Areas of Focus

The Global Goals

Our Areas of Focus

Financial Inclusion

Two Billion people still live without access to basic financial services.
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We cannot eradicate poverty without solving this problem.

Renewable Energy

It’s projected that 71% of electricity will be generated by renewable technology by 2050.
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That’s not nearly fast enough to avert catastrophic climate change.

Applied AI / ML

AI is expected to boost cumulative world GDP by 16% through to 2030.
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For better or worse, AI/ML will embed itself in the DNA of nearly every technology.

Disruptive Technologies

AI / Machine Learning

Renewable Energy

Network Inclusivity

Internet of Things

Blockchain Technologies

Impact Research and the Global Goals

In 2015, all 193 member countries of the United Nations ratified the 2030 “Sustainable Development Goals”: a call to action to “end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity.” The 2030 Agenda positioned Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) as a key means of implementation of these SDGs.”

It is often expedient for us to conduct our analysis within the framework of these goals, because they are wide-reaching and enjoy global consensus and recognition. It is also helpful that each of these 17 goals provide specific, measurable targets against which to evaluate success, and were deliberately designed to drive progress on an aggressive timeline.

Three of the most important fields with the potential to deliver the sweeping transformations needed to achieve the UN’s aggressive sustainable development goals are:

Financial Inclusion

2 Billion people live without access to basic financial services.
We cannot eradicate poverty without solving this problem.

One of the greatest challenge facing many people earning less than an average of $1.90 a day - the international poverty line - is the regularity of their income. Managing unpredictable earnings to cover unpredictable expenses is a perilous task, when a single emergency payment can lead to complete destitution. Access to essential financial services can be the critical factor that enables people to take control of their lives. These include tools to store savings, make and receive payments - including social payments - and obtain credit and insurance.

Much progress has been made in recent years. Globally, the number of adults with a bank account has risen from 51% in 2011 to 69% in 2018 - but that still leaves 1.7 billion people without.

The proliferation of mobile phones and the internet is key to making financial inclusion for all a reality. Many developing countries have make great strides in providing access to digital financial services without building a costly physical infrastructure, especially in rural areas. Technologies such as machine learning and blockchain promise to increase the speed and efficiency of this outreach.

But there are still huge challenges which need confronting. One is reaching the poorest people at the bottom of the pyramid - those who need access to financial services the most are often hardest to serve. Another is providing services that make a real difference to people's lives, not just a numbers game of ubiquitous bank accounts that remain dormant.

Technology can be a double-edged sword: the rush to achieve universal financial inclusion could expose millions of vulnerable people to over-indebtedness and exploitation. It is also at the heart of the solution to alleviating poverty.

Renewable Energy

It’s projected that 71% of electricity will be generated by renewable technology by 2050.
That’s not nearly fast enough to avert catastrophic climate change.

The long-standing contention that new energy sources cannot be harnessed more inexpensively than fossil fuels has been eclipsed. As of 2016, the cost of adding power generation capacity is lower for solar than traditional technologies in 58 emerging economies – including China, India, and Brazil, which together account for 3 billion people.

This is projected to lead to a “50 by 50” scenario, where 50% of the total electricity generated globally will be produced by wind and solar – with hydro, nuclear and other renewables taking total zero-carbon electricity up to 71% of global production by 2050.

This sounds optimistic - and it’s true that the projected proportion of energy coming from renewables is higher than previously expected. However, this progress is not nearly enough. It’s too little, too late. In order to keep global warming below the 2C threshold set forth in the Paris Agreement, we will need to cut annual global carbon emissions to one tenth of their projected levels, by 2050.

We believe that while hitting this target will require tremendous effort, it is possible to achieve. Humanity simply cannot afford to fail.

Applied AI & Machine Learning

AI is expected to boost cumulative world GDP by 16% through to 2030.
For better or worse, AI/ML will embed itself in the DNA of nearly every technology.

Artificial Intelligence is the ability for a computer to perform certain tasks on its own, or in response to stimuli. A defining feature of AI is its ability to make logical “decisions” in reaction to stimuli or other inputs, rather than through the simple application of pre-programmed instructions.

AI applications can intake tremendous amounts of data, synthesize the data to extract insights, and make decisions faster and better than any human - automatically, and without any human oversight.

While AI can often exhibit intentionality, it is more relevant to consider it’s transformative powers as a function of smart automation: In the same way that the digital revolution transformed the physical world, the AI revolution will transform the entire global economy. AI will automate entire swaths of every industry. It will enable smarter loan making, replace human drivers with fleets of self driving trucks, engender tremendous advancements in robotics and manufacturing, and improve security and fraud detection. In conjunction with ubiquitous networked sensors (The “IoT”) - AI will automate entire manufacturing processes, houses, cities, and industries.

Many believe AI represents a vision of the future, but this is not entirely true: AI is a fact of the present. AI is already here, and it will only become increasingly ubiquitous.

The important question is not whether - but how - it's impact will be felt.

Disruptive Technologies

Meaningful transformation will be made possible by the interplay between various disruptive technologies. In our research, we examine several of the most important of these technologies. Together, these have the potential to:

Profoundly change the economic and social lives of a majority of the world’s population by 2030.
Have a measurable impact on attaining the targets laid out by one or more of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals

We refer to these as Disruptive Technologies. We place special focus on five: