Jack Smith, Senior Advisor,

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ST Foresight A Tool for Prospecting the
Security and Prosperity Implications of
Convergent Technologies 2010-2025
Jack Smith, Senior Advisor, Federal
Foresight Innovation Strategy Defence
RD Canada
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Global Challenges

• Population Urbanization
• Water resource and food production
• Energy security and supply
• Health and disease
• Environment and climate change
• Conflict and terrorism
• Sustainability
• Information security, equity and overload

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What is Foresight?

• A set of strategic tools that support
  government and industry decisions with adequate
  lead time for societal preparation and strategic
  response.
• Key Attributes
• Anticipates multiple, plausible futures
• 5 25 year time horizon
• A rehearsal for potential futures
• Accommodates uncertainty diversity
• Highlights emerging opportunities threats
• Includes iconoclastic viewpoints

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Foresight Helps Policymakers By

• Revealing prospective new issues,
  challenges-threats, stakeholders, or shifts in
  alignments of influential players
• Identifying needs for new skills, knowledge and
  capabilities
• Highlighting new, weak signals that can become
  pivotal in the future, and potentially disruptive
  surprises, technologies
• Demonstrating current regulatory weaknesses
  zones where failure to prepare can bring severe
  consequences
• Can be used to determine ST, RD priorities,
  strategic technology investment domains and
  critical sectors
• Exposing the limits of current policies, gaps
  that should be filled
• Delivering intelligence on emerging business and
  market opportunities, new foreign strengths and
  players
• Providing alerts about threats, complex
  situations and organizational vulnerabilities
  allowing time to adapt

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Foresight Tools

• Environmental Scanning
• Delphi Probing
• Scenario Planning
• Technology Mapping
• Technology Road-Mapping
• Expert Technical Panels
• Web Virtual Conferences
• Competitive Technical Intelligence
• Computerized Modelling
• and Dynamic Simulation

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Scenario Planning

• Rigorous Approach For
• Managing uncertainties surrounding investment
  choices
• Exploring alternative environments, multiple
  futures
• Focusing on plausible rather than predicted
  outcomes
• Identifying robust problem-solving, adaptive
  strategies
• testing which will work No Matter How The Future
  Unfolds readiness what if and how would we
• Typically Chosen When
• Ambiguity in the operating environment is high
• Pace of change and degree of turmoil is
  accelerating
• Planning horizon stretches out to 10 years or
  more
• Stakeholders are able to manage complex,
  contingent situations and formulate strategies
• These strategies are aimed at preparedness and
  identifying opportunity within the accepted
  uncertainty represented by the divergence of the
  scenarios

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Scenario Basics

• Stories With Implications
• Rich context, relevant to stakeholders
• Provocative diversity real alternatives
• Relate to perceived needs opportunities
• Designate some edges choices, boundaries
• Consider also the opposites - and -

• Critical Parameters
• 4-7 is best, gt 10 confuses Plots are useful
  when transparent,
• Scenarios should be consistently structured,
  concise
• Focus is to engage key stakeholders
• Engage in what if rather than whether things
  will occur
• Challenges-evidence tests may be useful between
  scenarios
• Evocative names help recognition thematic links

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Macro Shaping Trends

• Demographic shifts in western world, NICs
  beyond the boomers
• Ambient Intelligence progress toward the
  Singularity
• Global Anxiety from Global Warming-Climate
  Change to Terrorism
• Miniaturization Socialization of Technology
• Globalization of Capital, Terror , Disease,
  Eco-environment
• Anti-globalization of Biodiversity, Culture,
  Sustainability
• De-Carbonization of Energy Economy
• Harmonization - Standardization for Trade
• Migration, Multi-Culturalism of Populations
• Intensification, Differentiation, of Wealth
• Virtualization, Digitization Integration of
  Business-Professions, Production, Communications,
  Entertainment, Education
• Transformation, of Infrastructure Systems
• Acceleration of Knowledge Services as Economic
  Driver
• Proliferation of Surveillance - Security

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Prospective Topics?

• Quantum Information and Canadian Positioning
• Energy Security, Substitution Plausible Shifts
  2010-2050
• Clean Energy, Sustainable Environments
  Opportunities for Innovation
• Infectious Diseases and Canadian Preparedness
• The Nanocosm- Societal Horizons for Nano
  Applications
• Convergent Systems for Enhanced Human
  Performance (PACT II)
• The New Built Smart, Efficient, Green
  Infrastructure
• Malware and Security of ICT Global Systems
• Defence and Public Security and the Future
  Economy
• Coping with Climate Change and Related
  Uncertainties
• Canadian Freshwater Horizons 2050
• Future Health System Practices, Materials and
  Devices
• Smart Sensors and Ambient Intelligence

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Convergence Question

• Which prospective nano-bio-info and
  bio-nano-info convergent technology applications
  do industry and government need to pursue to
  ensure that Canada prospers in the future global
  economy what are the prospective areas of
  application, products and impacts how should
  these be stewarded and what steps should be
  taken to accelerate their development?

