Business in a Transformative Context

We are seeing the physical world colliding with the digital world. Physical world people and businesses tend to focus on things they can see, touch, and manufacture. Even when their output exists largely in digital form (e.g. legal contracts) they still think of their world in very tangible terms. They are often comfortable with things they are familiar with, tend to think of progress in incremental ways, typically see technology as an enabler, and rarely see themselves as technology businesses.

Those born of or living in the digital world tend to be more forward looking, comfortable with technology, early adopters of new technology having grown up with social media, electronic devices and virtual communications. When they look at the world or an industry, they see the data and information first and look for streamlined systems solutions. They focus on outcomes and believe that – from vehicle manufacture to curing world hunger – the problem is at heart one that can be solved by technology-enabled redesign of the entire system, not just by human brain power and incremental improvement. Their view is that the application of science and new technologies are the way to develop solutions to existing problems, and to capitalising on emerging opportunities.

Technology’s “Possibility Explosion”

We are seeing a “possibility explosion” from exponential science and technology developments. Not only that, we are seeing the potential of the combinational impact of technologies that are being developed in tandem, e.g. artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics. What we know about these technologies is that they will drive dramatic and rapid change; in society, across industries, business, leisure, government, healthcare, and education.
The boundaries between magic and science are blurring. There are some radical developments taking place, many of which we will see come to fruition during our working lives including mapping and uploading the human brain, and cognitive, genetic, physical and electronic enhancement of the human body. These radical developments – particularly when put together with AI – could create challenging ethical dilemmas should machines gain self-awareness and even emotional intelligence.

We don’t have to look very far into the past to see the transformative impact of combinational technology development. Although the pace of change is accelerating, transformation in ICT has been ongoing for some years, so we have an evolutionary model we can look to. Think of the computer; from room-sized machines in air conditioned rooms, to the desktop, the laptop, and the tablet. Now consider the parallel development of the telephone, from the desktop to the “luggable” mobile, mobile with apps, and the smartphone. Just think for a second how transformative smartphones alone have been, how they have become part of the fabric of our daily life, and how we take for granted the ability to access information, communicate and be entertained on the move. The following examples demonstrate the exponential possibilities that are on the horizon in the aftermath of the most recent technological bursts of progress.

• Brain–computer interface (BCI) is a direct communication pathway between an enhanced or wired brain and an external device. A BCI is often directed at researching, mapping, assisting, augmenting, or repairing human cognitive or sensory-motor functions, but their application could also extend to “mind control” of objects and devices.
• Wearables and Implants or near body devices are coming into play. Many are currently being used for health and sports performance monitoring but increasingly we see wearable technology for other uses; Google’s Glasses and the Apple watch being just two examples. Soon, we will see device recharge technology built into his clothing fabrics, conductive fibres woven into fabric that provide processing capacity for wearable devices, and GPS tracking devices fitted into shoes.

We are already used to some implants: heart pace-makers, cochlear implants, and ocular implants for example. But a new range of implants will help to enhance other body functions into the future including memory for our electronic devices. Some of these technologies are being patented now.

• Augmented and virtual reality look set to play increasingly significant roles as we seek ever more immersive experiences. A growing range of devices, surfaces, and appliances in the home, office, factory, and school will be connected – creating the so called Internet of Things (IoT), and we will see new ways to interact with information. Estimates vary widely, but within ten years there could be between 200 billion and a trillion devices and objects connected to the internet, all capable of exchanging information and providing different sorts of functionality and experiences. Video and projection technologies will improve, including holographic technologies that will allow us to share information in new ways.
• Autonomous vehicles – A number of experiments are taking place on public roads across the world, and while cars have been the focus of much media attention, lorries, buses, trains, ships, and planes are all subject to developments in autonomous / driverless technology.
• 3D printing provides the opportunity to distribute production to where it’s needed and at significantly reduced costs. Why would you manufacture products thousands of miles away from the market and transport them, if instead you can make them where the consumer is? The 3D printed Strati car produced by Local Motors is a prime example. A typical car has say 5,000 components, whereas the electric powered Strati has 50. such designs can be developed 1,000 times cheaper than a traditional car and each vehicle manufactured up to 22 times faster.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) is arguably the big game changer and becoming more common place. We already see narrow AI in use in internet searches, customer targeting applications, and in predictive analytics. But AI has much greater capability that will emerge into every aspect of our lives in the near future. Increasingly devices will learn more about us, help to provide decision support to us and take on more of our tasks. We are automating a lot more of human social and workplace activity and that is set to continue at an accelerated rate.

The Future of Business

At Fast Future, we have identified six high value industry clusters that we expect to be radically impacted or enabled by exponential and combinatorial technology developments. Indeed, each underlying sector within each cluster is expected to worth US$1Tn or more by 2025:

• Information and communications technologies (including, AI, robotics and blockchain)
• Production and construction systems (From 3D/4D printing and synthetic biology to rapid, green and sustainable construction approaches)
• Citizen services and domestic infrastructure (from health and elder care to smart vehicles and new education approaches)
• New societal infrastructure and services (encompassing intelligent transport, the sharing economy and smart cities)
• Industry transformation (the modernisations of sectors such as financial services, accounting and legal)
• Energy and environment (from renewables and fracking to environmental protection and repair).

These technological advances will have an impact right across society and all business sectors, fundamentally changing many. For those that doubt the possible scale of impact, there are a number of prominent recent examples where established businesses have ignored the signals sent by new market entrants, new technologies and new business models.

For example, Kodak ignored new market entrants and were over confident in their brand and their customer loyalty. As a result, their market share declined rapidly and they rejected a technology innovation of their own invention – the digital camera. The company emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2013 and is now a very different business.

Similarly, in 2000 the relative new entrant Netflix proposed partnership with Blockbuster. The suggestion was that Netflix would run Blockbuster’s brand online, and Blockbuster promote Netflix in stores. Netflix advantages were lower costs and greater product variety. Having turned down Netflix’ overtures, Blockbuster were unable or unwilling to alter their business model and went bankrupt in 2010, while Netflix has market capitalisation of over $65 billion.
Conversely, other companies have embraced the opportunity to deploy technology to develop products and services that put the customer at the heart of the operation.

UBER was founded as a consumer-centric transportation company that utilized licensed taxi drivers for ridesharing services. The basis of what we see today was the integration a mobile application to connect passengers with drivers of vehicles for hire within a specified geographical area. What differentiated Uber from hundreds of other taxi apps was a more customer oriented experience including the ability to track their vehicle as it is on route to them, driver rating, and new payment options including fare sharing between multiple occupants. Uber is disrupting the market for taxi cabs and transportation in general and has already expanded into home delivery, food and helicopter services. It is also exploring driverless cars, drone delivery and on-demand urban air transportation.

Airbnb offers a user-friendly site for discovering and booking accommodation. The curated listings offer consumers far more than just “renting a spare room.” The proposition is about discovering cool, quirky, and creative properties. Rentals are generally 30-80% lower than available hotels. For the property owner, it is free to list with Airbnb who charge a 3% fee to process payments. Guests pay a service fee to Airbnb. They too have potential to transform a traditional service model – accommodation and space rental.

Harnessing Exponentiality

Moore’s Law has shown that $1,000 worth of computing power will double in capability every 18-24 months. If we apply that to the processing power of existing computers, in seven years or so we will see computers 128 times more powerful than today. Organisations that can develop the appropriate mindset and apply this notion of exponentiality could develop thriving business propositions and achieve dramatic growth.

Indeed, many organisations are trying to bring exponential ideas into their thinking. They are asking if technology can radically change what they do, and what they can change to solve more problems faster, deliver quicker and dramatically reduce process times. In short, they are using exponential thinking approaches to change the way they look at problems, solutions, and opportunities. They are changing the personality of their organisation, posing the question, “Should we play by the rules of the game or change the game itself?” They recognise that staying still – taking no action – is normally tantamount to going backwards.

After Brexit, artificial intelligence (AI) has become the hottest topic of debate at present. There are many ways in which this most disrespectful technology could change how we might save, spend, and invest in the future. To help understand its life-changing potential, here are 10 ways AI might impact personal banking.

