Hi there,
I think this is mainly a case of walls between design and engineering departments and educational programmes.
Until a few years ago it was not easy being both a product designer and programmer creating intelligent products and systems.
But now the tools are there to rapidly create intelligent interactive product prototypes so the time is right for hybrid designers.
It’s a great advantage to combine the two fields since it can speed up innovation, also the product’s form and intelligence are interdependent, for example placement of sensors is key to developing interesting behaviors as seen with Braitenberg vehicles.
I was educated with both AI programming and classic ID skills, but you also need to find the right projects and companies with the right ideas to work with if you want to be able to use these skills. I am still very interested in this field, especially in giving products brain-like intelligence so that mostly through unsupervised learning, adaptive behavior emerges.