The Innovator's Radar newsletter enables you to stay on top of the latest business innovations. Enjoy this week's edition.
Jennifer L. Schenker
Innovator Founder and Editor-in-Chief |
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| When Brazil passed a law in 2010 requiring companies to report on their waste management practices tech entrepreneurs Chicko Sousa and Raphael Guiguer saw an opportunity. In 2016, they created GreenPlat, an ESG management and monitoring software that tracks processes and supply chains from origin to destination to help companies comply and manage their operations
At first, they struggled to sign up customers. Corporates told them the law had no enforcement mechanism, so they were not interested, Sousa said during a June 25 panel at the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting of the New Champions in China, moderated by The Innovator’s Editor-in-Chief.
So, in 2018, GreenPlat donated its software to the São Paulo municipality, enabling it to monitor and assess the environmental impact of companies across all industries. It worked so well that in 2020 GreenPlat donated a new enforcement software to collect specific types of digital data to control circular economy and real estate development to the state government. Both of these successes pushed the federal government to pass similar new regulations. Before GreenPlat’s software was adopted by the government only 14,000 Brazilian companies registered and less than 5,000 were complying and paying taxes.
Today, thanks to GreenPlat, a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer, 722,00 companies have registered and 45,000 have complied. While many corporates were reluctant at first, clients like a McDonald’s franchise are now seeing a return on their investment, turning waste into new revenue streams, says Sousa.
It’s a powerful example of why technology alone is not enough to go green, says Sousa. A systemic approach is essential to achieving a future of zero waste and zero pollution. |
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- I N T E R V I E W O F T H E W E E K - |
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Who: Andrew Maynard is a professor of Advanced Technology Transitions at Arizona State University and director of the ASU Future of Being Human initiative. A former physicist and public health researcher, Andrew’s career spans nanotechnology, AI, risk innovation, and science communication. Maynard has advised U.S. and international policymakers, contributed to high-profile initiatives of the World Economic Forum and U.S. National Academies and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Topic: Managing technology transitions in an age of exponential change.
Quote: "Transitions that are being driven by accelerating advances in science and technology include AI (and possibly Artificial General Intelligence), gene editing, biotechnology, quantum technologies, neuroscience, robotics, nanoscale science and engineering, large-scale automation, virtual and extended reality, and much more. Individually these represent technologies that are enabling us to imagine futures that were inconceivable just a few decades ago. Together, they are synergistically accelerating the rate of transformative change between past and future beyond anything we’ve ever experienced. Successfully navigating the world-changing transitions these technologies will bring about is is perhaps one of the greatest challenges facing not just business but humanity."
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- S T A R T U P O F T H E W E E K - |
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- N U M B E R O F T H E W E E K - |
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The end of June might well end up being remembered as the week that the Continent's business leaders stepped up to make sure that Europe's tech sector and economy doesn't lag behind.
Some 70 high-level leaders convened in Brussels this week for the launch of Leaders for European Growth and Competitiveness. Led by the World Economic Forum the new initiative will seek to tackle the fragmented markets, high energy costs and technology investment gaps affecting Europe's economic and industrial performance. The initiative will focus on four areas: fast-tracking the development and adoption of key emerging technologies and scaling the region's innovation ecosystem through improved policy and investment conditions; accelerating clean and competitive energy; leveraging financial markets; and enabling strategic alliances.
Separately, the chief executives of more than 45 European companies including Airbus, Philips, Mercedes Benz and TotalEnergies this week called on European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to introduce a two-year pause on the EU AI Act, warning that it is threatening the bloc’s competitiveness in the global AI race.
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Synhelion has fueled a car with solar gasoline for the first time ever – a global first for road transportation.
A controversial MIT study called "Your Brain on ChatGPT" aimed to measure the "cognitive cost" of using genAI by looking at three groups tasked with writing brief essays — either on their own, using Google search or using ChatGPT. It found that the more help subjects had with their writing, the less brain activity, or "neural connectivity," they experienced as they worked.
Meta has been accused of using faulty data to train an AI climate tool, with scientists claiming the Big Tech group raised false hopes about the feasibility of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere at scale.
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The Innovator's Editor-in-Chief Will Be Speaking At The Following Events:
EIC Scaling Club Ambition Forum, Riga, Latvia, September 3 |
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