Patrick Schwerdtfeger is a leading authority on business trends including Big Data, social media and other disruptive technologies. He’s the author of the award-winning book Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed (2011, Wiley) and a regular keynote speaker for Bloomberg TV. Patrick has covered technology at conventions and business events around the world and is passionate about the disruptive innovation emerging from exponential digital technologies. These innovations pose a potent threat to large companies within established industries because they invalidate the existing business model. Examples include the personal computer replacing the electric typewriter and digital photography replacing its analog predecessor. Fortune 500 businesses are often afraid of these new technologies because they threaten their existing product or service offering. Patrick acknowledges this reality while presenting inspiring examples for attendees to consider, ensuring the message is one of opportunity and optimism rather than doom and gloom. If you’re looking for a speaker to energize your audience with the possibility and potential of disruptive technologies, Patrick is the perfect speaker for the job!
Past speaking clients include:
Recent speaking destinations include:
Some recent disruptive innovations include:
- The Social Media Revolution
- Big Data and Predictive Analytics
- Bitcoin and the Blockchain Protocol
- 3D Printing and Additive Manufacturing
- Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality
- Autonomous Vehicles and Drones
- Algorithmic Stock Market Trading
- Emerging Exponential Technologies
Disruptive Keynote Speech about Innovation
The reason “disruptive innovations” are disruptive is because they are generally based on exponential technologies. Due primarily to the digital revolution, these technologies are evolving along an exponential curve. And as new technologies, they are starting from a much lower baseline. At first, the progress seems deceptively insignificant and the new alternative is far inferior to the existing product or service offering. But as time passes, the progress takes on momentum and increasing rivals the existing business model. By the time they are actually competitive, the old model is evolving slowly and the new model is accelerating quickly. All of a sudden, the new technology hits critical mass and spreads quickly, leaving established industry leaders scrambling to change course. Many times, they can’t adjust quickly enough and the new technology destroys their business model.
The average lifespan of companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 list is getting shorter every year. In the 1960s, it was about 60 years but today, that has dropped to just 15 years. The reason the turnover of top companies has accelerated so much is a direct result of exponential technologies and disruptive innovation. New technologies are revolutionizing old business models, allowing innovative start-ups to take over entire industries in record time. Business leaders need to keep their eye on the ball and understand the exponential nature of digital technologies. Even when new innovations seem inferior and insignificant, they may still have the potential to gain momentum and threaten the existing market structure.
Companies like Google encourage their employees to spend 20% of their work time on personal projects. The reason for this is to keep an entrepreneurial spirit in the company. They’re trying to keep innovation alive within their ranks. Large corporations can learn from this effort. Done properly, it can help the business stay fresh and aware of the innovations taking place in their industry. They will see new technologies emerging and monitor their evolution along the way. When something promising comes along, they can try incorporating it into their own business model, protecting their downside should the technology hit critical mass. A perfect examples was when Allstate Insurance bought esurance.com in 2011. The criticism was that the purchase would cannibalize their existing sales force but the strategy was to mitigate the downside risk if the insurance market began shifting en masse to an online delivery model.
Disruptive Innovation Motivational Speaker
Examples of disruptive innovation include 3D printing, the cloud, robotics, autonomous vehicles and cognitive computing. Each technology threatens an existing business model. 3D printing and additive manufacturing threatens traditional prototyping procedures and traditional manufacturing methods. Robotics can increasingly replace human capabilities and autonomous vehicles have the potential to revolutionize transportation as much as the internal combustion engine replaced horses. Meanwhile, cognitive computing, predictive analytics and big data inevitably result in algorithms that deliver top quality outputs without human involvement. Patrick’s keynote program on disruptive innovation promises to inspire your attendees with a whole new world of possibility.
