
Petersen’s background in importing includes working in business with his brother to buy products in China and selling them to consumers in the US. Ryan Petersen, CEO and founder of Flexport.

I spoke to Ryan Petersen, CEO and founder of Flexport, who explained the traditional freight forwarding process is compounded by importers and exporters having to manage the entire process by telephone, email, fax, or courier. Usually, freight forwarding is an industry where global supply chains are clouded by lack of visibility, confusing paperwork, complicated regulations, rampant price discrimination, and unpredictable delays. The Potential of Blockchain Technology Application in the Food Systemįor related media inquiries, please contact more on the Fourth Industrial Revolution, please visit this page.Technology is disrupting traditional industries from printing to manufacturing – and now you can add freight forwarding to that list.12 awesome flying cars and taxis currently in development.”We can’t stop or slow the progress,” said Wadwa.įor additional resources, please visit the following:

Whenever disruptive innovations impact to market, the world must be watching, ready to respond. Mindful consumers and tech companies must work together to understand the ethics and logical applications of these new products. We must all come together to understand the importance of anticipating and understanding the legal and ethical ramifications of technological change.” “Because of this, the traditional approaches of governments and institutions are far less effective. “Technologies are advancing faster than our ability to regulate and understand their uses,” notes Wadwa. For example, how will the manufacturing workforce need to be retrained before intelligent robots become an accepted part of assembly lines? What’s going to become of the old cars when autonomous vehicles become mainstream?įast changes may also leave lawmakers rushing to catch up. This fast-iterating tech can also bring new challenges. Staff were paid 1,000 yen ($8.80USD) per hour, the standard wage for part-time work in Japan but more importantly empowered by technology to enjoy independence they typically can’t access. While Dawn ver.β is only a pilot project, it’s a great example of tech for good. The operation involves a combination of robotics, wearable tech, AI, point-of-sale systems, and brain-computer-interface applications. The robot servers are operated by a staff of 10 people whose physical impairments range from spinal cord injury to ALS. What makes the restaurant truly different (and potentially life changing) is that the robots are remotely operated by paralyzed individuals who can control the robots from their own homes. It’s staffed by robots, but that’s not the most innovative part of the venture. Together they created a pop-up restaurant called Dawn ver.β. By finding the right mix of two or more technologies, companies can meet customer needs and gain competitive advantages.Īnother recent example of combinatorial innovation is a partnership between the robotics startup Ory, NPO Nippon Foundation, and airline ANA. Even blockchain technology has been used to facilitate machine-to-machine payments between vehicles. Each vehicle is a mix of different technologies, including digital mapping, GPS, machine learning, lasers, infrared sensors and more. Self-driving cars are a great example of combinatorial innovation. But the more models of behavior that we develop – of people, materials, and other things – the more arrows we have in our quiver to solve problems.” As technology evolves, researchers and entrepreneurs across disciplines and industries are sharing knowledge, leading to cross-practice convergence and more discoveries.įuturist and thought leader Jeffery Stollman explains how knowledge builds on itself: “It isn't a steady flow. “The advances in everything from artificial intelligence to robotics to sensors and synthetic biology are setting the stage for changes like we’ve never seen before, including solving grand challenges, industry disruption and taking us into the future.”Ĭombinatorial innovation is part of what’s causing the new wave of discoveries.

“We’ve had more innovations in a decade than we’ve had in previous centuries,” said technology entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa. While it may take years for some of these inventions to be mainstream, innovation cycles are evolving at a greater speed than any other time in modern history. We’re in an era where devices that once seemed like science fiction – smart homes, caregiving robots and self-driving cars – are becoming reality.
