outlook
countries across the globe are facing a formidable challenge to manage the rapidly increasing cost of
health care. Although spending rose by just an estimated 1.9% in 2012, it is expected to pick up again,
with total spending rising by 2.6% in nominal terms in 2013 and by an annual average of 5.3% until 2017.
Given population growth, this means that spending per head is anticipated to rise by an average of 4.4% a
year from 2014-2017 (Deloitte, 2014).
Health Care Industry and Global Ageing Population
As per the graph shown below the percentage of worlds population aged 60 years and above has
increased dramatically from 8% in 1950 to 12% in 2013. Its expected to increase rapidly and in the next
four decades to reach at a dramatic figure of 21% in 2050. However, the phases and pace of ageing
population are quite different the more and less developed countries. Likewise the population aged 60
years or over in the more developed regions was 12% in 1950, rose to 23% in 2013 and is expected to
reach 32% in 2050. In the less developed regions, the proportion of older persons increased slowly
between 1950 and 2013, from 6% to 9%. However, the increase in the proportion of older persons is
expected to accelerate in the coming decades, reaching 19% in 2050. In the least developed countries, the
proportion of older persons has remained fairly stable at about 5% for many decades, but this proportion
is expected to double by 2050.

(Source: Department of Economic and Social Affair Population Division, 2013)

Appendix 2 External Environment Analysis

External Factors
(PESTEL)
Political

Economical

Socio-Cultural

The Global Health Care Industry Related to Ageing Population

Growing political focus and pressue on healthcare for ageing population.
Global governments looking for healthcare savings.
Harmonization of healthcare Eurpoe & Asian counties where high ageing population is found.
Increased government spending on health care and pensions.
65 years of age and older population to reach 72 million in 2030.
Reduction in individual disposable income.
Increase number of buying groups putting pressure on healthcare nurses/labors for ageing population.
An ageing population could lead to a shortage of workers and hence push up wages causing wage
inflation Global economic crisis

Medium

Increase in life expectancy and ageing population.

Pressure on land as more people move in. Conflicts of cultures from migrants can lead to civil wars.
A shift to lifestyle related diseases will be one of the driving elements for higher health care spends with
the ageing population.
Rising literacy rate and rapid improvement in technology helps elderly people to increase their awareness
in terms of latest technological products.
Invention of Robotics nurses for ageing population to take care of elderly people.

High

High

Improved healthcare services for ageing population.

Growing trends in robotics labour.
Investments in research and development have increased for future improvements of robotics
functionality and usability.
Increasing need for healthcare nurses/nannies for ageing population.

Robotics large part of employment and know-how.

Labour laws of outsourced consumer electronics manufacturing/assembling countries.
Rate of innovation and competition gives rise to violations in patents.

Medium

Technological &
Environmental

Legal

Impact on Industry

High

Appendix 3: Application of Porter 5 Forces Model

Substitutes

Only substitutes are

hospitals/elders home
and human labor.
Intensive involvement
of human labor
increases the time and
costs involved to take
care of ageing
population.
Increasing labor costs
has given scope for
increased adoption of
robots.

Threat of Substitutes Low

Customers

Lack of awareness about latest technology

in less developed market reduces
bargaining power

Buyers in developed markets require

customization in robotic device for ageing
population, which further reduces their
bargaining power.

Bargaining Power of Customers - Low

Suppliers

OEMs manufacture
their software solutions
which need to be
incorporated to health
care robots via third
party manufacturers.
This results into increase
in costs.

Less risk of backward

integration.

Existence of large
number of suppliers for
non-critical materials

Industry Competitors

High competition in individual segments

becauseNew
of limited
products available
Entrants

Market
competition
willisfurther
Threat of
new entrants
low. increase
as the present players will increase their
Procurement of high initial capital
efforts to enter into emerging markets of
investment is difficult except for
Asia-Pacific, Middle-East and Africa.
breakthrough technologies.
Existence
of high-regulatory
barriers.
Competitive
Rivalry
High

Research and development of devices

require huge capital investment.

Threat of New Entrants - Low

Bargaining Power of
Suppliers - Moderate

Appendix 4 - Force Field Analysis

The degree of impact in this analysis is evaluated using a score out of 10, 1 for not a serious impact and
10 being a large impact. As per the sum of scores depicted, it is highly likely that Robotic Nannies/Nurses
will have a high impact in the health care industry for ageing population in the next two decades.
Drivers to change
Impact score of drivers
50

Increasing demand for healthcare

facilities for ageing population (8)

Potential long lasting &

sustainable assistive
healthcare nannies (8).

Increasing availability of
information to educate
consumers on Robotic
assistants (7).
Rapid improvements in
health care facilities (8)

Robots performing tasks

autonomously (9)

Human-like assembly
robot to assist disabled
elderly patients (10)

Impact score of resistors

Adoptio
27
n of
Robotic
care
takers
for
ageing
populat
ion

Resistors to change
Total score
50 27 = +23

Mass producing high quality

health care robotic nurses/nannies
are still under testing (5)

Current costs of
robotic
healthcare
nannies are very high
(4)
Lack of consumer
experience with robotic
nannies may require
intense
marketing in developed
markets (3).
Low literacy rate in
potential markets like
India may lead to slow
consumer adoption (4)
Concerns of emotional
robotics - research is on for
slower speeds (5).
Large Investments in
R&D is needed (6)