DRIFT: Leading Emerging Futures

I owe this announcement and avant-premier invitation to my network of forward-looking leaders, innovators, executives, and decision-makers who have been following up on my work, and my dear friends and esteemed colleagues who have been supporting me with my recently launched ReTech Center and the portfolio of activities across our Research, Skills, Consulting, and Innovation Labs - under their guidance and thanks to their priceless contributions.

Background:

Grateful for the invaluable support of many good friends, colleagues, and experts from across sectors and industries, after a couple of years of working and developing my concept of Industry 5.0 - Digitally Empowered Responsible Economy in the company of leading organizations such as 美国哈佛商学院 , The Economist , MIT Technology Review , IBM , TOMRA , Finastra , CERC - Circular Economy Research Center WOMEN IN TECH ? Global , Circular Economy Alliance , United Nations , and the European Commission , among others, in June I launched our ReTech Center with the objective of creating an empowering ecosystem for driving digitally empowered responsible innovation and transformation of the emerging futures of Industry 5.0. The work and the announcement were strongly supported by thought leaders, support networks, partners, and affiliates, and it was a fantastic fit for the inaugural conference that I organized as the Chair of Harvard European Chapter of Microeconomics of Competitiveness Affiliate Network (MOC) of Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness at HBS , which we held in Paris at école des Ponts Business School of école nationale des ponts et chaussées .

In this conference, named Industry 5.0 for Competitiveness, we initiated highly enriching conversations with brilliant speakers and participants, with fruitful ongoing follow-up work presented under the DRIFT initiatives here. The focus of the conference was on the prominence of Leading Digitally Empowered Responsible Innovation and Transformation as a Competitive Edge and Strategic Hedge face to the forthcoming disrupting and enabling waves of the Dual Transition of Digital and Responsible Economies. The conversations shed light on the latter from the micro to macro scopes, across businesses, societies, and markets.

This post is an avant premier announcement and an invitation to the joint initiatives that we are working on across the four Labs of Research, Skills, Consulting, and Innovation of ReTech Center with our affiliate network.

Context:

The Emerging Futures of Digital and Responsible Societies, Businesses, and Markets are unfolding toward Industry 5.0 across sectors and geographies in a variety of degrees and scopes, driven by the two unstoppable Transitions of Digital and Responsible. The confluence of these megatrends and the ensuing disrupting and enabling forces across sectors are reshaping the fabric of societies and markets, and foundationally restructuring competitiveness indices and pillars.

Please refer to my previous posts for more elaboration on Industry 5.0 and the significance and implications of the Dual Transition of Digital and Responsible Economies across industries and scopes.

Announcement & Invitation:

As a result of the above, I'm thrilled to briefly present to you my new initiative DRIFT - Digital and Responsible Innovation and Futures Transformation - and invite my network of individuals and institutions to join this first series of programs under Research, Skills, Consulting, and Innovation Labs of ReTech Center, with a wide range of contribution capacities, at the Forefront of the Emerging Digital and Responsible Futures of Industry 5.0.

DRIFT - Digital and Responsible Innovation and Futures Transformation => Leading the Emerging Futures of Digital and Responsible Businesses, Societies, and Markets toward Industry 5.0

Why?

Among a myriad of perspectives - including Competitiveness, Survival, Resilience, and Growth in the Forthcoming Uncharted Territories of Industry 5.0 - it is crucial for innovators, investors, executives, decision-makers, policy-makers, researchers, students, experts, and leaders to comprehend the driving factors, enablers, and implications of these two megatrends and their convergence, systemically and systematically over the expanse of disciplines, contexts, cultures, industries, societies, and markets.

The reason for the above is that facing the forthcoming enabling and disruptive forces of The Dual Transition of Digital and Responsible Economies, the lack of knowledge in the main pillars of driving economies - digital and responsible transitions - would negatively and exponentially impact the innovation capacity, intellectual capital, competitiveness, and resilience of businesses, societies, and markets.

Given the above, proactive engagement at the forefront of The Dual Transition is not only a competitive edge but also a strategic hedge, from micro to macro scopes.

