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Top Ten Extreme Technology Trends

1. Practical Quantum Computing - This year will see breakthroughs in quantum computing that will provide useful applications in encryption and data mining that will move into the mainstream marketplace. Even Wall Street traders will be able to better predict the future outcome of financial markets by using quantum tools.

2. Geo-Engineering - Pollution problems threatening the environment will require huge investments in sophisticated tech fixes to engineer climate, water and soil. Large scale, planetary scale engineering plans are in the works now to meet this challenge.

3. Green Tech - The green and clean trend is just starting and will affect every product, consumer and company in 2008. New advances in green technology that will not harm, but help the planet, will emerge and be in demand in 2008. From fuels, to clothes, to hybrid cars—green tech will offer new alternatives to consumers and business alike. Every business must have a Green Tech strategy in 2008 to thrive.

4. Nano-Medical Devices - Nano-technology is no longer hype, but a reality in 2008 for medical devices that will dispense drugs and even help restore organs and reduce cancers. Look for nano-telemedicine and nano-tele-surgery in 2008.

5. Reality Mashups - This year the convergence of technology that connects people, from RFID to Wi-Fi, the Internet, cell phones and to cars will bring two billion people together over wireless global networks. When you combine geographic information with voice, video and search, you have one global dynamic trading and Connectivity Cloud.

6. Personal Robots - Get ready for personal robots that protect, clean and entertain in 2008. The next generation of smart robots is coming to a shopping mall soon at cheaper prices all can afford.

7. Stem Cell Organs On-Demand - Now that any cells can be used to develop stem cells, we will see organs created to prolong life and health starting in 2008. This will lead to an avalanche of new solutions for medicine that will drive life extension.

8. iHealth - New wearable devices and information applications will empower consumers with real-time information customized to monitor and track the health status of individuals, measuring risks and downloading customized personal health info.

9. CyberJacks - A new breed of rogue for-profit apolitical hackers will prey on banks, consumers and business, hacking into databases and stealing identities for the highest bidder in online identity trade marts. More networks get connected the more at risk.

10. Immersive Web - The next generation of the web will be shaped by immersive technology that delivers sensation, experience and emotion in rich online worlds.

New Reports

2007 Global Trends Report: The Top Ten Forecasts Every Business Needs to Know Now

We have just released our annual top ten forecasts for the New Year. This report covers green consumerism, to securing the future, to super innovations, pervasive mobility and the war for talent. If you want to know what top trends are coming this year, read this report. You may download the executive summary at this link: 2007 Global Trends Report

The Click-Stream Consumer

There is a powerful and dynamic new consumer who is fast disrupting the global marketplace. They want to InterAct: They blog, search, create media, game, transact, sell, buy, learn and live online. Their lifestyle and work-style has morphed into the Click-Stream. A new report by the Institute for Global Futures focuses on the emerging Click-Stream Consumer. What do they want? Who is this consumer? Our kids, clients, friends and family, all made up of a large global audience. No company can afford to ignore them. Understand them and profit for the future.

The Ten Tech Futures Every Executive Needs to Know About to Thrive in the Turbulent Year

Technology will enable more productivity and opportunity then ever before, challenging executives to become more tech savvy. There will also be new threats and risks. New competition will emerge. The era of the tech savvy executive has arrived.

There will also be accelerated changes to business due to radical new technologies. In my book Technofutures and in my keynotes, I remind my audiences that there have been more innovations driving change in the past fifty years then in the previous 5,000 years. Bits, atoms, neurons and genes are the building blocks of the next century. The companies that understand this will benefit. Welcome to the Extreme Future of 2001.

Technology will continue to be the key driver of business strategy. New business models, processes and strategies will emerge to reshape the landscape of industry. This work has just begun.

The dot com debacle is just the first stage of a massive technology transformation in business. Don't be fooled by it. This is the experimentation stage. Full integration and business process transformation is next. The revolution has not begun yet.

