During a period of slow global economic growth, the opportunity presents itself for emerging industries to gain recognition and a top spot in place of failing businesses. In the scenario of our most recent worldwide economic slowdown, IT has come out on top as a powerful driver of growth in nearly every developed country.
Newer technological innovations can reshape and transform economies. Take digitization – the mass adoption of connected digital services by consumers, enterprises, and governments – for example. According to the Global Information Technology Report 2013 by the World Economic Forum, digitization sent world economic output soaring by nearly $200 billion and added 6 million jobs in 2011.”The report highlights how digitization also bolsters improvements in GDP per capita and can certainly contribute to a lower unemployment rate.
Technology innovations change the way we as human beings live and work, and introduces new ways of doing business. They can also create new opportunities, such as international cybercrime and privacy issues, that society and policy makers need to wrestle with. As a whole, we should try to balance the risks and rewards of the new technologies that emerges around us. Even with the unintentional consequences that come along with new technologies, it is certain that exporting and sharing them worldwide is a force for good. The absolute benefits of a more connected, smaller world far outweigh the inherent risks.
As we look forward over the next ten years, there are a number of technologies that could have a massive, economically disruptive impact. I recently read the McKinsey Global Institute’s 2013 Disruptive Technologies report and was intrigued by the list of the top 12 technologies that they believe will “transform life, business and the global economy.” According to the report, these technologies share four key characteristics: high rate of technology change, broad potential scope of impact, large economic value and substantial potential for disruptive economics. They include:
• Mobile communications and internet
• Knowledge work Automation
• The internet and associated technology
• Cloud technology
• Advanced robotics
• Autonomous vehicles
• Energy storage
• Advanced materials
Another common theme gluing these technologies together is human advancement. These highlighted areas have the ability to bolster the global economy and make our day to day lives easier. But, they have the potential to introduce new challenges and risks that we as a society need to solve.
Take the progression of robotics, for instance. The further computerization of a few workforces will make a streamlined workflow that can produce a steady item at an institutionalized rate without human work. The profits are clear and selection of this engineering is by and large useful for our worldwide economy. Nonetheless, the human expense, for example, lost employments, can't be thought little of. We'll have to meet up as a social order – of purchasers, business pioneers and arrangement producers – to illuminate these tests and guarantee that we're profiting from the reception of these new innovations.
While the overall international impact of these innovations might be clear, what does this mean for your company?
Businesses should be focusing their efforts on the technologies that can have the biggest impact to their business. Competitive advantage often comes to early adopters who leverage technology to transform their business. As newer, mind boggling, technologies come to market, IT should move to quickly evaluate and implement those that make sense. And, they need to experiment with those technologies that they may not need right away.
As the world gets more diminutive and more associated, companies need to guarantee they have a worldwide R&D method. For a long time, numerous organizations were concentrated on offshoring R&D to India. Today, tech hotspots are popping up around the globe in spots like the U.K., Tech City, Germany, Singapore and Brazil. The key for businesses is to influence the pools of enhancement as far and wide as possible and set up shop in nations where capable designers and researchers can collaborate specifically with clients and prospects.
Clearly, technology innovations hold tremendous promise for our global economy and for our individual businesses. A decade ago, we had no clue the impact that mobile technology would have on our lives and today it’s ubiquitous. Regardless of the upheaval brought about by new technology advances and the new challenges they can introduce, disruptive innovations are the key to a prosperous future. I for one am looking forward to what the future holds!
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