1. Enhanced Security and Fraud Protection

By monitoring every transaction as it happens and comparing it to historical patterns, AI could identify fraud in progress, such as my personal bank account being drained. Equally it can detect warning signs i.e. your financial adviser being unavailable, changing their spending habits, and buying one-way flights to the Bahamas.

2. Go Compare on Steroids

AI could take the concept of price comparison websites to new heights. Collating different savings and loan options from across all providers, an AI finance supermarket tool would instantly identify financial product that met our requirements precisely, highlighting small print and full hidden costs. Through an ongoing subscription, this continuous comparison tool could make recommendations to the customer or be authorised to switch financial products automatically as better options emerge.

3. Spending Comparison

AI would allow us to compare the spending of individuals, households, and businesses.  Various views could be available e.g. how much do we spend on electricity, food, stationery, or transport relative to people with similar incomes, households of the same size, or comparable businesses to ours.

4. Aggregated Purchasing

My bank could aggregate customer purchase information on an opt-in basis and use it to secure higher discounts from providers based on the total spending power of its customer base. Deals could be offered by vendors, with our personal AI assistants deciding whether to buy based on our needs and interests – only consulting us when the AI doesn’t know enough to make a choice.

5. Dynamic Fund Management

The AI systems could look at estimated future spending based on past behaviour, and move our spare cash into whichever savings or investment products offered the best return based on the level of risk we’re prepared to take. Options might range from a stable interest-bearing account to highly volatile digital currency funds.

6. Digital Currency Trading

With growing investor interest in digital currencies like Bitcoin, Litecoin and Ether, our banks could trade the funds we allocate to this asset class – buying and selling on a dynamic basis as currency values fluctuate.

7. Financial Equality

While individuals with limited funds may not be able to pay for a human financial advisor, AI may become the great financial equalizer. Constantly declining technology prices would enable literally everyone to access the best AI investment advice at almost no cost.

8. Dynamic Pricing

Based on our past behaviour data, AI could predict what price each individual would consider fair. Prices would be public, but each individual would only see those customised just for them.

9. The “Jiminy Cricket” of Personal Budgeting

Smart systems would nudge us to make the best decisions for our financial situation. For example, for most 20-somethingsinstead of spending a month’s salary on Friday night, it would encourage more modest entertainment options and invest the rest to help achieve our holiday or retirement goals. The AI might go a stage further and add a small auto-saving amount to each purchase – automatically squirrelling the funds away at each purchase.

10. My Digital Banking Twin

Our personal AI clones or “digital twins” would be authorized to buy, save, sell, or trade on our account.  Credit card purchases,  bank transactions, bill payments, completing student loan or mortgage applications, and even impulse buys could all be delegated to our digital twin – under the watchful eye of the banks own AI big brother to make sure a digital twin doesn’t go rogue, get hacked, or collude with another to defraud their human counterparts

The applications of AI are nigh on limitless and we can expect to see them proliferate in the marketplace over the next few years. Some may thrive, others may be absorbed by larger institution. The majority will end us as a failure statistic like most technology start-ups of the past. The fun part is trying to pick the winners and convincing our own providers to up their game and bring a little AI spice into our financial lives.

• Where would you most like to see AI being used in the management of your finances?
• Which are the financial situations where you’d still require a human touch?
• What are the biggest benefits and risks that you can foresee from greater use of AI in managing your finances?

How might advances in artificial intelligence impact senior level opportunities in the recruitment sector?

Prime Minister Teresa May recently shared the UK government’s vision for an increasingly artificial intelligence (AI) enabled future at the World Economic Forum in Davos: A future characterised by more research, AI deployment, automation, and jobs in the digital economy. So, this should mean more opportunities in recruitment? Not so fast.

The pace of development in AI is delivering systems that can increasingly outperform humans across a range of tasks from diagnosing cancer to interpreting complex texts. In recruitment, we can expect to see AI playing a role in candidate search, CV evaluation, credential checking, and even interviewing candidates. Successive waves of AI-enabled automation will certainly drive technological unemployment across a range of sectors. Collectively, these developments could mean fewer jobs at each level in recruitment firms.

Inevitably, we will see some recruitment firms embrace AI fully and gradually replace humans at every level with ever-smarter technology. Less front-line recruiters should mean a thinning out further up the organisation. However, the industry is not rushing to embrace AI and the change will happen more gradually at first. Step five years out, and we could see even more diversity in the sector with a spectrum running from highly automated firms with literally no employees through to those that deploy the technology in the background but retain a highly human touch in the crucial client and candidate facing activities.

The challenge for recruitment firms is to invest the time now to start understanding this most disruptive of technologies, investigate current and potential application and employment implications in client sectors, and start looking at how it might be used in recruitment. We would then recommend doing some scenario planning to see the different storylines that might play out for the recruitment sector. These scenarios should naturally include different rates of take up of AI across different client sectors and the potential impact on employment numbers, turnover and recruitment demand. The time invested here will provide a powerful basis from which to spot emerging opportunities within a changing employment landscape.

The upside of change is that new AI-powered businesses and industries will emerge in sectors such as healthcare, human augmentation, synthetic biology, supercomputing, driverless vehicles, smart materials, robotics, drones, smart buildings, and countless others that will emerge over time. Indeed, over the next 7-10 years, the global economy could grow from around $78 trillion today to $120 trillion and 50% or more of this growth could come from firms and sectors that don’t yet exist.

We expect the innovation leaders in recruitment will look to automate using AI and other technologies wherever they can. However, rather than making staff redundant, the technology will free them up, allowing them to use that time to learn about and get close to the emerging sectors. This should mean that these leaders are well positioned to serve the increasingly complex, precise, and often multidisciplinary recruitment requirements of these new firms and their investors.

Hence, while AI will undoubtedly impact the recruitment sector and the client sectors it serves, it could provide the much-needed stimulus to automate more routine tasks and free up time to pursue new growth opportunities. This could in turn see changing organisational structures changing in recruitment firms. Far flatter hierarchies might emerge, with more staff operating in hunter gatherer mode, researching and building a presence in the new growth sectors.

At the operational level, AI tools will provide far greater information of personal productivity and effectiveness across the team, allowing leaders to target training and coaching interventions more effectively, and ensure more objective and consistent performance evaluation.

Clearly, it may be daunting to accept that the sector, like its clients, will be impacted by AI, with the potential for job losses at all levels. However, we are at a sufficiently early stage in the evolution of the technology for firms to give themselves the opportunity to learn, adapt, pursue new growth opportunities, and ultimately create a more human and differentiated workplace through the effective use of AI.

How can those at the top ensure they and their organizations are fit for the future?

Perhaps the biggest challenge facing leaders today is to ensure they are capable of navigating themselves and their organizations through a complex and rapidly evolving future landscape. The reality is becoming clear: A good future focused leader has to have a “futurist mindset”. This means being capable of looking over the horizon on a continuous basis, and constantly adjusting our present-day actions in response to what we see. It also means acting quickly in response to new opportunities and risks – trying rapid change experiments through which we can learn and evolve. Our forthcoming guide for surviving and thriving at the helm of business, The Future Leader’s Handbook, is intended to help address these challenges in a highly practical manner. In this extract from the book, we highlight 10 key principles for ensuring that we are leading into the future and not clinging on to the past.

1. Maintain a Constant Dialogue with Key Stakeholders

The leaders who are least surprised by the future tend be those with the broadest radar. They are always exploring both the issues of today and the factors that could shape and disrupt the future. They do their data gathering in the most natural way possible – by talking constantly to customers, prospects, suppliers, partners, shareholders, competitors, industry associations, business networks, advisors, industry analysts, commentators, journalists and – most importantly – their own staff. They probe for ideas and developments that could accelerate quickly and for weak signals of potentially big changes to come.

