Brands that unite people.
Herbert George Wells, one of the forerunners of science fiction, as well as historian, writer and philosopher, asserted more than 70 years ago that “human history is essentially a history of ideas. Ideas move us forward as a civilization. What makes the world evolve has to do with ideas. The transformation we are undergoing as a result of new ideas that have emerged and been implemented in recent decades never ceases to amaze us because of the inexhaustible human capacity to create, explore and innovate. Human beings not only do not remain indifferent to change, but also seek to reinvent and redefine themselves. If, as Wells said, “there is no intelligence where there is no change and no need for change,” we can be sure that the human being of the 21st century is probably the most intelligent in history. And in this context of expanded intelligences, discussing ideas, creating them, promoting them, sharing them, embracing them is another symptom of human evolution. We are facing a new world, a world in which new technologies, connectivity, autonomy, digitalization and so many connected forces are converging to create a new status quo. Even if we as humanity are not on the right path, it is far worse to stand still, immobile. In the end, “the measure of intelligence is the ability to change” as Albert Einstein said. What is changing? How is it changing us? Why so many changes? When to start taking them on board?
Man sometimes believes that change happens faster than his ability to assimilate it. The first steps of artificial intelligence date back to the mid-twentieth century, the first attempts of blockchain in the 90s, the beginnings of robots date back to the fourth century in ancient Greece, electric motors back in 1866 by the hand of a certain Werner vos Siemens, the origins of the internet in 1969 and the internet of things closing the twentieth century, in 1999. From the discovery or creation of a new way of doing things to its implementation can take decades, and not all ideas come to fruition. In this digital age, all the ideas that concern us have as a common denominator the change of the status quo. The set of conditions that prevailed at a given historical moment is changing, evolving, transforming. What is clear to us about our future is that what we know is just a dune and what we ignore is the desert.
What we know is that digitalization is irreversible. Algorithms and artificial intelligence are already part of our everyday being. New technologies, some newer than others, are reshaping our cities, our health, offices, stores, companies and, little by little, the world. We are at a juncture of defining the future of society as a whole and of the network with more and more connected objects, more and more diverse and in more and more places, in spaces such as the smart city and the connected office and home. Connectivity is already essential to ensure the functioning of our world. The Wi-Fi network and technology are as fundamental as electricity and water once were. According to the consulting firm Gartner in 2021, 20% of all activities in which an individual engages on a daily basis will involve at least the use of one of the digital giants.
The seven digital giants are Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent. As the physical, financial and healthcare worlds become more digital, many activities will be directly connected to them. Brands in the new economy are increasingly present in less thought of areas. The value and trust that brands represent allow them to spread almost ubiquitously. Certainly, the movement towards new companies is neither spontaneous nor dramatic, but is part of an inexorable cycle of evolution and transformation. In this regard, one need only look at the list of the Top 20 companies investing the most in R&D (more than €200 billion in the last twelve months) to see this virtual balance between new and not-so-new companies that have managed to reinvent themselves.
Amazon
VW
Alphabet
Intel
Samsung
Microsoft
Roche
Huawei
Apple
Merx
Toyota
Novartis
Johnson&Johnson
Daimler-Benz
GM
Pfizer
Bosch
Ford
Cisco
It is no coincidence that most of them are part of the select group of the most valuable brands and companies in the world. There is a world in which there are more experts in creating value than in cutting costs; a world where the future is not predicted, but where work, investment and research are done to build it. Reviewing this list, one could see how the great changes are associated with its reality. Regarding this list, the innovator Ignacio “Nacho” Villoch made the following observation: “AI & Big Data: Amazon, Google (Alphabet), Apple and Facebook. The 4 companies with the highest stock market value. Coincidence or causality? The automotive industry, connected car, electric vehicle and autonomous, 5 out of 20. GM, Ford, Toyota, VW and Daimler Benz. Health, biotechnology : Pfizer, Roche, Merck, Novartis, Johnson &Johnson. The new technologies that make it possible : Intel, Cisco, Samsung, Huawei and Bosch.” Everyone can see the data, not everyone is ready to transform it into ways forward.
It is not surprising then to find that G20 countries account for 92% of global investment in research and 94% of patents (protected by the US patent & Trademark Office).
