The document discusses emerging trends and technologies that will impact future business. It identifies several key trends, such as population growth, aging populations, and increased globalization. It also examines important technologies like digital ink/paper, RFID, teleliving, alternative energies, and autonomic computing. Understanding trends and technologies can help organizations anticipate changes and protect against technological obsolescence.

1. Emerging Trends and
Technologies

2. 1. Identify the trends that will have the greatest
impact on future business
2. Identify the technologies that will have the
greatest impact on future business
3. Explain why understanding trends and new
technologies can help an organization prepare
for the future
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3.  Obtaining a broad view of emerging trends and
new technologies as they relate to business can
help an organization anticipate and prepare for the
future
 Organizations that can most effectively grasp the
deep currents of technological evolution can use
their knowledge to protect themselves against
sudden and fatal technological obsolescence
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4.  Trend analysis – the examination of a trend to identify its
nature, causes, speed of development, and potential impacts
 Trend monitoring – trends viewed as particularly important in
a specific community, industry, or sector are carefully monitored,
watched, and reported to key decision makers
 Trend projection – when numerical data is available a trend
can be plotted on graph paper to display changes through time
and into the future
 Computer simulation – complex systems can be modeled by
means of mathematical equations and different scenarios can be
run against the model to determine “what if” analysis
 Historical analysis – the study of historical events in order to
anticipate the outcome of current developments
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5. 5
Top reasons organizations should study trends

6.  World’s population will double in the next 40 years
 Population in developed countries is living longer
 Growth in information industries creates a knowledge-
dependent global society
 The global economy is becoming more integrated
 The economy and society are dominated by technology
 Pace of technological innovation is increasing
 Time is becoming one of the most precious commodities
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7. Potential business impact:
 Global agriculture will be required to supply as much food as
has been produced during all of human history to meet needs
over the next 40 years
 Developed nations will find that retirees will have to remain on
the job to remain competitive
 Developed nations will begin to increase immigration limits
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8. Potential business impact:
 Global demand for elderly products and services will grow quickly in
the coming decades
 The cost of health care is destined to skyrocket
 Pharmaceutical companies will be pushed for advances in geriatric
medicine
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9.  83% of American management personnel will be knowledge
workers by 2005
 A typical large organization in 2010 will have fewer than half the
management levels of its counterpart in 1990, and about 1/3 the
number of managers
Potential business impact:
 Top managers must be computer-literate to retain their jobs and
achieve success
 Knowledge workers are generally higher paid and their proliferation
is increasing overall prosperity
 Entry-level and unskilled positions are requiring a growing level of
education
 Information now flows from front-office workers to higher
management for analysis
 Downsizing, restructuring, reorganization, outsourcing, and layoffs
will continue
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10.  International outsourcing is on the rise
 The European Union has relaxed its borders and capital
controls
 Internet users numbered about 500 million worldwide in 2003,
Internet users are growing by 6% monthly
Potential business impact:
 Demand for personnel in distant countries will increase the
need for foreign language training and employee incentives
suited to other cultures
 E-business and the Internet will reduce the cost of doing
business
 The Internet will allow small companies to compete with
worldwide giants with relatively little investment
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11.  Computers are becoming a part of our environment
 By 2007, artificial intelligence and expert systems will help
most companies and government agencies assimilate data
and solve problems beyond the range of today’s computers
 Personal robots will appear in the home by 2010
Potential business impact:
 New technologies provide dozens of new opportunities to
create businesses and jobs
 Automation will continue to decrease the cost of products and
services, making it possible to reduce prices while improving
profits
 Demand for scientists, engineers, and technicians will
continue to grow
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12.  Medical knowledge is doubling every eight years
 50% of what students learn in their freshman year of
college is obsolete, revised, or taken for granted by their
senior year
 All of today’s technical knowledge will represent only 1
percent of the knowledge that will be available in 2050
Potential business impact:
 Shortened time-to-market for products and services
 Tighter competition based on new technologies
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13.  U.S. workers spend 10% more time on the job than they did a
decade ago
 European executives and nonunionized workers face the same
trend
 This high-pressured environment is increasing the need for any
product or service that saves time or simplifies life
Potential business impact:
 Companies must take an active role in helping their employees
balance their work and lives
 Stress-related problems affecting employee morale and wellness
will continue to grow
 Use of the Internet will continue to grow as the time to perform
activities, such as shopping at a mall, evaporates
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14.  Digital ink
 Digital paper
 Radio frequency identification (RFID)
 Teleliving
 Alternative energy sources
 Autonomic computing
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15. 15
refers to technology that digitally represents handwriting in its
natural form
 Digital ink can be used in many applications:
◦ Point-of-sale signs
◦ Next generation displays in mobile devices and PDAs
◦ Thin, portable electronic books and newspapers
 RadioPaper – dynamic high-resolution electronic display that
combines a paperlike reading experience with the ability to
access information anytime, anywhere