2. Continuous Foresight and Experimentation Cycles

The old planning model has been overturned, an annual or bi-annual long-term planning exercise to guide strategic leadership just won’t cut it, when sectors are being disrupted on an almost quarterly basis. The emerging best practice model is to scan continuously – looking far, wide, and into the shadows for what might be coming towards us. These insights need to drive at least a twice-yearly update of scenarios of how our world might play out in the near, medium, and longer term. These scenarios and scanning insights should help us iterate our way towards the future using rapid idea testing experiments around possible new products and services, processes, channels to market, business models, and customer engagement approaches. The goal here is to help us learn key information rapidly, develop new knowledge and capabilities, fail fast when appropriate, and progress quickly.

3. Hire a Futurist

Alongside learning and development, and managing your digital ecosystem, continuous scanning and evaluation of the future will be a critical core function for future proofed organizations. Like it or not, the organization needs constant prodding to ensure it is looking at new potential threats and opportunities early enough to address them before they create a crisis. Many leading companies are hiring futurists or directors of strategic foresight or other job titles that denote a role involved in continuously thinking about the future. Well-known organizations that have created positions for in-house futurists include Google, Intel, Volkswagen, Hershey’s, Ancestry.com, and even the City of New York.

4. Define the Present Broadly

Study history and archaeology to cultivate and enhance understanding of time and progress. The best future leaders have a sense of context – a solid grasp of civilizational rise and collapse, failed societies, and gaps in the scientific understanding of the past. Consider future generations as stakeholders for whom you are accountable. Envision the great-grandparent holding the new-born baby, and all the past and future the image conveys: that is the present.

5. Learn Something New Every Day, Then Watch it Grow

Don’t leave scanning just to the futurists. Allocate at least a couple of hours a week to exploring what’s coming next. Good future leaders learn quickly to establish the habits of a trendspotter and seek out new information at every possible turn. Subscribe to newsletters, follow thought leaders on social media, join webinars, and work daily to widen your media diet to include information that broadens your mind. Seek out diverse information sources and cultivate your findings on a link-sharing or social media page of your own. Watch and learn as your observations go from fringe to mainstream.

6. Let it Go!

Letting go of that which no longer serves us is critical to understanding and acting on the emerging future, and to appreciating and responding to the strategies and business models of new and existing competitors. Cherished assumptions and worldviews may need to be overturned, and long-held ideas and beliefs that have served us well may need to be retired. Our thoughts and beliefs can become a prison which prevent us from exploring and making sense of the world that’s unfolding. Also key here is acknowledging that our own ideas may not be the best ones for any given situation, and that they also have a limited time to be acted upon before they might be overtaken by developments in the world around us.

7. Shape a Forward-Looking Culture

Look at the dominant behaviors and stories around the organization. Who do we make heroes of? Are we celebrating and rewarding those who scout out emerging change and seek to pioneer new ideas? How are we using public spaces – are staff surrounded by constantly changing images, icons, and questions of what’s next – or charts of past performance, safety notices, and policy statements? How is our appraisal and bonus system designed – are innovation and challenging the “system” encouraged and rewarded?

8. Re-balance Technical and Soft Skills

If we accept that in the past our success as leaders has been based on our technical knowledge, then acknowledging the pace and scale of emerging change should lead us to conclude that softer skills will become increasingly important. Presuming that automation takes away the need from some technical know-how, perhaps future leaders will be required to demonstrate a tolerance of uncertainty, the ability to cope with complexity, to exhibit empathy within our organisations, and to value collaboration and relationship development.

9. Take a Sustainability Perspective

Sustainability has often been talked about in the context of the environment; climate change, wildlife protection, and natural resource consumption. Increasingly, we see organisations taking a much broader view of sustainability that incudes economy, business, and employment, eradicating inequality, developing ethical business practices, our communities and eco systems, education, and personal fulfilment. Perhaps we should be posing questions about how our businesses and our business practices support sustainability, rather than damaging it.

10. Define and Redefine Organizational Identity

Fluctuating conditions in the business environment impact organizations in different ways. Being attentive to unexpected shifts in society gives future leaders an innate sense for when company culture, identity, and values should evolve. A future leader inspires others with a consistently positive attitude towards change.
Never has it been more important for those leading organizations to demonstrate a deep understanding of the forces, trends, developments, and ideas that could shape the emerging future. From shareholders and stock analysts to customers, partners, and staff – they are all looking for tangible signs that we have real grasp of what’s on the horizon and the scenarios that could play out. These stakeholders want reassurance that our decision making is based on what’s next as well as what’s been.

The Megashifts Reshaping Our World

Welcome to the latest issue of FutureScapes! In today’s edition, Technology vs. Humanity author Gerd Leonhard goes beyond paradigm shifts to discuss the coming Megashifts – forces that “radically reconfigure the age-old relationship between our past, present and future.” Then, in “Governing in the age of Uber, AI and Zero Hours Contracts,” Rohit Talwar focuses on the very recent UK court rulings concerning Uber employees as a case example of what our future economy may look like, and how governments need to be much more forward looking to better legislate our future. Finally, find out how you can contribute to our newest book, The Future of AI in Business.

In this issue:

• The Megashifts Reshaping Our World By Gerd Leonhard
• Governing in the age of Uber, AI and Zero Hours Contracts
• Submit a proposal for The Future of AI in Business

Please feel free to share this newsletter with your networks, and as always, we welcome feedback. We can be reached at .

The Megashifts Reshaping Our World

By Gerd Leonhard, Futurist and Author of Technology vs. Humanity

Science fiction is increasingly becoming science fact and exponential technological changes are rapidly changing our culture, business and society.

Much of it is extremely promising and indeed has the potential to solve our biggest challenges, such as energy, water, diseases and global warming. But at the same time we are facing a myriad of unintended consequences such as the likelihood of widespread technological unemployment, a near-total loss of privacy and an overall dramatic dependency on technology.

The most powerful companies are no longer the oil and gas companies or the banks – they are the big data / big Internet companies and platforms, such as Google, Facebook, Amazon, Baidu and Tencent. These players are propelled to supremely dominant positions by what I call the Megashifts; a dozen or so drivers that are unfolding exponentially as well as combinatorially – amplifying each other and reaching unprecedented magnitudes.

Any organization looking to understand exponential thinking and to achieve future-readiness must have a clear picture of what these shifts mean, and what opportunities or threats may arise from them.

Megashifts are much more than mere paradigm shifts, which usually affect only one sphere of human activity. They arrive suddenly to transform the basis and framework of entire industries and societies. Megashifts do not replace the status quo with a new normal – they unleash dynamic forces which reshape life as we know it. Megashifts radically reconfigure the age-old relationship between our past, present and future.

Here are some Megashifts I expect us to see in the next few years:

Digitization: everything that can will become digital. Information and media were the first, now it’s banking and financial services, transportation and mobility, health and government, and soon, energy. Digitization always creates abundance (witness the near-zero cost of a song on Spotify vs iTunes or CDs) which means much lower costs for consumers yet also a mad scramble for new business models because distribution or access is no longer an issue.

Mobilization: computing is no longer at the desk – everything is becoming mobile, and soon wearable or ‘hearable’. Computing is becoming ‘like air’, invisible, omnipresent – utterly indispensable.

Screenification is very much related to the previous two Megashifts: everything that used to be physical (or printed) is now available on screens. This also means that things are becoming increasingly medialized; what used to be between people (such as conversations in foreign languages) can soon be done via a screen using free translation apps such as SayHi, Google Translate, or soon, Waverly Labs’ Pilot prototype. A true #hellven challenge – is this heaven or is it hell?

Disintermediation: many incumbent middlemen are suffering because technology increasingly makes it feasible to go direct, or indeed via new middlemen such as social media platforms or telecoms and mobile operators (such as mpesa in Africa which is competing directly with banks). Examples include record labels (musicians now launch their careers via YouTube), publishers and advertising (brands can increasingly tell their stories via digital / social media i.e. without mass-media TV or print), and consumer banking where millennials increasingly use mobile platforms and apps to make payments and organize their finances.

Datafication: much of what used to happen face to face i.e. things that were not recorded or mediated, is now being turned into data, e.g. electronic medical records vs. talking to the doctor – the connected hiking boot that tells the store it needs new shoelaces, or the grocery delivery service that tracks all its products.

