HOW close really are driverless cars, drones and robots from becoming part of our everyday lives? We hear about the development and innovation in tech news regularly, but how do we know which technologies will take off and which won’t?

Why would we get products shipped from China when we could simply print them at home?

It’s sometimes hard to remember that the smartphone revolution only really took off in 2007, when Apple released its first iPhone. Look at how much our lives have changed since then. What will the next eight years bring? Perhaps the most important question of all is 'where is my flying car?'.

If this query plagues your day then you might want to take a look at the TMRW event, taking place on Wednesday 20 May at Manchester Central.

Manchester is abuzz with technology and innovation and our bid to become a start-up city was sealed with the announcement of Tech North at the end of last year, so it seems right that the TMRW event - a one-day conference looking specifically at future technologies - should take place in the heart of Manchester with our own Professor Brian Cox giving the closing keynote speech.

.Manchester Central

TMRW event organiser Tom Cheesewright is a futurist at Book of the Future, a consultancy that helps businesses look at how technologies are changing our lives.

He said: “It is, of course, incredibly difficult to predict how the future will turn out and what technologies will really take off and which ones won’t. I wanted to create a one day event to bring together the creators of new technologies, the disruptors and insightful commentators to find out how our lives could be completely transformed again over the next decade.”

Here are the top five sessions not to miss at the TMRW on Wednesday:

1. Keynote speech from Professor Brian Cox

Professor Brian Cox first achieved recognition as a pop star and could now be described as a pop star of the science world. Currently a Professor of Particle Physics at the University of Manchester and TV personality, Professor Cox will give the closing keynote speech of the conference. His talk will encompass how Manchester was once known for its music but now there is a real buzz about the city related to its innovation and technology developments.

2. Robot Wars: soldiers, drones and self-driving cars session

Digital minds and robot bodies continue to advance at an exponential rate, bringing sci-fi visions of drone armies, self-driving cars and all-knowing artificial intelligence ever closer. What’s the near-term prospect for robots in life and work? Should we be as fearful as Bill Gates and Elon Musk have suggested?

Panel discussion with Martin Bryant, group editor of The Next Web and Noel Sharkey, computer scientist and Professor at the University of Sheffield.

How close are we to driverless cars?How close are we to driverless cars?

3. Augmented, Automated, Awesome: smarter people and smarter places

Technology is disappearing into the fabric of our clothes and our buildings, invisibly automating our lives and augmenting our capabilities. Is the next generation the first to be truly bionic? What does this mean for our skills, our knowledge and our control of our destiny?

Panel with Tom Cheesewright, Book of the Future; Lynne Murray, London College of Fashion; Harshita Shetty, Connected Homes and Annina Verkkomäki, OMUSS Ltd.

4. Material World – a printed future?

New 3D printing techniques could entirely change our lives - why would we get products shipped from China when we could simply print them at home? To what extent will 3D printing affect our lives and economy?

Panel with Brendan Dawes, designer; James Bruton, from Xrobots.co.uk, Chris Elsworthy, CEO Robox 3D printers, Chris Thorpe, founder of icanmake and Professor Brian Berby, lecturer at the University of Manchester.

5. Nothing is secure and it never will be

As more of our lives are integrated with technology, so the security risks grow. What will happen when the internet is absorbed into widely-used products? Who's controlling our driverless cars? How will we keep ourselves safe from hackers?

Panel with Emma Carr, from Big Brother Watch; Samy Kamkar, hacker and entrepreneur; Chi Onwurah, Shadow Cabinet Office Minister and Dan Prince, Security Lancaster.

For the last few remaining tickets visit tmrwconf.org. Tickets for TMRW are £195+VAT.

TMRW conference takes place at Manchester Central, alongside the IPExpo, which is free to attend.