Advances in NLP and machine learning are allowing automatic processing of knowledge. An untapped potential of this revolution is the augmentation and possible automation of the invention process.

Everyone has a perception of an inventor as a crazy guy in a shed who is somehow, suddenly inspired. I would like to challenge this view by exploring the process of famous historical inventors to present day inventors and disruptors to give an understanding of how novel ideas come about, before moving onto what invention might look like in the future.

In particular, I would like to share a vision of AI augmented inventors and what this will mean for the democratisation of invention, drawing on my experience as a modern inventor with example patents and progress that has been made so far using new approaches.