Another question to be resolved is about how artificial intelligence and machine learning will deliver a more relatable and applicable experience for humans. Contextualized algorithms have advanced to include a variety of behavioral interventions, such as psychology, social neuroscience and cognitive science. Today, people turn their social networks into havens of their own volition. Consumers are not only surrounding themselves with and shaping their affinity domains within social networks, or algorithms are already doing it for them, but they are also beginning, still in their infancy, to personalize the way they experience the world with augmented and virtual reality technologies. One in three say that social networks are their main source of news, and a considerable number already value the opinions of their contacts more than the views of politicians.
In this extraordinary era, those who look transformation in the eye need to have three states of mind: serenity, strength and wisdom.
Serenity to accept all that they cannot change.
Fortitude to change what they are capable of changing.
Wisdom to understand the difference.
Paraphrasing the American philosopher and writer Reinhold Nieburh, we see that coincidences do not exist.
This cycle of seeking knowledge we have discovered that to learn is to discover what we already know. To act is to demonstrate that we have learned it. Because learning that does not result in action is useless. The great creators, the most admired inventors are all children of action, because doing is the only thing that transforms the world.
Certainly the world is moving at two speeds (at least). The speed of a part of the world that is already in the digital era and the other half. The situation is that in terms of population, the first half represents a little more than 50% while the second half represents the rest. In this second half of the world in which digital is a future and not a present, talking about machines, robots, artificial intelligence, smart cities, big data and blockchain sounds Martian, so this paper is focused on the “connected” half, which is also advancing at different speeds, both physical and legislative and mental. Which does not in the least imply ignoring the titanic pending task of reaching the meeting point between the two halves so that we then have a world that advances and progresses collectively. Aldoux Huxley wrote in “The Ends and the Means” (1937) that “we all wish for a better social state. But society cannot be improved until two great tasks are accomplished. Unless peace is established on firm foundations, and unless the dominant obsessions with respect to money and power are profoundly modified, there is no hope that any desirable transformation can be effected.” The processes of social transformation are not as rapid as we would wish, it is evident. We are quicker to embrace the introduction of the smartphone as a natural extension of our lives than to embrace a change in mentality.
The human being of this digital era already lives in the paradox of privacy and security of smart devices. The smartphone has become the essential companion for the modern man, separating from it means that his behavior is altered. More than half of the users of these devices already use emergency alarms, location or notifications. Of those who say their smartphones make them feel safer, 60% say they take more risks because they trust their phones. When a major transformation takes place in the human condition, it always brings with it a gradual change in attitudes, in their behaviors.
Nearly nine out of ten smartphone users start using it before the first fifteen minutes of each day are up. Users start and end the day with a device in their hand. Through screens they connect with the world, and vice versa. People are also beginning to move as normal in a fully mobile future, which means that the demand for instant and fast connectivity (the time of 5G networks) will be as necessary as the air they breathe. It is estimated that starting in January 2018, Spain’s Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Digital Agenda will begin bidding for the first 5G frequencies, thus initiating a progressive transformation process that will culminate in 2020.
A report on predictions by Deloitte (TMT Predictions 2017) that gathers which trends will mark the future of various industries confirms the vision of the majority, which does not mean that most of them are right. The study assures that the speed that will be achieved with this connection will offer a capacity 10 times the current 4G standard, a support intended for the internet of things and take advantage of better bandwidth thanks to the spectrum. By 2018 more than 2.6 billion people will have a smartphone.
In some countries, awareness of the impact of climate change is no longer debatable and the demand for new technologies to respect the environment will grow rapidly in other countries. Sustainability and social commitment are no longer posturing, but are now an essential part of the DNA of organizations in the new century.
An increasing number believe that smartphones will learn their habits and perform their activities automatically. two out of five advanced Internet users in the world want to use encrypted services, but people are divided. Nearly half would like to have appropriate and reasonable privacy on all services, the others consider that privacy no longer exists. Does privacy exist, and did it ever exist?
According to Ericsson’s ConsumerLab report 35 % of advanced internet users want an AI advisor at work and one in four would like to have an AI as their boss. At the same time, nearly six in ten respondents are worried that AI robots will soon cause many people to lose their jobs.
The fear of job loss is more related to the fear itself than to a latent reality. Machines have been taking jobs for as long as machines have existed. Historically, all this progress has taken time. The Deloitte study complements this data with an estimate that over 300 million smartphones with user behavior learning capabilities will have been sold this year, allowing phones to improve their tasks without the need to be connected to the network. These tasks are conceived in the same way that a human brain is articulated, so that based on the elements used by the user, one result or another is defined. The absolute transformation of everything we know about work will take place within the next 20 years, and nothing will be able to stop it.
