The New Global Technology Order

The New Global Technology Order
The advent of technology has led to a power shift from a predominantly American world technology monopoly, to one that has become more dissipated and where power now is shifting to the East. America was previously viewed as the hub of technology and a center for excellence, attracting the best brains and innovating the greatest technology products for the world to consume.
The ubiquity of technology in today’s age has meant that America is no longer in pole position on the world stage as the tools for innovation are now in the hands of people across the world. The only barrier is for them to be knowledge workers, which is becoming a de-facto standard especially in Asian countries who have started to overtake their US counterparts by filling local and regional appetites for technology products and service.
Previously, we saw mainly US technology companies leading technology innovation which saw the creation of the Facebook’s and Google’s that we see today. The US still holds a very strong position with relation to technology, innovation, rule of law and intellectual property, but we are seeing a trend of regional competitors showing great promise in the East. Chinese companies it seems like doing business with local companies as they understand their problems and bring a local element with US companies seem to lack.
They share the same concerns, worries and bring about culturally acceptable technology solutions, using a progressive approach where they look at people as assets to be unleashed rather the western top down approach that focusses on people as problems to be solved. This can be seen in the East with the dominance of local technology firms over US ones, that seem to cater for local needs much better than US companies ever could, meaning that consumers no longer need to accept US technology products and can choose providers that are more attuned to their cultural preferences.
This can also be seen all over the world in many examples of non US companies dominating their US rival in foreign markets. For example, the largest e-commerce player in China is ‘AliBaba’ and in Latin America is ‘Mercado Libre’; ‘Amazon’ is nowhere to be seen. The largest ride application in South Asia is an application called ‘Grab’, rather than ‘Uber’ that has dominated Western markets. There are many other such examples where the US giants have little, if any, market share.
Two thirds of most societies around the world consist of young, under 35 years - old member and they do not share the old mindset where America was seen as the leader of the free world. They have access to technology at their fingertips and are eager to make a difference to build the latest technology innovations. They are bottom-up thinkers and generally dissatisfied in the way that big American tech giants have forced technology options onto them. They have rather, taken things into their own hands to build strong rival technology brands. Talent is now available everywhere to build local, tailored innovations and there is a huge market to be tapped into as global audiences demand more localized products and services.
While the American technology sector is still a strong world player, it will need to change the way it engages with non-US markets. In the past, they were somewhat insensitive to local needs and even not interested in securing non-US business as the English speaking markets were enough. In today’s market, there is not just a willingness for the Chinese to work with the Chinese, but a real enthusiasm for it as they understand local needs and culture much better than the Americans.
I think it is quite clear that the traditional way of doing business by American firms is no longer valid. In the past, they would enter large consumer markets with no competitors and outsource production to the cheapest bidders. For years this has worked like a charm, but as foreign market develop their own talent pools and alternatives, US firms will have to work double time and change their strategy if they want to secure foreign markets.
The world now has a choice and America needs to pay attention if it wants to maintain its global market dominance as technology rivals are fast catching up.
Technology is our future and those countries that want to ensure they have a role to play in this digital future would be wise to focus on building knowledge workers to serve this ever-growing sector. This was the prime reason for me to author ‘The Brave Knowledge World’; a book that is a factual journey into the future, showing how technology will change the course of human history in the 4th industrial revolution.
I welcome anyone wanting to secure a position in our digital future to read this book a build capacity in the technology areas mentioned which are set to revolutionize our existence.