Intelligization or Cognification (as Kevin Kelly terms it): everything that used to be dumb is now becoming connected and intelligent, such as gas pipelines, farms, cars, shipping containers, traffic lights etc. This connectivity allows for intelligence to be derived from the aggregate output of hundreds of millions of sensors and devices – once artificial intelligence learns from this flood of data we will have a vastly different way of reading, seeing and directing the world.

Automation: the result of smart machines will be widespread technological unemployment. Everything that can be automated will be – including science and engineering. I believe this is actually a huge opportunity rather than a threat, but we are currently ill-prepared for it.

Virtualization: we no longer rely only on physical things in some room or location but on an instance in the cloud, e.g. software defined networking instead of local routers, virtual friends such as Hello Barbie etc.

Augmentation: humans can increasingly use technology to augment themselves i.e. to be omniscient, omnipotent, superhuman. Examples include my smart watch, smart Goggles, Augmented and Virtual Reality, Intelligent Digital Assistants and (sooner or later) Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) and implants.

Anticipation: software (IA/AI) can now anticipate and predict our behavior; thus changing the way maps, email and online collaboration work.

Robotization: even many white-collar jobs will soon be done by robots. Robots are leaving their industrial cages and entering our daily lives and homes.

De-humanization: taking humans out of the equation by cutting a complex human task to its bare bones and giving it to machines.

Yet the most important Megashift might soon be Re-humanization: finally we are just about to realize that our customers don’t buy technology – they buy relationships? Maybe this is the driving force behind the recent Partnership on AI to benefit people and society, initiated by FAMIG (Facebook/Amazon/Microsoft/IBM/Google).

Technology is not what we seek, it’s how we seek – and we should embrace technology but not become it.

About Technology vs. Humanity
For more on the book, to pick up your copy, or to check out a free preview of Technology vs. Humanity, please visit our website here.

Governing in the age of Uber, AI and Zero Hours Contracts

By Rohit Talwar

In response to the Ars Technica article “Uber drivers are company employees not self-employed contractors, court rules“

We are at the start of a dramatic reshaping of the economy, the business world, and the future of jobs and employment. Governments need to start thinking about the implications for national policy, economic strategy and ensuring a fair society.

The current maelstrom around Uber drivers being classed as employees in the UK is a fantastic case example of the kind of complex problem scenario that will be played out many tens of thousands of time all around the world over the next five years as we try to create a sustainable next economy.

Governments are desperate to avoid the impression that they are condoning what are effectively zero hours contracts and the erosion of workers’ rights that come as an almost inevitable by-product of the strategies of societal capacity recyclers like Uber.

However, most governments are looking in the rear view mirror and legislating for a situation which is already being overtaken by the automation of entire roles. For example – Uber is in an accelerated pursuit of driverless vehicles which could at one level render the debate over driver contracts irrelevant in a decade or less.

I think that governments need to be way more forward looking, experiment with a range of policies that address the world we are entering – rather than that which we are leaving behind. We need to explore strategies and policy measures that edge us towards an economic platform that serves the whole of society.

One practical step would be to look at automation taxation policies that get firms like Uber to be financially responsible for a certain level of jobs based on total revenues – that money could be funneled into retraining people with the skills of the future, supporting people to create their own sustainable ventures and a guaranteed basic income that gives people the money required to hire the driverless Uber.

Otherwise ‘Anarchy in the UK’ could become a prescient forecast rather than just a song I used to pogo to!

Submit a proposal for The Future of AI in Business

Deadline Nov. 18th

We are putting out a call for proposals for our next book, The Future of AI in Business. We’re looking for a broad range of contributors who are creating, shaping and implementing the coming future of AI in businesses and corporations worldwide.

Fast Future Publishing and AI Business are pleased to announce their collaboration on the forthcoming book The Future of AI in Business – Unlocking Human Potential. The book will bring together case studies and future perspectives from leaders in the development and deployment of AI across the business world and will be launched at AI Business flagship event, The AI Summit in London on May 9th 2017.

The book is a collaboration between Fast Future Publishing, a specialist ‘exponential’ publisher focusing on fast track delivery of futures-oriented books, and AI Business, the leading media and events organisation focused on the practical application of artificial intelligence (AI) in the business world.

The Future of AI in Business is a response to the explosion of demand for quality insights on the current and future role of AI in business. Over the last year, interest in AI has reached fever pitch as the business world has started to explore and embrace what represents potentially the most socially transformative technology since the invention of gun powder. The pace of investment in, and adoption of, AI in business is accelerating, and the level of interest and activity is rising rapidly across all sectors.

The intention is to provide a diverse set of perspectives on where the technology is going, how it is being deployed in business today, and how the capabilities, applications, and impact of AI could evolve over the next 3-10 years. The book will present case study experience, insights, and visionary thinking from end users, technology vendors, professional service firms, researchers, and those with a deep interest in the field.

If you are interested and would like to find out more, please visit our website for a fuller description of the book and contributor guidelines:
http://dizzydev2.co.uk/books/future-ai-business/

And see our full press release here.

Press Release and Call for Chapter Proposals

The Future of AI in Business – Unlocking Human Potential

New Book will Chronicle the AI Revolution and Map Pathways to the Future

Fast Future Publishing and AI Business are pleased to announce their collaboration on the forthcoming book The Future of AI in Business – Unlocking Human Potential. The book will bring together case studies and future perspectives from leaders in the development and deployment of AI across the business world and will be launched at AI Business’ The AI Summit in London on May 9th 2017.

The book is a collaboration between Fast Future Publishing, a specialist ‘exponential’ publisher focusing on fast track delivery of futures-oriented books, and AI Business, the leading media and events organisation focused on the practical application of artificial intelligence (AI) in the business world.

The book is a response to the explosion of demand for quality insights on the current and future role of AI in Business. Over the last year, interest in AI has reached fever pitch as the business world has started to explore and embrace what represents potentially the most socially transformative technology since the invention of gun powder. The pace of investment in, and adoption of, AI in business is accelerating, and the level of interest and activity is rising rapidly across all sectors.

CEO of Fast Future Publishing and co-editor of the book Rohit Talwar, said “Through the growing demand for our keynote speeches on The Future of Business to corporate leaders around the world, and across all of our current and forthcoming books, it is clear that the commercial world is waking up to the true power and potential of AI. Every executive wants to know what AI is, how it could transform business, how far and how fast it could develop, and what the potential economic, political, social, and ethical implications, opportunities and challenges might be.”

CEO of AI Business and co-editor of the book Georgios Kipouros, said “Since 2014, AI Business has been the pioneer in highlighting the transformational impact of artificial intelligence in the corporate world. Through the world’s largest online community and events focused on AI for business, we are engaging with the thought leaders that are enhancing human productivity through implementation of AI technologies. This book, the first one on this topic, will be a milestone in deciphering the future of AI-powered organisations.”

The intention is to provide a diverse set of perspectives on where the technology is going, how it is being deployed in business today, and how the capabilities, applications, and impact of AI could evolve over the next 3-10 years. The book will present case study experience, insights, and visionary thinking from end users, technology vendors, professional service firms, researchers, and those with a deep interest in the field.

Fast Future Publishing and AI Business are inviting chapter proposals from those at the forefront of the deployment of AI in Business. Further information on the objectives and scope of the proposed book, contributor benefits, and the proposal submission process can be found here: http://dizzydev2.co.uk/books/future-ai-business/

Fast Future Publishing develops books using an exponential fast track publishing model that delivers high quality insights in less than a third of the time it would take a traditional publisher. The company has completed the successful launch of its first two books – The Future of Business (top five per cent of all business books in its first year), and Technology vs. Humanity (Amazon bestseller within one week of launch). The Future of AI in Business will be launched at The AI Summit in London on 9th May 2017. This leading event series, run by AI Business, gathers thousands of business leaders and AI developers from around the globe in London, San Francisco, New York, Tokyo, and Hong Kong.