The transformation has been moving toward the pinnacle of complexity and, having assumed that the technology has arrived and been adopted, the pinnacle right now is us. It is up to us to ensure that the transformation continues to generate more inclusive progress in the future. We can help make this world a more amazing place than ever before as long as we assume our role and our place in this inexorable process.
Another big issue is that of mobility. The continuous migrations to urban centers as well as the huge deficit in infrastructure and the ease of access to a vehicle are leading to the situation that car drivers might not exist in the future. It sounds paradoxical, because there have never been as many drivers as there are today. But paradoxes are not something we live by, and the transformation of the energy sector will also have a direct impact on mobility. The end of fossil fuels and the definitive irruption of electric and other alternative energies are redefining the scenario. In several cities around the world, many pedestrians would feel safer crossing the street if all vehicles were autonomous. The Deloitte study predicts that by 2022, traffic fatalities could fall by 16% thanks to the implementation of new assistive driving technologies. In particular, it sees automatic emergency braking (Auto Emergency Braking), cameras, sensors and imaging systems as essential. These will be installed in one-sixth of all cars in the USA, which could save thousands of lives.
Just as the airbag revolutionized road safety in the 1970s, this type of technology will greatly reduce the risk of accidents. AEB will have the power to react in milliseconds and reduce the number of meters the car travels before braking, thus not only avoiding accidents, but also minimizing their impact.
Car accidents are the leading cause of death among young people worldwide, with the highest proportion among those aged 18 to 24. In Europe, young people in this age group make up 8% of the population, but account for 15% of all road traffic fatalities.
For the weekends when so many parents become “chauffeur” parents (children’s activities, birthdays, social engagements, study groups, practical teamwork, volleyball, soccer, field hockey, basketball, park, dozens of other things) and it is certain that if it were within their reach, most of them would prefer to have an autonomous vehicle. The freedom of time and the freedom to avoid traffic are priceless. The transportation industry is already seeing the entire ecosystem transform, from software companies, hardware, service providers and the manufacturers themselves.
In Ericsson’s report nearly four out of five virtual reality users believe that VR (virtual reality) will be indistinguishable from reality in just three years. Half of the respondents are already interested in gloves or shoes that allow them to interact with virtual objects. Virtual is also joined by augmented reality: more than half of people would like to use augmented reality glasses to illuminate dark environments and impending dangers. One in three would also like to edit out unpleasant items in their vicinity. Technologies such as virtual reality mixed with augmented reality, which has given way to a new innovation they call mixed reality will evolve without limit. Gartner projects that by 2020, 100 million consumers will shop in augmented reality stores and algorithms will positively alter the behavior of more than one billion workers worldwide.
Undoubtedly, “connected things” will open the door for offices, homes and all physical spaces to become “smart.” The things themselves will generate so much data that with the right algorithms they will autonomously know what to do, what to ask, what to buy, what to give. The silent revolution of the Internet of Things continues to develop. I was recently talking about IoT with one of the most brilliant CEOs I have ever met. During the conversation he made me see many things in a different light and one of the questions he asked me was: Let’s imagine for a moment that we reach the level of the “smart and connected” refrigerator; how soon and at what cost will we see every household with the Internet of Things refrigerator? I estimate that in terms of time this process will take at least a decade, and in terms of costs, what I found is that by 2019, every euro that companies invest in innovation will require an additional 7 euros to deploy the solution. Assuming moreover, that the design, implementation, integration, operation and management of the solution devised could have a significantly lower or higher cost than the initial one depending on the evolution of new technologies. By 2020, the Internet of Things will increase the demand for data center storage, the IoT has enormous potential for data generation through the approximately 21 billion points expected to be in use by 2020 (out of an estimated population of 7,758,156,792, an average of 3 per inhabitant).
By 2022, the Internet of Things will save consumers and businesses $1 trillion per year in maintenance, services and consumables. As devices become more capable of performing self-learning tasks there are implications for industry such as saving mobile data or saving battery or consumption based on usage. The user will be able to better engage with their objects and thus trigger their functionalities. Some mention that the universe must be in balance and that for every action there must be a reaction. And the question that emerges is: is there balance in a world that advances at such disparate speeds? Undoubtedly, the spread of new technologies has not given the customer-consumer-citizen of this new era time to absorb it in all its dimensions. While we are still trying to adapt our fingers, wrists and arms to this extension of the arm called device, voice interaction is making its way to evolve our relationship with devices to a new level, both physical and emotional. And among so many devices, it occurs to writer and teacher Dan Simmons “that our survival may depend on talking to each other.”
