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Collaboration Forum Series 5 Building a brighter future (Week-6)

Collaboration Forum Series 5: Building a brighter future (Week-6)

The Future of Technology – Are you Ready for the Tech Storm?

Every day we are tempted by new technology to solve our business and personal challenges. The pace of technology innovation and creativity has never been so high, solving problems we don’t even know we have. How do we choose and embrace the right technology? How can technology shape our future success? What is the impact of choosing the wrong technology? Are we dehumanising our interaction with each other and our clients through our increasing use of technology? Nicklas Bergman - founder, funder and futurist – joined our forum to debate the future of technology for business and society. Watch session recording below.

Meet Our Inspiring Speaker

Nicklas Bergman, Founder, Funder, Futurist

Nicklas Bergman is an entrepreneur and technology investor who focuses on investments and business development in instrumentation, nanotechnology, computing, new materials and new media art. Bergman aims to understand where technology is taking us and if we are ready for the upcoming tech storm. His primary interests are currently AI, predictive analytics, new media art and quantum computing.

He advises on the topics of technology, strategy and business transformation. He is strategic advisor to European Commissioner Carlos Moedas and the European Innovation Council, working on a new innovation strategy for Europe. He is also Scandinavian representative of the TechCast Technology Think Tank in Washington DC.

How will technology shape our future?

The futurist Niklas Bergman joined the Collaboration Forum in May to talk about the role of technology in our lives and businesses. He shared two frameworks to help companies get the most out of their tech investments – and suggested everyone should broaden their perspective when solving big challenges.

On one side, we’ve seen the deployment of technology that’s been around for quite some time. There is nothing new in teleconferencing and video calls, for example. But because of the pandemic, the speed of implementation has increased a lot.

This is an example of how existing technologies are maturing: they are relatively accessible to all of us. We’ve seen that with electricity about 100 years ago and with cars in the Western world during the 1950s. We’re seeing that now with IT. We have smartphones with us all the time.

And on the other side, we’ve seen more scientific innovation and a lot happening in biotechnology and computation. No one in these industries thought we’d be able to get vaccines ready so quickly, for example. There has been a great influx of money and intelligence in these areas.

There are four areas and the first is called delayed participation. Often, companies start a small project, don’t really get it and it gets put to the side. Those first projects are usually quite crude and simple, but it’s important to be part of the tech ecosystem, and to not wait and see.

It’s also really easy to stick with the familiar. It’s a psychological fact that humans are risk averse. And that creates a challenge when companies are trying to find new ways of doing things. They need to venture into the unknown and that can be scary.

The third thing is that companies have to commit fully. That is difficult, especially if they risk cannibalising their existing products, for example, and if they are working in areas where they don’t see results early on.

The last one is persistence. When businesses start working on a new product line or innovation it has to be fully supported by the management team. They also need to have patience. There will be deadlines missed, budgets missed, more money needed, and it will take longer than expected.

It’s a three-stage process. First, they need to analyse technologies and get a sense of what’s out there. Listen to a webinar, read a book or go to the movies, for example. Science fiction is a great way of understanding technology. Read an article, watch the news and connect the dots, because people will hear something useful. I don’t think it has to be in depth, but it will help broaden their understanding about what’s happening.

The second part is to assess the implications of technology for the business. Look at the company, its customers and competitors, and the opportunities to make changes. There are many ways to be more productive, decrease costs and improve efficiency by using technology. Then adapt the business model. Look at the strategy and how the company relates to uncertainty, sustainability and the ethical perspectives of new technologies.

Recently, I got a question from a software engineer in his late 20s. He was thinking of going back to school and getting a master’s degree in software engineering. He asked me for advice, and I said: ‘well do something different’. Because you could go deeper into software engineering, but you could also study philosophy or business. Whatever it is, it will broaden your perspective. I think that’s really important, on a personal and corporate level.

Today, a large corporation does need an understanding of automation, artificial intelligence, robotics and cloud computing, for example. But they can’t expect all employees to have a deep understanding of these areas. In any field, companies need the experts to come in and make sense of it.

But I do see companies being more engaged in education. There’s a lot of push in the STEM subjects of science, technology, engineering and maths, for example. But even though I live with technology, visiting an art gallery, going into the movies or reading a book is also very, very useful.

Assuming companies are already working with cloud computing, data analytics, the Internet of Things, and 5G, people won’t stare into their smartphones or screens; they will have contact lenses on instead. We’re also going to see automation. Jobs will disappear, but new jobs will be created. If companies don’t automate what can be automated, then someone else will do it, and they will be out of business.

Micro mobility and autonomous driving models will also change how and where we live. They will change how we get to the office and where the office will be, combined with the remote workplace we have now, of course. That’s something that companies need to adjust to and understand. If someone runs a roadside restaurant near a fuel station, for example, then the number of people that will pass through will be different in the future.

I think we have crossed that line from time to time. Companies like Facebook, for example, are definitely pushing the boundaries. We can discuss if it has crossed the line or not, but I opt out of being tracked as much as possible. That’s a power struggle. Companies like Facebook, Google, or even Amazon, make a lot of money selling targeted ads.

We do want people to use technology, we just want them to use it in an ethical, thoughtful way. I could list 100 technologies, and there would be good reasons for not using any of them, and good reasons for why we use them. We need to have that discussion, people need to be informed, because technology in itself is useless unless we use it in the right way.

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