Fon Mathuros, Head of Media, World Economic Forum, Tel.: +41 79 201 0211, Email: fmathuro@weforum.org
· Consumers’ mindset and lifestyle changes will continue to encourage innovation
· Need for fresh rules to serve people and progress
· The Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2016 is taking place in Tianjin, People’s Republic of China, from 26 to 28 June
· Follow the Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2016 (#amnc16) at http://wef.ch/amnc16
Tianjin, People’s Republic of China, 26 June 2016 – Technology will continue to redefine the future in unexpected ways even as concerns over consumer safety, data security and government regulations persist, according to panellists in a session on “Technology Tipping Points: Digital Ubiquity” at the Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2016, which opened today in Tianjin.
With 1 trillion sensors and 80% of the world population expected to be online by 2025, mindset and lifestyle changes will mean that consumers will embrace new technology readily, encouraging innovators and entrepreneurs to make greater leaps in tapping technology to provide ever larger numbers of people with greater access to products and services.
Matthew Prince, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer, CloudFlare, USA, and a Co-Chair of the Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2016, said he believes that the inevitable will happen and entrenched industries will continue to be disrupted. Citing the examples of Uber and AirBnb, he noted that if someone had predicted eight years ago that people would be wilfully getting into a car that they registered online to take a ride in to a house they had registered online to sleep in, people would say, “that’s insane.” Prince said that, while concerns about consumer safety and regulations are important, there is no stopping innovators from looking around for industries that are ripe for disruption, just as Uber changed the rules in an entrenched, relatively inefficient industry.
Travis Kalanick, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Uber, USA, and a Co-Chair of the Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2016, noted that prevailing rules, which are mostly designed to protect existing players, are an impediment to innovation. “The physical world is highly regulated ... the old rules we have today were once the new and controversial rules,” he said, adding that there is a need for “fresh rules that serve people and progress instead of holding on to old rules that are not serving people.” On how his industry would change, he quipped: “I guarantee you that, by 2025, you won’t be waving at a car anymore.”
Yitzhak Peterburg, Chairman, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Israel, observed that, for technology to succeed, it must serve a need. “Everything begins with a need,” he said. In the pharmaceutical industry, the technology is available in many instances; the challenge has been the issue of mass adoption.
The World Economic Forum’s 10th Annual Meeting of the New Champions is taking place on 26-28 June in Tianjin, People’s Republic of China. Convening under the theme, The Fourth Industrial Revolution and Its Transformational Impact, more than1,700 business leaders, policy-makers and experts from over 90 countries will participate and explore more than 200 sessions over the three days of the meeting.
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