Voice will become the key in the interaction of people with machines. Voice computing will replace traditional robot interfaces and other applications to be the star of the next decade. The “voice” of each brand will be a new area on which companies and organizations will focus their energies and resources. By 2020, 30% of web browsing sessions will be done without a screen. New audio-centric technologies, such as Google Homo and Amazon’s Echo, make it possible to access information based on voice interaction alone.
The voice domain has also generated a growth of chat bots, a new space for brands to interact and interact with people. Well-applied technology can help humanize relationships between organizations and people, both internally and externally. And while some companies are considering the use of the same, Japan has just given citizenship to Shibuya Mirai, a chat bot that acts as if it were a 7-year-old child and has been the first artificial intelligence to obtain citizenship of a country. This is no joke, Shibuya does not have a physical form, he only exists in the messaging application LINE, where he offers direct response to all people who communicate with him.
Is granting citizenship permanently to a chat bot another way to humanize AI systems and at the same time a clear hint of what awaits us in the very distant future?
And what else will happen in 2018?
The EU has chosen four strategic areas on which to focus its investments until 2020; these are circular economy, climate change, security and digitalization. In total the EU will invest about nine billion euros (less than what Novartis or Toyota invest in 12 months), of which security and circular economy will take one billion each, digitalization 1.7 billion and climate change 3.3 billion. For the EU by 2020 the future is circular, digital, natural and unsafe.
In “the history of love” Nicole Krauss wrote that “the idea of evolution is beautiful and also sad. Since life on earth began, there have been between five and fifty billion species, of which only between five and fifty million are still alive. In other words, ninety-nine percent of all species that have ever lived on earth have gone extinct.”
By 2022, Blockchain will be worth $10 billion. And in 2017 Bitcoin’s Price Milestones have shown us blind trust or limitless speculation.
December: $15,000
December: $13,000
December: $12,000
November: $11,000
November: $10,000
November: $9,000
November: $8,000
November: $7,000
October: $6,000
October: $5,000
August: $4,000
June: $3,000
May: $2,000
January: $1,000
People and companies seek security, they seek efficiency and effectiveness, they seek profitability, they seek optimization and productivity, most seek immediate results. And while many are pinning their hopes or fears on machines, by 2020, 40% of employees will be able to reduce their healthcare costs with the use of a fitness tracker. Healthcare providers will be able to save lives and reduce costs by acting on data recorded by fitness trackers that show health risks to the user.
According to molecular engineer George Church of Harvard University, “Today we already have tools that make us stronger and faster. But they are inorganic: an airplane, a car. Soon they will be organic! We also have medicines that allow us to live longer. But we will make a leap: we will live young until the day we die. Today, it is already possible to reverse the aging of a cell in the laboratory. When we manage to do it inside the body, we will be young until we die.” Work until you die or be able to retire and enjoy life at full physical and mental capacity?
Understanding how the user’s relationship with technology is evolving requires more and better connectivity, improving cybersecurity systems, and basing the growth of IT services as a service is vital for companies to be able to adapt and optimize to the trends of the coming years.
In the quest to optimize security, the rise of biometric security is also evolving. The usability of the fingerprint was only the first step that will allow the development and improvement of this type of technology to offer additional biometric information (such as iris scans) and to be able to implement this technology in less common supports, such as checking in for a flight, opening the car or the office door.
And recurrently there is a constant return to the issue of security. In an increasingly connected world, denial-of-service attacks will become more frequent and on a larger and larger scale, making them more difficult to mitigate. This increased threat will be due to the growing base of connected devices (Internet of Things – IoT) without sufficient security, the ability to execute malware attacks more easily without the need for as much technical knowledge as well as the availability of ever-increasing bandwidth. In other words, the “bad guys” could get into your home, into your fridge, into your Smart TV, into your energy. With more and more connected and better connected devices, the exposure will be greater, so customers will demand more and more secure systems against attacks, which could lead to increased costs and therefore slower adoption by people. Some may even consider staying in an analog environment in order to maintain their privacy and security.
Access to indoor navigation systems will make it possible to improve emergency services, improve the situation of retailers in terms of time spent in their business by, for example, providing useful information in shopping malls and even mapping the positioning of users in certain situations in order to take advantage of this data and act to meet specific demands (retail, travel, conventions, communications or even video games).