16. any paper that is optimized for any type of digital printing
 The major difference between paper produced from a
tree and paper produced in a laboratory is that
information on a digital paper sheet can be altered
thousands of times and not degrade over time
Potential business impact:
 Paperlike displays will replace newspapers, magazines,
and books
 Reusable paper is an environmentally sound idea
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17. Digital Paper

18. Digital ink and digital paper
past, present, and future

19.  RFID – uses active or passive tags in the form of chips or smart
labels that can store unique identifiers and relay this information to
electronic readers
 RFID systems are automated, reducing the need for manual
scanning, such as required with a bar code
Potential business impact:
 Reduces the labor required to monitor goods movement and
inventory flow through a supply chain
 Allows manufacturers and retailers to complement existing systems
while gathering more information
 Provides complete supply chain visibility without the prohibitive
labor costs and error rates associated with a manual system
 RFID helps enforce security by conducting automatic inventory
counts
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20. Comparison of bar code labeling to RFID

21.  United States Postal Service’s (USPS) productivity has grown by
only 11 percent over the past three decades
 USPS is pursuing several e-business projects to help increase
growth including:
◦ NetPost Mailing Online
◦ Post Electronic Courier Service
◦ NetPost.Certified
◦ EBillPay
1. Do you think the USPS’s steps are far-reaching enough to ensure
its relevance in e-business?
2. What other strategic alliances, akin to its partnership with
CheckFree, can the Postal Service develop to stay competitive?
3. Why would the USPS compete in a market that private companies
already serve well?
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22.  Teleliving – refers to using information devices and the Internet to
conduct all aspects of life seamlessly
 Includes shopping, working, learning, playing, healing, and even
praying
 Each year, four billion chips are embedded in everything from coffee
makers to Cadillacs
Potential business impact
 In the future, people will move through a constant stream of
information summoned at the touch of a finger
 Virtual assistant (VA) – a small program stored on a PC or
portable device that monitors e-mails, faxes, messages, and phone
calls. VAs will mimic real assistants helping individuals solve
problems
 Robotic salespeople will take on human appearances and perform
all tasks associated with a sales job
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23.  Wind, geothermal, hydroelectric, solar, and other alternative energy
sources will account for 30 percent of all energy use
 By 2010 nuclear plants will supply 16% of Russia and eastern
Europe’s energy
Potential business impact:
 China, India, South America, and Russia are modernizing their
economies, which increases their needs for energy
 Cost of alternative energy sources is decreasing
 Deregulation of the energy industry is expected to increase
innovation and foster a wide variety of new energy sources
 Oil will remain the world’s most important energy source
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24.  Autonomic computing – a self-managing computing model
named after, and patterned on, the human body’s autonomic
nervous system
Potential business impact:
 Autonomic computing will be used in complex IT
infrastructures for security, storage, network management,
and redundancy/failover
 Computers will monitor components and fine-tune workflows
 Autonomic computers will be able to “self-heal”
 Autonomic computers will be able to “self-protect”
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25. Autonomic Computing