In the comments, I share the link to my previous post on Industry 5.0 where I covered why the convergence of these megatrends is restructuring the fabric of markets and societies, and how the proactive engagement of individuals and institutions with the emerging digital and responsible futures of Industry 5.0 plays a significant role in Competitiveness, Survival, Resilience, and Growth of societies, industries, markets, nations, and regions face to the forthcoming uncharted territories of Industry 5.0.

How?

DRIFT Initiatives accelerate and facilitate the - as it stands for - Digital and Responsible Innovation and Futures Transformation of societies and markets; a proactive series of initiatives under the four Labs of ReTech Center.

DRIFT expands the borders of knowledge and practice in leadership, governance, strategy, competitiveness, and the design of business, operational, and economic models of the forthcoming markets and societies. To do so, ReTech Center DRIFT programs in Research, Skills, Consulting, and Innovation provide unique opportunities for investors, innovators, executives, and decision-makers to delve into and expand the frontiers of cutting-edge technologies, policies, practices, processes, and the design of the supply and value chains and multi-stakeholder engagement strategies that lead the Industry 5.0 transition, and the emerging futures of markets and societies.

To this end, with a multidisciplinary, cross-contextual, and transversal approach, DRIFT initiatives enable Socioenvironmental Prosperity and Collaborative Competitiveness by Leading the Convergence, Divergence, and Emergence of Digital and Responsible Futures of Industries, Markets, and Societies toward Industry 5.0 - elaborated in my previous posts.

Research Lab covers Public and Private Joint Publications and Initiatives, Policy Papers and Applied, Consortia, Industrial, Academic, Scientific, Action, and Company Research activities,

Skills Lab covers Upskilling, Reskilling, Life-Long Learning, Corporate, and Executive Education, Advanced, Bespoke, and Specialized Degree and Certificate Courses and Programs, in collaboration with public and private industrial and academic partners,

Consulting Lab covers Public and private Consulting, Advisory, and Accompaniment in Digital and Responsible Innovation, Transformation, Strategy, and Competitiveness Initiatives,

and Innovation Lab on the top, covers Intra and Entrepreneurship, Incubation, Acceleration, Growth, as well as Impact and green Investment, and Public and Private Competitions and hackathons, among others, with a strong network of professors, researchers, advisors, experts and senior leaders from across sectors, and the network of leading academic, scientific, and industrial partners.

What??

Following priceless conversations and working sessions with innovators, senior executives, decision-makers, investors, expert practitioners, and public and leading private institutions, we will kick off the ReTech Center Industry 5.0 DRIFT with a series of cutting-edge topics, in parallel, under the four labs of Research, Skills, Consulting, and Innovation of ReTech Center.

These topics span a myriad of disciplines and perspectives covering Enabling and Disrupting Technologies and Innovations, Digital Economy Transformation, Responsible Economy Transition, Digitally Empowered Industries (xTech), Infrastructures and Solutions (SmartX), and Business Models (XaaS), as well as Governance, Strategy, Competitiveness.

As an example, one of the topics is The Emerging Futures of Markets and Societies, with a focus on Ecosystems and Driving Factors. Among many perspectives, the implications of The Dual Transition on Markets and Societies and the ensuing cross-contextual Enabling and Disrupting Forces of their confluence are pursued. Some initiatives focus on the interaction of Enabling and Disrupting Technologies such as GenAI, Robotics, Tokenized X, Digital Twins, and Web3 with Policy Initiatives and Strategies within the context of the evolving value systems and forthcoming socioenvironmental emergencies. The restructuring forces of competitiveness landscapes, market dynamics, as well as the socioeconomics and socioenvironmental aspects of Digital and Responsible Innovation and Transformation are major elements of this topic. Like others, this topic will be advanced in parallel across the four labs of the ReTech Center with the network of individual, institutional, public, and private partners and affiliates, depicted in the previous image of the labs and activities.

DRIFT Avant Premier - Invitation to Join

I’m honored to extend this invitation to my network of individuals and institutions in all sectors - innovators, investors, experts, students, researchers, professors, executives, decision-makers, leaders, and enablers.

Join the Forefront of the Emerging Digital and Responsible Futures of Industry 5.0 at ReTech Center - école des Ponts.

Sign up here to receive further information - Individual and Institutional Participants and Contributors.