What futurists (or “futurologists”) do is to help people plan and prepare for the future, as opposed to offer predictions about the future. This can involve looking at future trends, notably about new technologies and technology trends, and a lot more besides.
If you’re looking for a conference speaker, a keynote speaker, or a workshop presenter or facilitator on this topic, the examples below represent some of the keynote speeches or workshop presentations I’ve given as a futurist speaker in the past. But each presentation is created specifically to suit your needs. If you don’t see a presentation about the future that would work for your conference, by all means contact me, and we’ll see if we can create one specifically for you.
Artificial Intelligence and Health Management
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the hot topic in technologies these days, but even though there’s a healthy dose of hype involved, there are still very good reasons why those involved in health care, but especially in the pharmaceutical industry, need to pay attention to how it is changing the economy, society, and business.
Futurist Richard Worzel is a business visionary as well as a Chartered Financial Analyst. In this presentation, custom crafted for Pfizer, he provides an overview of how technology generally, and AI specifically is changing all the rules, including:
- Drug discovery – Evolutionary algorithms have the potential to reduce the costs of drug discovery at every stage of research and clinical trials, and to rescue drugs that have potential, but might not otherwise make it through clinical trials.
- AI excels at multivariate analysis and pattern recognition, both of which are critical to developing new pharmaceuticals, as well as marketing them to the right people.
- AI and automation will be as disruptive to supply chain management and lean operating efficiency as the Internet was, which means that organizations cannot afford to be left behind in adopting it.
- The emergence of personal AIs, today through smartphones, but eventually through virtual assistants, have the potential to revolutionize health assessments, medication management and monitoring, and crisis intervention.
- In combination with Cloud and Fog computing, virtual assistants could lead to the emergence of an integrated, global, health management system that would, among other things, revolutionize drug development, testing, and management.
As well as providing a road map of the future of health care, Richard will also provide insights about tools from the futurist toolkit to help you turn the uncertainty of the future into a competitive advantage.
The Biosciences Century
The remarkable emergence of Information Technologies in the second half of the 20th Century will pale in comparison to the revolution now underway in the biosciences, with its implications for everyday life.
Humanity’s newfound understanding of how life works is opening possibilities in health care, new pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, bionics, and evidence-based medicine that will increase life expectancy, extend life span, and improve the quality of life. Meanwhile, new techniques, such as genetic programming – a new form of machine-learning based on the techniques of natural evolution – are dramatically increasing the odds of success with new pharmaceutical research while driving down costs, and assisting in the emergence of personalized medicine.
But the biosciences revolution is going to extend well beyond health care, encompassing new breakthroughs in environmental management, manufacturing, nanotechnology, and computing that are unlike anything that has come before. We will look back 10 years from now and marvel at the breakthroughs. We will look back 20 years from now with astonishment at how much has changed, and how quickly. This stirring and disturbing keynote presentation surveys tomorrow’s landscape in the most radical, and rapidly changing, scientific revolution in history.
Preparing for Our Bio-Based Future
The industrial biotech industry is like a skier perched at the top of a long, unknown, dangerous, and exhilarating downhill run: we can feel the adrenaline pumping, and we’re looking forward to the trip, but we’re mindful of the hazards below. Richard Worzel, one of North America’s leading futurists, will survey the trip ahead of us, identifying and discussing how techniques are likely to change, some of the principal technical challenges ahead, and the dangers presented by public opinion, regulation, governments, and the need for financing. He will also present a vision for the next 20 years in biotech, where it needs to go, and how it can benefit society and innovators alike.