Trends Identified
Regulation and legislation
Ageing and environmental laws are likely to shape much future regulation and legislation at least within the European Union.
2012
The future
Steria
Growing individual empowerment
Against the background of the economic and financial crisis, it is more urgent than ever to fundamentally review the manner in which society functions and to empower people to contribute actively in their communities to live as independently as long as possible
2014
Challenges at the horizon 2025
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Enduring loss and damage from extreme weather
After the unprecedented climate events of 2017, vulnerable cities, countries and people will face yet more extreme and disruptive weather events, with the potential to impact business though value chain disruption and stranded assets, and contribute to social unrest.
2018
8 sustainability trends that will define 2018
Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership
Learning isn’t enough; professionals will focus on doing.
After the explosion of the online learning sector, our heads are full of all those classes we’ve been taking. But what we are doing with this newfound knowledge? Whitney Johnson, author of "Build and A Team" and "Disrupt Yourself," says the next trend is to focus on improving our behavior, not just our expertise, in order to apply these lessons to our work and personal lives. She points to the success of books like "Atomic Habits" by James Clear and "Willpower Doesn’t Work" by Benjamin Hardy, along with perennial bestseller "The Power of Habits" by Charles Duhigg. “Perhaps because of the political environment, people want to take action, take control,” Johnson says. “And the only thing you can control is what you do.”
2018
50 Big Ideas for 2019: What to watch in the year ahead
LinkedIn
The Business of IT
After reengineering the rest of the business, IT’s children deserve some shoes. With shrinking budgets and increased scrutiny over ROI, many IT organizations are under pressure for bottom-line company earnings. This manifests in two ways: enabling the business to be more effective in the market (IT for the business), and driving efficiency of IT operations (The Business of IT). To do both, IT organizations should automate and integrate their core processes and services, just as they’ve done previously for manufacturing, finance, and sales. When it comes to supporting business performance, IT has a thirty-plus year record of delivering what’s needed. First it was the transition from manual processes to technology-driven solutions. Then, from standalone systems to integrated offerings. And now, IT is striving for similar returns from information, digital, and innovation. In the years ahead, however, IT’s value proposition will likely increasingly be shaped by how well it addresses its second mandate: to improve operational efficiency in the business of IT itself.
2013
Tech Trends 2013 Elements of postdigital
Deloitte
Who's afraid of artificial intelligence
After losing three games of Go to Google Deepmind’s AlphaGo, the world’s second-ranked Go player in 2016, Lee Sedol, said, “I will have to express my apologies first. I should have shown a better result, a better outcome.” While Lee was apologising for his play, many also understood his statement as an apology for the limits of human intelligence and the advent of a superior form—Artificial Intelligence (AI).
2017
Foresigth
Singapore, The Centre for Strategic Futures
Order comes to the Wild West of data collection.
After a year of scandals, the implementation of Europe’s GDPR and upcoming copycat legislation from other jurisdictions, the advertising business will move away from the wholesale collection of personal data and the extreme personalization of advertising, predicts Mihael Mikek, the founder and CEO of digital advertising platform Celtra. “The question will come down to, Is the data being used in a way that benefits the consumer or not?” he explains. “In the last five years, it’s been such a crazy race to collect as much as possible.” Advertisers will follow consumers, who will demand more ethical and consent-based use of their data. After The New York Times' investigation of location-tracking appspublished yesterday, location data is likely to be the next battlefront.
2018
50 Big Ideas for 2019: What to watch in the year ahead
LinkedIn
Science supplying national needs
After a series of major global economic crises over the preceding two decades, there is public disenchantment with globalization and a strong push towards new localized growth models with sustainability at their core. The goal is to be more self-sufficient, to increase local production for internal and regional markets, and to improve quality of life and societal satisfaction, rather than growth per se. At the same time, efforts to build effective global governance structures have largely failed and instead, complex national and supranational regional alliances have formed among states, businesses and civic groups to address pressing challenges. Diverse national and regional solutions prosper in a widely experimental society.
2011
ICSU Foresight Analysis
International Council for Science (ICSU)
Industry Consolidation
After a minor decline in 2016, merger and acquisition activity – particularly across borders – is expected to increase, especially with the return of private equity buyers to the transaction market.
2017
Beyond the Noise- The Megatrends of Tomorrow’s World
Deloitte
Alternative internet delivery
Affordable access to the internet remains one of the major challenges to getting more poor people online. The poorest people in the least developed countries pay more for internet access than citizens in developed countries in absolute and relative terms.
2016
Ten Frontier Technologies for International Development
Institute of Development Studies (IDS)