For further information, please contact:
Co-Editor – Rohit Talwar: Tel +44 7973 405145
Co-Editor – Georgios Kipouros: Tel +44 7858 333838

The Future of AI in Business – Scope

The book is designed to have the broadest possible scope and will be co-edited by Rohit Talwar from Fast Future Publishing and Georgios Kipouros from AI Business. They will be joined by a team of experienced writers from AI Business including Robert Woolliams and Daniel Pitchford, working alongside global futurists Steve Wells and April Koury from Fast Future Publishing.

The aim is to address the following key topics:

• AI as the catalyst of the fourth industrial revolution; providing a paradigm shift comparable to mass production or the Internet, not a phase akin to ‘the cloud’
• Examining case studies of how AI is being trialed and deployed in businesses today
• Outlining how AI capabilities, tools, and technologies could evolve over the next 3-10 years
• Exploring the future potential applications across a range of business sectors for the various branches of AI – including machine learning (ML), deep learning (DL), natural language processing (NLP), image / voice / speech / video recognition, cognitive computing, and robotics
• Evaluating the potential impacts, business benefits, and challenges that could arise
• Considering the importance of an organisation’s internal culture to the speed / breadth of AI implementation
• Outlining the power of AI to help unlock the true potential of people in the workplace
• Assessing the potential of AI to transform, reshape, and even create entire industries and economies
• Discussing the possible impacts of AI on employment and how society might respond
• Considering the potential legal, moral, and ethical issues that could arise from the acceleration of adoption of AI
• Evaluating the perception of AI in some sections of the media as a force for evil and destroyer of jobs.

The publishers are inviting chapter proposals for the book and are keen to hear from new and established writers alike. We are particularly interested to hear from:

• Businesses that are deploying or about to experiment with AI technology within their organisations
• Professional service firms that are using AI within their organisations and in client-facing applications
• Vendors with strong perspective on how AI technologies could evolve and where they could have the greatest impact in business
• Researchers and academics who are either creating the next generations of AI technologies and tools or studying the future evolution and implications of AI in business
• Trade unions, civil society organisations, and NGOs who are exploring the potential implications of AI on the future of work and society
• Government researchers and policy makers who are considering the broader potential future commercial, societal, and governmental impacts of AI
• Analysts, observers, and commentators who have unique insights and perspectives on the potential evolution of AI in business and what that could mean for businesses, employees, shareholders, governments, and wider society.

About Fast Future Publishing

www.fastfuturepublishing.com

Fast Future Publishing develops our books using an exponential publishing model, and we have completed the successful launch of our first two books – The Future of Business (top five per cent of all business books in its first year), and Technology vs. Humanity (Amazon bestseller within one week of launch).

We are a new breed of publisher founded by three futurists – Rohit Talwar, Steve Wells, and April Koury. Our goal is to profile the latest thinking of established and emerging futurists, foresight researchers, and future thinkers from around the world, and to make those ideas accessible to the widest possible audience in the shortest possible time. Our FutureScapes book series is designed to address a range of critical agenda setting futures topics that we believe are relevant to individuals, governments, businesses, and civil society. Technology vs. Humanity by futurist Gerd Leonhard is the second book in the series and was published on September 8th 2016.

Our first book, The Future of Business, has shipped over 6,000 copies in its first year – placing it among the top five per cent of non-fiction books worldwide. The book provides 60 fast moving chapters and 566 pages of cutting-edge thinking from 62 future thinkers in 21 different countries on four continents. Traditional publishers would take two years to deliver a book of this magnitude; we completed the journey from idea to publication in just 19 weeks. We have also created an innovative business model that bypasses most of the traditional publishing practices and inefficiencies, embracing digital era exponential thinking and applying it to transform the publishing process, the distribution approach, and the profit sharing model.

Our publishing model ensures that our authors, core team members, and partners on each book share in its profits. Additionally, a proportion of profits are allocated to a development fund to finance causes related to the core topic. For The Future of Business, the fund will be used to finance scholarships for those wanting to take courses in foresight research and practice. For Technology vs. Humanity, the fund will be targeted at initiatives that seek to further the debate.

For further information, please contact:
Project Manager – Steve Wells: , or
Series Curator and Co-Editor – Rohit Talwar:

About AI Business

http://www.aibusiness.org

AI Business is the world’s leading media and events business dedicated to Artificial Intelligence in business.

Since 2014, AI Business has built partnerships with some of the leading innovators who are developing groundbreaking AI technologies, together with the CxO level business leaders who are actually implementing the technology. By engaging across the enterprise and developer landscape – through exclusive interviews, case studies and events – our editorial coverage has enabled us to build the world’s foremost community of thought-leaders in AI for business.

By providing up-to-the-minute news on developments in AI across all industry sectors worldwide, and focusing on the practical applications of AI in business, we illuminate the transformative opportunity that AI presents the business world.

AI Business runs the world’s number one AI conferences & exhibitions for business, The AI Summit Series, that gather thousands of business leaders and AI innovators from around the globe in London, San Francisco, New York, Tokyo, and Hong Kong.

For further information, please contact:
Head of Research – Robert Woolliams:

Welcome to the latest edition of FutureScapes. Today we dive into some amazing and controversial futures finds in social media. An in-ear, real time translator straight out of sci-fi blasted across social media these past weeks, but is it everything its creators are claiming? Plus, 3D printing is going metal, banks are still behind on the times, AI dips its employment toes into the legal profession and physics, the obsolescence of voting via Big Data, and a bit more.

In this issue:

• Futures Finds in Media
• New Books & Old Friends
• Rohit on the Road

Please feel free to share this newsletter with friends, colleagues, and anyone interested in the future, and your feedback is always welcome! Reach us at .

Futures Finds in Media

In-Ear Language Translators May Soon Be Here, Thanks to Waverly Labs via Futurism

Waverly Labs will soon release a pair of in-ear translators, called Pilot, that allow conversations between people speaking different languages to be translated in real time. Through crowdfunding, the in-ear translators will be available next year for $410. How Star Trek.

I Just Spoke With Pilot And I Don’t Know If It Is Real… via Forbes

However, Forbes contributor Paul Armstrong has strong doubts that Pilot is all it’s cracked up to be. After a 20 minute conversation about the technology and funding behind Pilot with Andrew Ochea, the founder and CEO of Waverly Labs, Armstrong had this to say: “Ochea did his best to answer and asked me at the end if I was convinced it wasn’t a hoax. I answered honestly. I wasn’t.”

Lasers and nanoparticles combine to allow metallic 3D printing in midair via ExtremeTech

Harvard’s Wyss Institute and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences has stepped outside of the 3D printing box to develop a new type of printer that uses a special formulation of silver nanoparticle ink and lasers to print unsupported metallic structures in midair, overcoming the traditional 3D printing medium of supported plastic.

More People Are Living Past 100 Years Old Than Ever Before — Here’s Why via Bustle

Pew predicts that by 2050 there will be 8 times as many centenarians as there are today, with China and Japan projected to have the highest number of adults over 100. Rohit spoke on this phenomenon and its socio-economic ramifications late last year. What will society look like when people retire at 100 and live to 120?

HDFC Bank exec: This is how future of digital banking looks like via CNBC moneycontrol

Established banking is one of those sectors that is potentially the least prepared for and the most resistant to the change exponentially growing digital technologies are bring about in other business sectors…

Portugal runs for four days straight on renewable energy alone via The Guardian

Renewables can power the world! In a clean energy milestone, Portugal ran on renewable energy alone for 4 days. This followed Germany’s announcement on May 15th, when clean energy had powered almost the entire country all day, with power prices actually turning negative a few times.

Artificially Intelligent Lawyer “Ross” Has Been Hired By Its First Official Law Firm via 2045

“Ross, the world’s first artificially intelligent attorney, has its first official law firm. Baker & Hostetler announced that they will be employing Ross for its bankruptcy practice, currently comprised of almost 50 lawyers.”

Nobel-Winning Physics Experiment Recreated by AI… In One Hour via Futurism

In another leap forward for AI and physics, Australian physicists have created an AI that can run and improve complex physics problems with little oversight. The idea is to leave the manual stuff to the AI, allowing the scientists to focus on high-level problems.

