In 2013 I wrote about convergence as a meeting of formerly distinct domains. Now, in 2025, that framing feels quaint. The question has shifted: we no longer approach convergence.
We live it.
We're seeing biology, machines, code, data, and workflows collapse into one ambient mesh,
“The Convergence” is no longer a moment to arrive at. It is the present.
Connectivity (Again) Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
Connectivity used to mean phones, wires, routers. In 2025 it means presence. The network is everywhere. Edge‐Ai agents monitor conditions before you know you need them. Devices talk to devices, not just via human commands. Predictive transfers, local inference, self‐repairing mesh—all standard.
Global reach is no longer aspirational. It is baseline.
Fabrication & Emergence
The idea that manufacturing still “makes things” is obsolete. Instead, 2025 sees emergent fabrication. Materials self-adapt, robotics reconfigure on the fly, biohybrids grow parts. 3D printing morphed into 4D adaptive fabrication, where structures adjust themselves in response to stress or environment.
You don’t launch “a product.” You deploy a
system of change.
Systems, Not Software + Hardware. Zero Sum, No More?
The old binary between software and hardware is dead. Code lives inside actions, not abstractions. Computation is embedded in materials, optics, and motion. Imaging sensors are designed jointly with neural nets. The optimization is holistic. (See differentiable imaging.) (Wikipedia)
You don’t “run software on a machine.” You unfold a system that is instantly alive.
Predictive Flow (Business at Warp)
Business processes are not automated. They anticipate. Ai orchestrates billing, supply, service, and customer life cycles in a continuous loop. Decision velocity (your own word) isn’t a goal. It’s the norm.
No more batches, no more episodic handoffs. Everything is fluid, continuous, adaptive.
Synthetic Existence
The boundary between life and work is extinct. It's not work/life balance.
It's just Life.
Identity itself is hybrid. Co-workers are avatars and agents. Relationships run on context, not schedule.
Phones, tablets, keyboards are relics. We exist through streams of data and interfaces that adapt to your presence. The line between 'synthetic' and 'real' is blurred.
Imaging: The First Convergence. "Copiers, Schmopiers"
If any industry predicted the collapse of separation, it was imaging. You once sold copy, print, fax, scan. Now those are functions inside systems that ingest, analyze, distribute, learn.
In 2025 a copier is an edge sensor, a local compute node, a workflow agent. It’s part of a sensor grid. It senses document types, routes content, enforces compliance, triggers audit trails, indexes meaning. Ai inside the device does what once needed full server farms. (EnX Magazine)
There isn't 'Ai in the machine', your MACHINE is in Ai.imaging methods deepen that fusion for niche applications. (arXiv)
In short: copiers were on the threshold of convergence.
So What (Again)?
The old “Now what?” questions still matter, but they change meaning.
Acknowledgment
Accept that your tools no longer describe your domain. Ai, sensors, agents all belong. Your job is now translation: between state, data, and value.
Holistic View of the Ecosystem
Clients don’t see silos. They see friction or flow. Your conversation can’t be about devices or services. It must map the client’s data system.
Knowledge Transfer → Fluency Transfer
“Never stop learning” is outdated. You must now teach fluency in prompt design, model behavior, ethics, cause-effect in live systems.
Talk the Talk
Drop the phrase “managed print services.” Speak of “agentic infrastructure,” “predictive flow,” “embedded sensing.” Reps should carry stories about systems, not toner cartridges.
Final Thought
In 2013 I asked whether convergence was happening. Now the question is moot. Convergence is done. The space between silos has collapsed. What remains is coherence.
We are not converging. We are coherent.
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