Seventy-five percent of the world's population has not made its first phone call. The Net only reaches 500 million. Less than one percent of all supply chains have been connected. The Human Genome was just mapped. We don't have the wireless web. We are in the Middle Ages when it comes to mature deployment of technology.

Will you be ready to meet these changes? What is your strategy? As you prepare for the next year here are Ten TechnoFutures that you will need to know about to build a winning strategy.

TechnoFuture # 1. Every Business is an eBusiness

One of the key competitive forces will be your investment in the Internet. eBusiness strategy is all about the fast-shift to a digital organization and the transformation of supply chains. Stop moving paper and move bits. Look at the opportunities for procurement, online collaboration, web broadcasts, online direct marketing and more. Many companies have benefited in cost savings, efficiencies, and better customer service from leveraging the Net. How can you shift the thinking in your organization to embrace the opportunities that eBusiness offers?

TechnoFuture # 2 Look For Online/Offline Synergy

Customer service, marketing, finance, procurement, storage, transactions, inventory management-combine cost-saving efficiencies by combining what you do offline with what you do online. A robust IT architecture will enable this synergy to work.

TechnoFuture # 3 Knowledge Engineering

Data is dumb. Knowledge is smart. Learn to capture, package, and communicate the knowledge that creates success. Set up a data warehouse, conduct customer profiling, deploy customer data mining , create a Knowledge Bank to share best of breed solutions in your organization. How do you share, communicate, and re-use knowledge in your organization?

TechnoFuture # 4 Develop a eCustomer Relationship Plan

Customers Rule. An electronic customer relationship plan drives the organization to think differently about customer needs, such as the integration of customer touch points linking call centers and the web with face to face interactions. What are the key strategies about how you want to serve customers that will shape your organization's future?

TechnoFuture # 5 Wireless Will Be Everywhere

Wireless technology and mobile eCommerce will be everywhere from cars to phones to palm computers and wearable devices. Look for location-based marketing tied to GPS satellites and real-time messaging. How could you use this technology to grow your business?

TechnoFuture # 6 Artificial Intelligence is Coming !

Ready for things that think? Super fast, intuitive, personalized, sensing chips embedded in everything will create a networked " smart awareness". Imagine refrigerators that talk, clothes that are online, reactive windows that screen the sun or homes that self-monitor security and energy needs. How might intelligent materials affect your organization?

TechnoFuture # 7 The Next Fast Net

Fast bandwidth via DSL, satellite, cable modem optics, and fiber will dramatically increase the customer access to the Internet. Internet 2 is coming-a super fast web. Look for over 100 million new high affluent Net surfers joining the 450 million online today. Are you ready to manage one billion more potential customers?

TechnoFuture # 8 Get Ready for Web Broadcasts

Media downloads, video conferencing, live event streaming will be high in demand. Interactive multimedia over the Net will emerge propelled by real-time learning, shopping and entertainment. How could you use web broadcasting to empower employees, agents or customers?

TechnoFuture # 9 Deal With Security and Privacy

The more things get connected the more the potential for security risks. Invest more this year on encryption, firewalls and security. Protect consumer privacy or risk losing their loyalty. Urity committee. Get the message out to customers and employees how important their privacy is. Set up a privacy/secHow could you use your commitment to privacy as a competitive strategy?

TechnoFuture #10 Manage Cultural Change

Every tech innovation brings with it people's resistance to change. A supportive culture can make a new tech strategy work or kill it. Pay attention to the human element, get buy in from the troops, deal with manage change and the stress that affects organization culture through training, education and planning with the folks who will affected the most. How do we plan better for managing change so it is less painful and is more effective?

Be Innovative - Time for Business Process Transformation!