The potential for accurate indoor navigation is eye-opening and could be transformative. Again, many people will not want to be “tracked” at all times, wanting to have some “privacy,” even if this sounds like a fallacy in the digital age. However, it will be a challenge to provide the accuracy of the information obtained and above all to know how to interpret it and put it in value, which is likely to be difficult to see in the short term. But once the customer is able to receive the benefit of the data it provides, then we could begin to talk about a quid pro quo between those who receive the information and those who generate it.
Digital as a service
The growth of the services division gives new impetus to Apple. One of the relevant data from the latest fiscal report of the Cupertino giant is Apple’s earnings in the services division, whose increase in recent times is so significant that if it were an independent company it would be in the Fortune 100 and would be just short of catching up with Facebook.
In this sense, this category, which covers the firm’s digital content or the Apple Pay application, recorded 7,266 million dollars, a jump of 21% compared to the third quarter of 2016, which was 5,976 million. In addition, Apple already has 195 million people paying for one of its subscription services, such as iCloud or Apple Music.
Historically, companies would buy the computing hardware, telecommunications hardware and software to provide their employees with the connectivity needed to carry out day-to-day tasks. Now, thanks to the conception of IT as a service and the adoption of new connectivity systems companies are not forced to have to buy these types of systems but rely directly on contracting solutions. This way they can adjust their budgets and pay for exactly what they use, without wasting equipment.
The people factor
Can technology solve all of humanity’s problems? It absolutely can, but whether it will or not will depend greatly on whether humans allow it to live up to its potential. What happens in the future also depends largely on discovering that what we know now is probably wrong.
Futurology is a risky game. But the truth is that all the reports I have read speak of those things we already know. There is nothing that the trend reports describe that leaves us truly surprised. We have all, at least once, heard or seen or experienced something related to AI, autonomous cars, IoT, genomic medicine or biotech, smart devices and cities, machines, robots, chat bots and so on. The future has a lot of face of our present.
What would be really fascinating is to be able to travel to the future, but as it is not possible at the moment we have to understand our context, and what is real and what is not.
If we think about all the profound, but erroneous, theories that have existed over the years from the flat Earth to today. Much of what we think we know today, by the year 2100, will be considered archaic pseudoscience.
If our technological creations help us truly understand the past, so that we don’t repeat the mistakes in the future … of the future would be fantastic.
It is while talking about a third world war that a lot of future technology, some seemingly simple, others incredibly complex, will change the world.
Progress is wonderful and undoubtedly everything we observe and experience is the result of human talent, effort, creativity, curiosity and imagination. Andy Miah, professor of emerging technologies and director of the Institute for Creative Futures in Scotland, says that we will be able to perfect the human species, to influence evolution. And will this evolution be for everyone, or only for those who can afford it? Will we widen the gap or will the difference in speed and access narrow?
All in all, I would like to share with you one last thought, a mixture of concern and doubt. We talk about buying Bitcoin, digitizing the company, the house, the city, implementing chat bots, incorporating robots, improving algorithms, teaching artificial intelligence. There is a lot of talk about technology and almost nothing about people. It is true, you will tell me, that technology is created by people and its purpose, in general, is the person, but I still do not see clearly the prominent place of the human being in these formulas of the future. So the question that keeps recurring in my mind is: Where does the human being fit in?
Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, believes that computers will have surpassed human beings and could even compete with us in sentient matters.
“In 40 years we will have conscious computers, endowed with feelings, with their own personality. Your best friend will be a computer. You will talk to it. It will look you in the face and know your mood. It will know your heart and soul better than anything or anyone else.” In the search for people’s attention, is it worth saying things like that? Does Wozniak really believe it? Is he right? My vision is that clearly the only thing that cannot be automated is human emotion. Among so many technological advances, let’s leave a relevant space for what we are, and ask ourselves again, what do we want to be?
Man has repeatedly throughout history encountered change; but humans, through ideas, transform the world; and transform themselves in the process. It would be fabulous for 2018 to be, or to be again, the year of the human being, a change as essential as it is transformative. More than one hundred and thirty years ago, the poet and writer Victor Hugo reminded us that “what drives and drags the world is not machines but ideas”.
A sensible company is one that adapts to the world around it. The unwise company expects the world to adapt to it. Therefore all progress is built by the non-sensible companies. Building progress is neither quick nor easy, but it is a sign of intelligence and humanity.
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