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Trends in ICT AI

• Progress toward ubiquitous access and integral
  capacity
• Open source collaborative tools and deeper peer-
  to peer functionality social networks
  maturation
• Continued migration towards device and functional
  convergence
• Info-based manufacturing, claytronics for
  distributed fabrication
• Broader object based nodes and networks so
  everything can be smart and connected
• Pervasive E Science and dynamic simulation and
  modelling
• Gaming for personal and organizational decisions,
  learning
• Emerging horizons for faster, exponentially more
  powerful encryption, quantum information and
  environmental knowledge-control-efficiency
  potential
• Sustained info markets growth for surveillance,
  sensor networks, tracking capacities,
  nano-electro-mechanics
• Wearable, implantable personalized micro-nano-bio
  info sensors with data and communications
  capabilities

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Trends in Nanotechnology

• Smart materials with nano films, structures
• Integration of functions and structure in
  membranes, fabrics, fibers, self powered
  entities, biomimetic materials
• New environmental leaps in performance e.g water
  filtration and purification, biocidals,
  bioremediation and decontamination
• Nano sensor networks, tracking capacities
  nano-electro-mechanics (eg HVAC embedded)
• Wearable personalized nano sensors with data and
  communications capabilities
• Energy and power efficiencies improvements,
  battery power management
• Smart dust capability for widespread human ,
  environments surveillance
• Computational devices embedded in consumer,
  commercial goods
• Functional, programmable nanostructures for
  controlled drug delivery, performance of
  implants, protheses
• New devices, building materials and fabrics that
  incorporate nano film solar power and are climate
  responsive

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Trends in Biotechnology

• Control, improvements in living organisms
• Bio-sensing at the micro and nano level, micro
  and nano electromechanics
• Integration with wireless, RFID,
  photonics-molecular level cameras
• Tissue engineering, artificial organs, implants
  and protheses
• Targeted drug delivery and use of in vitro
  capacities
• Rapid scaleable bio-assays for molecule ID,
  medical diagnosis and forensics
• Personalized medicine using large data sets of
  patient information, disease statistics, gene
  sequences and genotypes
• Genetically modified insects to counter pathogen
  carriers
• In silico- computer testing and comprehensive
  modelling for drug characteristics, side effects
  and receptor simulation lab on chip
• Molecular recognition targeted drug delivery to
  organs, tumours

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Energy-Environment Convergence
Opportunities

• Climatic events warning and prediction
• Bio-nano devices, arrays, diagnostics
• Bio-fuels, bio-energy systems optimization
• Energy production and distribution
• Energy end use and device efficiencies
• Environmental stewardship toxicology
• Environmental monitoring sensing
• Bio-remediation, toxic removal

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PACT for Energy and the Environment 2020
Anticipated Market Size

Anticipated Feasibility
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PACT for Water, Food, Bio-fuels 2020
Anticipated Market Size

Anticipated Feasibility
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Examples of Emerging and Re-Emerging Infectious
Disease past 10 years
Source A Fauci, NIAID/NIH, 2005
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PACT Could Combat EID

• Prevention of EID
• Risk assessment of EID
• Travel trade, agriculture, climate ecological
  change
• Assessing tools
• patients respiratory and health status
• Disease Surveillance
• Local, regional, global
• Early warning Remote sensing of EID
• Traceability of tiny outbreak
• Rapid field diagnosis
• Reagents test kits
• Pathogen Identification
• Vaccination Tech-based barriers

• Management of EID
• Infection data management
• Strategy for drug administration
• Preparedness Rehearsal
• Treatment Facilities (Hospitals)
• On-demand Experts/ Pub Services
• International Collaboration
• Policy Supporting Framework
• Public Supply (e.g. water) Network Management

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PACT for Health and Life Sciences 2020
Anticipated Market Size

Anticipated Feasibility
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Converging Technologies by 2050?

• "Clean Coal" technologies (science incubator)
• Bio-nano-health Monitors (application developer)
• Implantable Nanoarrays for Livestock (application
  developer)
• "CO2 Sequestration" technologies (application
  developer)
• Environmental nanobiosensors (producer/application
  developer)
• On-time Nano-vaccinology (technology developer)
• "Biomass ? Biofuels" technologies (application
  developer)
• Medical "Tricorder" (producer)
• Smart Agri-bio Nanoencapsulation (tech.
  developer)
• Food-tracking Nanotags (science incubator)
• Directed Evolution Chips (technology developer)