Identifying and exploring emerging trends, disruptions and convergences which might signal significant future challenge or opportunity
A colleague ‘Skyped’ me (made an Internet call) from 30,000 feet recently. He was aboard a Singapore Airlines flight back from Signapore to Australia. Amazing! This ‘Connexion by Boeing’ wireless broadband Internet service is now provided to passengers on selected flights of ANA, Austrain, Asiana, China Airlines, El Al , ETIHAD, JAL, Korean Air, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, SAS. The The cost of accessing the Internet is determined by each carrier (Lufthansa, for example, charges $9.95 per hour or $26.95 per flight).
A recent survey of 3,200 passengers who have used the service, reported in-flight Internet is changing traveler behaviour: 83 percent of those surveyed said that the availability of the Connexion by Boeing service will have an impact on future travel plans and their choice of airline carrier.
Thoughts: If you travel often then battery life is finally going to mean something. Le t’s also hope that this innovation might drive the seats a bit further apart in 'cattle class'. The combination of most ageing baby boomer bellies and cramped space generally means the only possible viewer of your laptop screen currently is likely to be your crotch!
My passion is ANTICIPATION ~ a continuous Internet hunt for emerging weak signals of potentially significant change and opportunity. My colleagues and I are particularly focused on designing better futures. Globally, humanity is confronted with extraordinary opportunities (e.g. the accelerating rate of technology advance, rapidly increasing green consumer awareness), and challenges (e.g. climate change, water and resource scarcity, peak oil, disease, loss of biodiversity, global financial crisis). Unless we can successfully design and implement some transformational and sustainable global solutions within the next 10 to 15 years, our species and planet’s co-inhabitants will be in big trouble.