The big elephant in the room is banging around again. This year what every CIO and CEO should be thinking about is how to re-design work for optimal performance, customer service and max speed and profitability. In order to meet this tall order, BPT is in order—this is actually a long overdue action that if done right re-thinks work, process and outcomes. The goals are to re-invent the organization and use a more intelligent fusion of people and tech to do so. If this sounds too mundane, arcane or non-specific consider this. Competitive advantage will be established by those leaders that re-design work processes and organizations for optimal performance. Those that stand still, avoid innovation and resist change will die.

The Top Ten Trends in the Future of Security: What's Coming?

1. Economic Information Warfare (EIW), consisting of sophisticated attacks against entire economies, commerce and enterprises will accelerate as a global threat.
2. Smart Watchers, a new generation of super-sensitive satellite and video network ed electronic surveillance, will be everywhere. Real-time personal face scanning and suspi cion profiling tied to massive supercomputers, sensory-aware networks and data warehouses w ill determine risks, provide prevention strategies and intelligence on neutralizing threats .
3. National Identity Cards with embedded smart chips, containing an individual's e ntire Genomic Profile will act as a secure personal identifier. They will wirelessly auth enticate an individual's location, security clearance level and identity to a sea of intell igent networks tied to government, transportation, banking, telecom and enterprises.
4. Pandoras, the next generation of computer virus attacks, will be self-mutating viruses created to destabilize, confuse and destroy critical electronic infrastructures ess ential to industry and government. These will be used as offensive and defensive weapons by all sides.
5. Sniffers designed to automatically sense, watch, search and identify individual s with critical information, weapons or bombs will have the capability to navigate physical , wireless and electronic realities.
6. Secure-Wearables that are embedded, pinprick size hyper-sensing bio-reactive na no-chips, personal pin codes and GPS location monitoring will assist in security tracking, and recovery after kidnapping or theft.
7. DEPS, Digitally Engineered Personalities, personal sensors that live in the glo bal telecom Internet network and provide 24/7 follow-you-anywhere security protection for i ndividuals, enterprises and governments, will be necessary and in demand.
8. Biometric Authentication: facial, eye, fingerprint and genomic scanning will be necessary to validate an individual's physical or virtual entry into electronic networks o r physical areas. Security Tattoos with bar-scans will be popular and fashionable.
9. Biowar and Agri-Terrorism targeting the destruction of targeted ecosystems will emerge as common threats putting at risk public health, soil, food and water resources.
10. Numerous personal privacy violations will occur, requiring new laws to protect and preserve individual freedoms.

The Top Ten Global IT Trends For 2008 and Beyond

2008 is the year IT becomes a key growth driver for the organization. IT for competitive advantage will become business-critical. IT will be the enabler of new growth, new customers and new products. Business justified IT, where real metrics can defend growth, will reshape the IT landscape. This is just the beginning.

This year, IT future trends will be about enabling the enterprise to do more, to become faster and more cost-effective, and competitive. 2008 will be a new era for IT executives because, for the first time, top management will realize IT is the primary enabling force that can drive competitive advantage. IT will no longer be back room alchemy, but a key competency, a weapon used for seizing new market share, forging new alliances and better serving customers. This is also a new era for the CIO-a business accelerator of new opportunities. Here are the top IT trends for 2008 that every leader needs to know.

Read more: The Top 10 IT Trends for 2008 and Beyond

Visualize This!

At the Institute for Global Futures, we track trends by visualizing complex information. We build information rich models to help construct our forecasts. History flow is a tool for visualizing dynamic, evolving documents and the interactions of multiple collaborating authors. In its current implementation, history flow is being used to visualize the evolutionary history of wiki pages on Wikipedia. The collaboration and conflict between authors can often be revealed in a dynamic environment. For more info., go here and click on gallery: History Flow

Too much complexity can be frustrating in getting meaning from information. Visualizing information, especially innovation, can be daunting. How do we better explain ways in which we think about innovation, or new models of reality, science and commerce? We have developed a series of Future Mapping Models that are an attempt to organize complex information so understanding may emerge. For examples, see: Mapping the Future