? The Future Normal: Fast Forward #19
Henry Coutinho-Mason
?? Reluctant futurist | Provocations > Predictions ?? 150+ keynotes in 30+ countries ?? Author: The Future Normal & Trend-Driven Innovation ?? Cofounder 3Space
After last week’s deep dive into the implications of 3-minute drone delivery, this week I’m bringing you a lighter roundup of where we're headed.
Less to read, but no less to digest - the ideas and instigators behind these will reverberate through business and society in the coming years.
Will the new wave of rejuvenation startups finally solve the ‘problem’ of ageing and even death? Future Normal, or Future ‘No Thanks’?
AI is ‘anything we can’t explain’. But just as spreadsheets didn’t make accountants redundant (far from it!), the same will be true for coders. The bigger picture? There will be two types of workers in The Future Normal: those assisted by AI, and those managed by it.
“The treatment halted tumor growth, and caused a complete regression of the cancer in 17 [out of 20] of the animals.” The Biontech story is already remarkable. But what if pandemic’s legacy was accelerating the research needed to cure cancer??
Solugen offers a more serious reminder of the scale of the opportunity in going green. Its ambition is to become the world’s first carbon negative chemicals company, which considering the industry makes up 6-7% of total global emissions is a Very. Big. Deal. But they aren’t asking for any favours:
"The Green Premium doesn’t exist. We go to market by selling directly to operators based on performance, price, and safety. Now that we’ve executed all of these field trials, we can go to the new bold statement-making corporate sustainability groups with proof and case studies to support company-wide rollouts.
A lot of startups make the mistake of going immediately to that corporate sustainability person with the belief that they’re the hammer that pushes everything down. That’s not true at all. Sustainability is only 30% of what influences people making purchasing decisions. You need to solve for that other 70% before getting broad adoption within a company."
Gaurab Chakrabarti & Sean Hunt, Solugen cofounders
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Carbon capture remains promising, if controversial. But this baby step (it represents the emissions of about 250 US residents) could be an important one if we are able to scale the technology as we have done with solar energy.
Right here, right now: a much easier to visualise, and fun, example of how we might be able to rethink every process to capture value, eliminate waste and unlock circularity.
Virtual club culture of a very different kind. This article blends moral panic with a bored shrug, as it tries to decide whether low res, not-remotely-sexy virtual lap dances are bemusing or concerning. New worlds, same humans.
And finally, the US government’s report on Erroneous Predictions reminds us that “making predictions is hard, especially about the future”. I hope to avoid featuring on future lists :)
If you want to explore these ideas further, then make sure you’re subscribed as I’ll be diving into the underlying themes in upcoming editions of this newsletter.
Until then, thanks for reading.?