I have one of the world's coolest jobs I
track trends for a living
hundreds of trends here's what's
interesting in the last global recession
when the stock market lost three point
one trillion dollars eighty percent of
the trends we track kept growing and all
the ones I'm sharing with you today kept
growing we use trends to help
organizations spot the next billion
dollars of growth but trends are
relevant for everyone I'm here to share
a few insights in how you can use trends
to stay ahead of the curve in a highly
uncertain world
the first tip some trends are a lot more
predictable than others the price of
Alibaba stock in 2016 the price of oil
in 2015 the price of gold any day
we call these items that are hard to
predict dice rolls what is fascinating
to serious futurists is there's a whole
nother set of trends that are so
predictable you can set your watch by
them these are trends like the rise of
the aging market the rise of e-commerce
the rise of entertainment and celebrity
and the rise of Internet of Things
connecting objects to sensors to the
Internet's these are just four of the
many trillion dollar trends that we
track even though these represents some
of the largest opportunities on the
planet many organizations have not yet
built these trends and their
implications into their strategies take
the market serving the growing
population over 60 when this market was
worth 1 trillion it was called the gray
market when it went over four trillion
kucing it was renamed the silver market
now this isn't only about this growing
population and how much of the wealth on
the planet they control it's also about
organizations understanding the shifting
needs of this trend
when companies think of this trend they
think of their parents and products
their parents need we tell them to think
of Tina Turner age 74 who headlines one
of the top-selling concerts of her life
six years ago the future of this four
trillion dollar trend belongs to
organizations that can unlock products
that Tina and the rest of us will want
products that allow you to age in place
breehn fitness or that smart appliance
that teams with you to keep your diet on
track now where the Futurists work gets
even more interesting is in spotting
emerging billion-dollar trends how do
you know which trends are good bets
today and which will be great five years
from today take the rise of robotics
it's 25 billion today it will be 67
billion in 2025 as prices come down and
performance goes up you'll see robots
move to whole new applications from
mining bots to Kara BOTS to agricultural
BOTS over the next 10 years
expect to see robots move from making
our cars to driving them but there is a
second emerging trend that gets a lot
less attention than robotics it's inside
many of your houses and more than three
times the size of the robotics trend
it's the 97 billion dollar pet market ok
pets may not seem relevant for your
company but when Eli Lilly was looking
for a new consumer segment for their
anti-anxiety drug Prozac imagine the
creative marketing director who
suggested they develop a chewable liver
flavored version doesn't sound like a
winning idea well it turns out that our
pets share our anxieties the PAP market
for health care for dogs and pets is
already 20
five billion the US EU and Japan all now
have more pets than children and last
year one of the largest IPOs wasn't a
tech stock
it was Pfizer's animal medicine division
the trends that are relevant for each of
you will differ but in a world with lots
of uncertainty betting on more reliable
trends is critical now while the trends
themselves are endlessly fascinating
what turns out to be equally important
is what you do with the trends and when
each trend has its own pace this is the
rise of the Internet I think of a mega
trend like a surfer trying to catch a
wave there's the early period when the
wave is hard to detect it's far off you
need to be suited up and ready to go but
much of the energy is in tracking and
waiting then as the mega trend builds
momentum you have the opportunity to act
and you need to catch the wave but less
focused on is the fact that for many
mega trends there is a third period when
it is often too late to lead the trend
can switch from being an opportunity to
a risk and companies that miss the wave
they can get caught in an endless
catch-up cycle which for some companies
can be fatal
take Kodak Kodak dominated the
photography space from most of my
lifetime they also happen to have a
patent on the world's first digital
camera kodak saw the digital wave coming
for certain they discussed it at almost
every board meeting but they
fundamentally misjudged its pace their
Kodak moment ended in bankruptcy filing
January 2012 spotting a trend isn't
enough you need to know the pace of a
trend to act in the window of
opportunity what does a winner
like on the Digital Trends well luckily
there are many winners they're all
around us
but what surprised me when I started
this job is just how many trends
companies need to spot and lead on to
win in today's world take Amazon
everybody knows Amazon as an e-commerce
winner I think they have that position
for sure but did you know that Amazon is
also leading in web and cloud services
and as of 2007 they're leaving on the
mobile device trend with the Kindle even
when pursuing this trend risk
cannibalizing their existing sales and
now Amazon is pioneering in robotic
advantage these are just four of the 14
major mega trends that Amazon has
spotted and led to become the 35th
largest company in the world in less
than two decades Amazon spots trends
early has the courage to act and does so
repeatedly now trend tracking is an art
and a science and it does depend on
access to good databases and using the
latest tools I'd like to share with you
one of our more popular tools for
spotting trends in that early phase at
first glance this looks like the
archipelago for your next vacation but
actually it is a map of Starbucks
historic patent clusters patent maps are
a fabulous way to understand where a
company is investing that give you clues
of products that may materialize years
in the future this first island is
Starbucks patents and coffee and brewing
here are their patents in packaging
design those all-important cups
here's sandwich preparation here's
loyalty cards and digital music patent
maps are just one of the many powerful
tools that we use to get advanced notice
of future moves
and the waves that are forming now so
far we've talked about the trends
individually but obviously powerful
opportunities are created where the
trends combined in the last decade as a
planet we have crossed many inflection
points these are just three as of 2005
we now have more people on the planet
over 60 than under five as of 2008 we
now have more devices connected to the
Internet than people connected to the
Internet and as of 2009 we have more
people living in cities than not we all
know about many of these shifts but how
can you use this knowledge to build one
of the world's greatest companies well
take the world of toys in 2010 Lego was
half the size of Mattel in four short
years as of the first six months of this
year Lego is on track to be the largest
toy company in the world how did they do
this well first of all Lego is the first
toy company to build toys for kids of
all ages my husband has a very
impressive set of Legos and they took
dumb plastic blocks and connected them
to sensors building some of the most
popular robotic kits for kids and adults
and they took their farm kits and they
added some of the most popular toys for
them which is a set of toys around
cities an urban design and as of earlier
this year
Lego participated in the entertainment
and celebrity trend helping in a movie
that grossed five hundred million
dollars and proving that everything is
awesome when you live at the confluence
of multiple megatrends we live in a
world where foresight is increasing
critical to many companies aim to be
market leaders in 2015 and not nearly
enough are aiming to be market leaders
in 2025 foresight is a muscle that can
be developed so if you want to stay
ahead of the curve first get literate on
the trends know your organization's
trend hot spots and blind spots second
timing matters third leverage tools to
get advance notice of those waves and
fourth everything is awesome at the
confluence of multiple mega trends and
last in today's world there is no credit
for spotting trends shaping the future
belongs only to those with the courage
to act we need to become foresight
masters to navigate the challenges and
leverage the opportunities of the 21st
century
thank you