Dronebuster will let you point and shoot command hacks at pesky drones via ars technica

Tired of your neighbors or the CIA spying on you via drones? Hack them! “DroneDefender is a two-pronged drone jammer—it can disrupt command-and-control signals from a remote operator or disrupt automatic GPS or GLONASS guidance, depending on which of the devices’ two triggers is pulled.”

IN THE FUTURE, BIG DATA WILL MAKE ACTUAL VOTING OBSOLETE via Nextgov

Better than just predicting winners, the big data being collected by search engines and trend watchers may make voting obsolete: “Why are we struggling so hard to figure out how to use Trends or tweets or shares to predict elections when Google actually knows exactly how we are going to vote. Impossible, you say? Think again.”

New Books & Old Friends

We’ve added quite a few new authors to our store in the past months. Be sure to drop by and check out the latest works available at Fast Future Publishing.

In addition to new books, we’ve updated the site with a brand new Free Presentations page, a collection of Rohit’s most popular presentations through the years. Check back regularly as the page will be updated as Rohit continues to speak around the world.

Gray is the New Green by Karen Sands

Gray is the New Green is paradigm shifting business book for visionary leaders, savvy marketers, and innovative entrepreneurs who are ready to rock their revenues in the Longevity Economy by staying in sync with the people who keep them in business. Discover how demographic trends coupled with cutting-edge findings will positively influence your future leadership, business development, market reach, and succession planning.

What Works: Case Studeis in the Practice of Foresight by Sohail Inayatullah

What Works furthers the practice of foresight in organizations, institutions, cities and nations. Divided into three parts, the book moves from theorizing the future to case studies of foresight in action and concludes with innovative futures methods. What Works covers over thirty years of Inayatullah’s research in futures studies and offers one of the most comprehensive works on methods and case studies and, most importantly, implications and applications available today.

Resilience And The Future Of Everyday Life by James H. Lee

How can we sustain ourselves in a world turned upside-down? That’s the central question of Resilience and the Future of Everyday Life. In this thought-provoking book, James H. Lee explores the unprecedented challenges of the post-modern age. Some see these problems – from financial chaos and exploding debt to career uncertainty and environmental worries – as proof that human society is on the verge of collapse. Lee looks past the doom and gloom and sees possibility instead. He asks, “What if the so-called ‘coming apocalypse’ leads not to societal collapse but a more resilient way of life? What if these global problems initiate a positive cultural transformation?”

It’s YOUR Future… Make It A Good One! by Verne Wheelwright

Awarded “Most Important Futures Work” by the Association of Professional Futurists, It’s YOUR Future… Make it a Good One! by Verne Wheelwright takes a step-by-step approach to teaching you how to achieve the future you want. This book shows you in simple, easy steps how to learn about the methods and tools that futurists use (very successfully) in large businesses around the world and how you can use the same methods (even more successfully) in your own life, career, or business.

2015-16 State Of The Future From The Millennium Project

2015-16 State of the Future brings together an extraordinarily diverse set of data, information, intelligence, and hopefully some wisdom about the future. This report is for thought leaders, decision-makers, and all those who care about the world and its future. Readers will learn how their interests fit into the global situation and how the global situation may affect them and their interests. The report provides an eye on global change and information utilities that people can draw from as relevant to their unique needs. It provides an overview of the global strategic landscape: business executives use this research as input to their strategic planning, and university professors, futurists, and other consultants find this report indispensible in teaching and research.

To order your copy of these books, please visit our store.

Rohit on the Road

• May 28: Early Childhood Council, New Zealand – Living to 120
• June 8: Hogan Lovells, Washington DC – Future Impacts of Artificial Intelligence in Legal
• June 20: Ernst & Young, London – Keynote The Future of Business
• June 30: Frost & Sullivan, Growth, Innovation & Leadership Conference – Keynote The Future of Business in Europe
• July 1: DS Smith, Innovation Workshop London – Disruptive Innovation & The Implications for Manufacturing, Packaging & Distribution
• July 18: Nokia, Inspiring Leaders Program Munich – The Future of Business Workshop

Welcome to the latest edition of FutureScapes. Today we take a look at global drivers of change focused around emerging social technologies, and in the media, a few interesting finds ranging from big data and virtual reality, to a mainstream endorsement for blockchain and sci-fi LEGO bodies of the future.

In this issue:

• Futures Finds in Media
• Writings on the Future: Global Drivers of Change
• Rohit on the Road

As always, please feel free to share this newsletter with friends and colleagues, and send us an email if you’d like – feedback is always welcome.

Futures Finds in Media

AR, VR, MR: Making Sense of Magic Leap and the Future of Reality via WIRED

You’ve probably seen the stunning promotional videos floating around the web from Magic Leap, but what the heck is the difference between augmented reality, virtual reality, and mixed reality? Here’s a short video from WIRED that breaks it all down.

The Modular Body

Take living tissues and plug them into a bio-battery for life. The Modular Body is a new, slightly disgusting and creepy sci-fi website gone viral that shows us where we may be heading. Could we one day switch out our extremities or even our internal organs by simply plugging a new one into a body socket?

This 15-Ton Computer Creates Clean Water, Electricity, and Internet Access via Futurism

“The Watly unit comes equipped with photo-voltaic solar panels that produce heat and solar power. Water is then pumped into its tank that produces clean water following a vapor compression distillation process—a method that employs solar thermal energy to vaporize water and segregate contaminants (from sea salt to poisons.) A single machine can purify up to three million liters of water annually and has a lifespan of up to 15 years.”

Singapore in 2030: Minimum wage in place and innovation driven? via SMBWorld AISA

“What does the future hold for Singapore’s talent landscape in the year 2030? Will there be a minimum wage in place, with the country enjoying full-employment with continued reliance on foreign employees? Or will the adoption of technology result in old business models making way for new ones?” This report, put together using the Delphi technique and 45 Singaporean experts, develops four potential scenarios for the future of Singapore.

Microsoft Just Struck a Major Blockchain Deal With World’s Leading Banks via Futurism

The winds are shifting – while financial institutions have largely ignored digital currencies, the tech behind it, blockchain, is beginning to go mainstream in a big way…

Artificial Intelligence: Bringing Humanity to Big Data & Customer Experience via insideBIGDATA

CEO and co-founder of Boxever Dave O’Flanagan discusses how airlines are leveraging big data and predictive capabilities to transform customer engagement. Yet another great example of harnessing big data to your advantage.

Writings on the Future
Global Drivers of Change: Social Technologies

By April Koury, Iva Lazarova and Rohit Talwar from The Future of Business

There is little doubt that accelerating and ever-more impactful advances in science and technology will play an increasingly significant part in our everyday lives. The below global drives of change highlight how rapid advances are altering the way we might live and work and the way in which we manage our relationship with technology.

Evolving Personal Tech Ecosystems – The personal technology we use daily has evolved from desktop to luggable, from luggable to portable, from portable to wearable, and we are beginning to see an evolution into embedded / implantable technology. Wearable technology is becoming prevalent in smart watches, intelligent clothing, and personal health trackers like FitBit, while embedded technology now stretches beyond medical necessities like pacemakers and cochlear implants, to subdural microchips that operate lights, doors, and other computers remotely.

The Internet – Increasing Ease of Access and Worldwide Penetration – The internet is already a critical part of the operational infrastructure for individuals, businesses, and governments within the developed world. As technology becomes faster, cheaper, and more globally accessible, even individuals in the most remote regions on earth will gain access to the internet. It continues to transform access to services like education, and encourages entrepreneurship by giving people with limited resources the ability to reach the entire world and have unimaginable amounts of information at their fingertips. By 2025, experts forecast that more than 91 percent of people in developed countries and nearly 69 percent of those in emerging economies will be using the internet. The expectation is that we will rise from about three billion users today to up to 7.6 billion over the next decade.

