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The Promise Opportunity: New Markets, New Partners, New Profits
Here’s the good news. For those who are aware, informed and connected to the global community:
There has never been a better time (age) to create powerful, profitable and mutually rewarding business (and personal) relationships
That’s a literary mouthful, so let’s examine that audacious claim a little closer.
The term “Death of Distance” (from author Lynn Cairncross’ book of the same name) aptly describes the world we live in. It’s a world of integrated communication technologies, easier travel, and lowered trade barriers between old adversaries.
Already 1/2 the planet – three billion people – are using cell phones (many of whom never had land lines!). In the next few years, over 1/3 the planet (two billion people) will have Internet access. Furthermore, converging technologies such as Wifi, Skype, Voice-over-Internet and Web II; along with new mediums such as social networking and blogging, connect us faster and easier than ever.
World travel is growing at a rate of 6-7% per year, which means it’s doubling in volume every decade or so. With enough time and gumption, a traveler can be most places on the planet – from the wilds of Siberia to the pampas of Patagonia; from the Martian-red soil of the Australian Outback to the idyllic turquoise beaches of Zanzibar – in 24-36 hours. More importantly, for the first time in history, an average-income citizen of an average country can afford to take a foreign excursion.
Large economic coalitions such as NAFTA, the EU, Mercosur (six South American countries) and ASEAN (ten Asian countries) – despite their many controversies – are creating attractive commercial opportunities the world has never seen before. Tom Friedman, author of The World is Flat, noted that “no two countries with a McDonalds have warred upon each other since getting their McDonalds.” If that seems a little too pedestrian (or if you’re not particularly enamored of the Golden Arches), consider this: There has never been a time in history when as few countries (percentage-wise) have been at war, and as few citizens (percentage-wise) have been in military uniform.
We also are on the threshold of new “enabling technologies” which promise to make the PC/IT explosion of the 1980’s forward look more like a burp. Nanotechnology, which enables the fundamental properties of materials to be altered at the atomic level (thus creating products which are stronger-lighter-faster-cheaper-malleable), will become a multi-trillion$ “paradigm” over the next decade. Likewise, courtesy of the Human Genome Project, industrial applications for genetics-based products and services will mushroom. Ditto for telecommunications; ditto for the Green revolution, with multi-trillion$ ramifications for building construction, automotives,