The Internet of Things (IoT) / Internet of Everything (IoE) / Internet of Humanity – The IoT is a further development of the internet, where items are connected to the network and can send and receive data. These everyday objects can communicate with each other and transmit information to people and systems. Everything from street lights to refrigerators to cars is now being connected. In 2015, Gartner estimates that 4.9 billion “things” will be connect to the internet, and by 2020, that number is expected to increase anywhere from 25 billion to 100 billion things.

Intelligent Web – The intelligent web is the evolution of the internet as we know it. Increasingly complex algorithms and artificial intelligence will become smart enough to search web data and draw meaningful inferences. The system will understand spoken questions, gather the relevant information, and form a meaningful answer to inquiries. The intelligent web will transform the way we access information and interact with each other on the web.

Virtual Worlds – Virtual worlds are computer-based, 3D simulated environments where online communities of users can interact with each other. Massively multiplayer online games like World of Warcraft create a fantasy virtual world, whereas the virtual world of Second Life represents the real world. Beyond gaming, virtual worlds are increasingly used for online conferences and meeting spaces for businesses and education.

Digital Currencies – Digital currencies like Bitcoin are an internet-based medium of exchange similar to paper currency, but they are “borderless” and allow for instant transfer between accounts anywhere in the world. The currencies are usually decentralized, controlled by users, outside of any governmental regulatory bodies, and transactions are anonymous. (For an in-depth look at the future implications of Bitcoin and blockchain, listen to Exploring the Business of the Blockchain by Rohit Talwar and Alexandra Whittington).

Smart Cities – Smart cities utilized digital technologies to connect with their citizens, improve overall wellbeing and reduce costs and unnecessary waste. Everyday city objects such as electric grids, roads, sewer systems, buildings and cars will be connected to the internet of everything, enabling object-to-object and people-to-object interactions. The belief is that these connections will open up vast new possibilities for sustainable, healthy communities, safer streets, and economic growth and development. At the same time, there will be push-back from privacy advocates who are concerned about the massive data collection associated with smart cities. Smart city initiatives are being pioneered in Boston, Copenhagen, Dublin, Masdar Abu Dhabi, Rio, and Singapore.

Augmented Reality (AR) – Augmented reality is the process of overlaying objects in the physical world with digitally generated content like maps, video, and sound. Generally, this is accomplished through smartphones or tablets, but advances in wearable devices like Google Glass and Hololens, and research into AR-enabled contact lenses will result in a much more physically integrated AR experience.

Virtual Reality (VR) – Virtual reality uses computer modeling and simulation to generate real and imagined 3D worlds, 3D objects, and even sensations with which people can interact. Oculus VR, makers of the most recognizable VR headsets on the market, believe VR will reshape many fields in the future, including medicine, architecture, education, and business.

Human Enhancement – Human enhancement is defined as any attempt via augmentation to overcome the limitations of our bodies through chemical, genetic, or technological means. Enhancements range from improving mental performance, to boosting physical speed, strength, and stamina. It is predicted that by 2025 humans will have “hacked” every aspects of their bodies, creating a new breed of human 2.0 and 3.0. All of these enhancements will be monitored and managed constantly by a variety of wearable technologies and devices implanted into the body, which will track every vital sign and link directly to personal hand held devices and to monitoring services provided by healthcare providers.

Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI) – Using EEG signals detected by electrodes attached to the scalp, a BCI system records the brain’s electrical activity, and as the user thinks of a certain concept or command, patterns in the EEG are deciphered by machine-learning software. The resulting information enables applications which communicate these commands wirelessly to computers and other objects. A new venture by Braingate hopes to commercialize a wireless device that can be attached to a person’s skull and transmit the thought commands of paralyzed patients to various devices in the room.

Rohit on the Road

• April 28: Lex Mundi International Law Firm Network Partners Event Berlin – Future of Law Firms
• April 29: Baker & McKenzie – The Future of Business
• May 5: Nokia, Espoo Finalnd – Inspiring Leaders
• May 11: IFS Consulting & Reykjavík University Iceland – Future of Finance
• May 14: London Business School – The Future of Business
• May 15: ASSA ABLOY, Sitges Spain – The Future of Business
• May 19: Association of Corporate Treasurers, Liverpool – The Future of Business
• May 27-29: Early Childhood Council, New Zealand – Living to 120

Welcome to the latest edition of FutureScapes. Today we take a look at some of the global drivers of change that may have a hand in shaping the future over the next decade and beyond. Specifically, we focus on economic, policy and governance drivers, and shifts in economic systems.

In this issue:

• Writings on the Future: Drivers of Change
• Futures Finds in Media
• Rohit on the Road

As always, please feel free to share this newsletter with friends and colleagues, and send us an email if you’d like – feedback is always welcome.

Writings on the Future:
Drivers of Change

By April Koury, Iva Lazarova and Rohit Talwar from The Future of Business

In these drivers of change we explore some big picture views of how our world could play out in the next two decades and the potential implications for individuals, society, governments, and business. These drivers examine how the key economic, social and technological forces, emerging ideas, and developments discussed in the rest of the book could come together to drive fundamental change. In particular they highlight critical current and future technology revolutions that could disrupt and reshape how we live, how we govern and the future purpose, role, nature, and conduct of business.

You can also listen to this chapter on The Future of Business Podcast on iTunes, our RSS feed, or our YouTube Channel.

Emerging Paradigms

Age of Abundance – The Singularity Movement argues that, counter to the peak proponents, advances in science and technology will lead to a world of post-scarcity or abundance between 2020 and 2050. Nanotechnology, genetic sciences, bio and molecular manufacturing, robotics and AI will result in great efficiencies in resource usage and management, as well as offer up a whole new host of plentiful new materials. This will extend to lab-grown meat, replacing the need for animal farming.

Innovating to Zero – Innovating to zero is the idea of creating a “Zero Concept” world, where companies will deliver energy solutions, goods, and services with zero carbon emissions. Some extend the idea to include delivering goods and services with zero environmental impact. Technologies that will assist in the drive for zero emission include wind power, the travelling wave reactor (TWR), solar PV, and third generation biofuels (biofuels derived from algae).

Circular Economies – Traditional linear economies are based on a “take, make, dispose” model, whereas circular economies rely on the re-use of resources to extract maximum value and minimize waste before being safely returned to the biosphere. Governments as well as businesses are taking notice of the potential economic and ecological long-term benefits of investing in a circular economic model. In 2012 a report sponsored by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation found that a subset of the European Union manufacturing sector could realize net material cost savings of up to $630 billion per year by 2025 through switching to a circular economic model.

Civic Ecology – Civic ecology practices are community-based environmental stewardship actions that enhance the green infrastructure, ecosystem, and human well-being within urban areas. In essence, communities come together to care for nature typically in places marked by disaster, poverty, and environmental degradation. Activities include community gardening, tree planting, and park cleanup. Civic ecology practices are growing in number as the need for global sustainability initiatives becomes increasing prominent.

Environmental Market-Based Instruments (MBIs) – Environmental market-based instruments are policies that provide incentives to polluters to reduce their negative environmental impacts. Carbon taxes and “cap and trade” policies are the most widely adopted MBIs. Continued global growth is expected to increase the adoption of MBIs to encourage more sound behavior in carbon usage and provide the funds to finance ecological protection.

Community Sustainable Resource Management Schemes – Local community initiatives are encouraging communities to reuse, recycle, repurpose, and share resources. In Mexico City, for example, at the Mercado del Trueque, families exchange recyclable materials for fresh produce. On its opening day the Mercado collected an estimated 11 tons of recyclables from 3,000 local families.

Energy

Rising Energy Demand – Global energy demand is expected to increase by one-third by 2035, with emerging economies accounting for more than 90 percent of that net energy demand growth, according to the International Energy Agency. Low carbon energy sources like renewables and nuclear could meet about 40 percent of the growth in primary energy demand by 2035.

Scale of Alternative Energy Adoption – Oil prices are expected to rise in the longer term as the pressure on fossil fuel supplies drives up costs over time. This could result in a growth in the use of alternative energy by publicly owned energy utilities, existing private sector players, and new providers. Sources could include a combination of solar, geothermal, tidal, wind, biomass, nuclear, motion capture, and other forms of alternative energy. Self-managed alternative energy supplies are becoming increasingly popular at the corporate level. They provide firms with more options for fulfilling their energy needs, and allow them to decouple themselves from the price volatility of the public energy supply.

Growth of Fracking – Hydraulic fracking involves drilling vertically into the earth to release gas and oil by using a high-pressure fluid to cause fractures and cracks in deep shale rock formations. Trillions of cubic feet of gas and oil by using a high-pressure fluid to cause fractures and cracks in deep shale rock formations. Trillions of cubic feet of gas and oil may be extracted this way. Though the fracking market is expected grow from $13.33 billion in 2013 to $19.8 billion by 2020, environmental concerns and governmental regulations banning fracking may hobble this energy source.

Resources

Resource Scarcity – Resource scarcity greatly impacts many aspects of business decision making, from location to securing raw materials and supplies. Every resource will become a battle ground as nations seek to secure access to food, water, raw materials, rare earth minerals and other energy resources. Sustainable resource management is gaining increased government attention due to the combined pressures of climate change, population growth, economic growth, and of course, resource scarcity.

Peak Everything – According to peak everything proponents, humans are reaching the peak limits of our planetary resources including oil, water, carrying capacity, and all raw materials. For example, peak oil production is expected to hit between 2015 and 2020 (although advances in technology continually push that date into the future). The FAO warns that world food production needs to increase by at least 70 percent to meet the demands of a growing population by 2050.

Food Security – In the coming decades, population growth coupled with reduced access to fresh water and declining arable land will resulting in mounting pressure on food security globally. The regions expected to have the largest population growth (Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa) by 2050 are currently seen as the least well equipped to meet these growing food demands and to deal with food security challenges, increasing the risk of conflict in the future. However, growing agricultural practices like permaculture, vertical farming, community gardening, edible landscaping, and urban fruit gleaning are redefining where and how we grow food, and will help alleviate future challenges to food security.

Climate and Environment

Climate Change – Experts agree that the planet is experiencing a rapid change in global and regional climate patterns. This is predicted to lead to increased sea levels, changes in the amount and the pattern of precipitation, and the expansion of deserts in subtropical regions. In particular, extreme weather and heat, drought and heavy rain, maritime acidification, and the extinction of living organisms would lead to decreasing yields from agriculture and fisheries. Severe climate change effects could also lead to increasing numbers of refugees. Governments worldwide are facing the challenge of developing policies that mitigate these effects and also build resiliency into our systems. Many nations may simply be unable to cope with the costs of protecting against severe climatic incidents and remediation after they occur.

Developing Materiality of Biodiversity Impacts on Business – Environmental impacts such as growing resource scarcity, biodiversity loss, and degradation of ecosystems provide new opportunities and risks to investors, shareholders and, insurers given corporate reliance on these assets.

Futures Finds in Media

How Machines Destroy (And Create!) Jobs, In 4 Graphs via NPR

From NPR’s Planet Money, a few great interactive graphs & charts showing how machines have destroyed some ‘traditional’ jobs like farming, but also how they’ve been responsible for creating new careers and decreasing the cost of goods among other things.

The Scarlett Johansson Bot Is the Robotic Future of Objectifying Women via Wired

“If a man can’t earn the attention of the woman he longs for, is it plausible for that man to build a robot that looks exactly like his love interest instead? Is there any legal recourse to prevent someone from building a ScarJo bot, or Beyonce bot, or a bot of you?”

In 2015, the future of energy experienced a major shift via Tech Insider

For the first time ever, developing nations spent more on renewables than developed nations. Developing countries spent $156 billion on renewable projects using sources like wind and solar, while developed nations spent $130 billion.

CRISPR Dispute Raises Bigger Patent Issues That We’re Not Talking About via Singularity HUB

“…we’ve been ignoring two important lessons from the CRISPR/Cas9 patent dispute: patent systems no longer fit the realities of how science works, and patents give their owners significant control over the fate and shape of technologies.”

Functional skin—complete with hair and oil glands—grown in lab via ars technica

“The mouse-based study, published in Science Advances, brings scientists closer to pulling off the feat in humans, which would provide synthetic skin grafts that could treat burn victims and patients with various skin diseases.”

Brains of Veterans with PTSD Changed after Mindfulness Training via FUTURITY

New research is showing that mindfulness training is acutally altering the connections in veterans’ brains, helping them avoid getting stuck in a ‘flashback loop’.

The Answer to Nuclear Waste Storage and Transportation Could Be Metal Foam via Futurism

CMFs may just be the new way to store toxic waste: “Researchers discovered that composite metal foams (CMFs) are significantly more effective at insulating against high heat than the conventional metals and alloys. CMF consists of metallic hollow spheres—made of materials such as carbon steel, stainless steel, or titanium—embedded in a metallic matrix made of steel, aluminum, or metallic alloys.”

Rohit on the Road

• April 6-7: PwC’s 2016 Future of Work Conference Paris – The Futures of HR and the Workforce
• April 19: Young Presidents’ Organization San Salvador – Future of Business Keynote
• April 21: Young Presidents’ Organization Peru – Future of Business Keynote
• April 25: Young Presidents’ Organization Buenos Aires – Future of Business Keynote
• April 28: Lex Mundi International Law Firm Network Partners Event Berlin – Future of Law Firms

Last days to celebrate Future Day 2016 with 65% off of The Future of Business and 20% off all other books in our store.

We’d like to thank everyone for their tremendous support of our Future Day Sale and for helping us make the best of futures thinking available to the widest possible audience around the world.

If you haven’t had a chance to pick up copies of The Future of Business or any of our other books for yourself, friends, or colleagues, now is the best time! Our sale ends tomorrow, March 31st.

More details on our books are provided below, and you can always stop by our website to order books and to check out some of our free futures samples and downloads.

The Future of Business

The book has been a massive success with over 4,500 copies shipped or on order. The Future of Business draws on a wide ranging and mind-blowing set of perspectives provided by 62 future thinkers from 21 countries across the globe. This 60 chapter, 566 page deep dive into tomorrow was completed in just 19 weeks. More…

Use coupon code FutrDay during checkout to receive 65% off. If you would prefer to be invoiced please contact .

2015-16 State of the Future

The 2015–16 State of the Future brings together an extraordinarily diverse set of data, information, intelligence, and hopefully some wisdom about the future. This report is for thought leaders, decision-makers, and all those who care about the world and its future. Readers will learn how their interests fit into the global situation and how the global situation may affect them and their interests. More…

Use coupon code 20Futr during checkout to receive 20% off.

Resilience and the Future of Everyday Life

How can we sustain ourselves in a world turned upside-down? In Resilience, futurist James H. Lee explores the unprecedented challenges of the post-modern age. Some see these problems – from financial chaos and exploding debt to career uncertainty and environmental worries – as proof that human society is on the verge of collapse; Lee looks past the doom and gloom and sees possibility instead. Resilience and the Future of Everyday Life is for those who recognize our global challenges are real… and are ready to do something about it. More…

Use coupon code 20Futr during checkout to receive 20% off.

What Works: Case Studies in the Practice of Foresight

What Works furthers the practice of foresight in organizations, institutions, cities and nations. Divided into three parts, What Works moves from theorizing the future to case studies of foresight in action and concludes with innovative futures methods. The book covers over thirty years of Inayatullah’s research in futures studies and offers one of the most comprehensive works on methods and case studies and, most importantly, implications and applications available today. More…

Use coupon code 20Futr during checkout to receive 20% off.

It’s YOUR Future… Make it a Good One!

Awarded “Most Important Futures Work” by the Association of Professional Futurists. There is a lot you can know about your future. There is a lot you can do about your future. There is a lot you can change about your future to make it the future you want to live. It’s YOUR Future… shows you in simple, easy steps how to learn about the methods and tools that futurists use (very successfully) in large businesses around the world and how you can use the same methods (even more successfully) in your own life, career, or business. More…

Use coupon code 20Futr during checkout to receive 20% off.

For more about The Future of Business, our other books, or Fast Future Publishing, visit our website at www.FastFuturePublishing.com.