Dr. Claudia Schärer is head of early detection at the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences (SATW). Every two years, her team produces the Technology Outlook report, which describes forward-looking technologies and assesses their importance for Switzerland. The 2021 edition considers 43 technologies, ranging from computerized innovations in Big Data and Blockchain to biotech research in Synthetic Biology. Dr. Claudia Schärer, as head of the early detection team, you surely make important decisions on what technologies make the cut and get published in the report. How do you select worthy innovations? Would you consider your methodology to be rather quantitative or qualitative?
To answer this question, I need to briefly explain SATW’s foresight process. It involves our topical platforms, experts and member societies and is governed by the scientific advisory board. The expertise in the 13 platforms and more than 50 member societies is very broad and covers numerous scientific fields ranging from digitalization and manufacturing to energy and life sciences. The boards mentioned above are invited to share their knowledge and to nominate disruptive technology trends in their fields every other year.
The maturity level and relevance for Swiss industry are then determined for the submitted technologies. To make it into the Technology Outlook, the technologies should be expected to reach product maturity within the coming five years. In addition, it is pivotal that Switzerland is home to research and industrial activities in the field. Therefore, technologies appear and disappear in consecutive Technology Outlooks as they exceed the desired maturity level.
Our methodology of technology selection is therefore rather qualitative.
The Technology Outlook 2021 compares Switzerland and seven other European countries with the help of data from social media, especially Twitter. More specifically, you measure differences between these countries by looking at the relative frequency of social media posts from higher education institutions that mention the technologies the report assesses. Why has your team opted for a social media analysis to compare international levels of interest for a technology?
We looked for data sources that are available for all European countries, that are fully searchable without license fees and that reflect trends in an almost real-time manner. Twitter posts fulfill all these criteria. To keep the background noise low, we opted for the messages posted by the official social media channels of European universities.
Even though posts from universities do not necessarily reflect the industrial profile of a country, they do show the topics that universities are working on and that they find of general interest. Since academic research is the foundation for industrial applications, the technologies mentioned by the universities in the posts will also have industrial relevance in the future. In addition, we observe that country-specific industrial characteristics are to some extent reflected in the posts.
Your team monitors a wide range of technologies spanning many industries. Considering the breadth of content, your reader base is most likely very heterogeneous as well. Who do you consider to be the target audience of your team’s work, and who else do you believe could benefit from reading the findings in the Technology Outlook and beyond?
Even though the Technology Outlook is commissioned by the federal authorities, it meets the interest of other target groups as well. CTOs and technology transfer officers in SME, scientific experts at universities as well as location and economic promoters appreciate the broad scope of technologies, the assessment of their relevance for Switzerland and the description of the interactions between the technologies to enable broad technology trends.
We feel that politicians and the general public could also profit from the findings. Obviously, the Technology Outlook in its entirety is too comprehensive and has to be “resized” for these target groups.
The CYD campus of armasuisse S+T is tasked with a similar role of monitoring the market and assessing the importance of certain future-oriented technologies. However, the CYD campus focuses on technologies with a consequential impact on the field of cybersecurity and therefore does not investigate all emerging technologies. What are your thoughts on the differences between the two monitoring strategies? At the end of the day, does monitoring few versus many technology clusters entail the same tasks or are there visible differences in how monitoring is carried out?
I wouldn’t think that there are major differences: Both approaches involve horizon scanning, close collaboration with experts and a system for assessing the relevance of the tentatively identified technologies. I see the difference rather in the flight altitude and the mesh size used for technology identification: SATW flies high, covers a broad territory and deploys a net with large mesh size whereas CYD circles above a specific area and works with a closely knit net.
However, the tasks remain the same – to identify technologies of future relevance for Switzerland!
According to your methods, what would currently be the main trends in cybersecurity technologies?
The challenges are numerous as digitalization and cybersecurity go hand in hand. Many security incidents result from the violation of fundamental security principles, which explains why, besides promoting new security solutions, it is increasingly important to provide for the regulation and certification of ICT services, products and processes.
At the technical level, more automation is needed. For example, artificial intelligence should help to identify weaknesses in systems and to close gateways. In future, it will also be important to share information on existing threats.
Talking of a specific technology, we put quantum cryptography in the spotlight. It is pivotal to have highly advanced encryption methods in place once quantum computers are used on a large scale.
Since cybersecurity is also highly dependent on human activity, it is essential that workers but also politicians and private persons understand the mechanisms. Next to technological innovations, there is a need also for education and for unbiased knowledge sharing.
In addition to the Technology Outlook, the SATW developed the Cybersecurity Map to specifically address technological developments in the field of cybersecurity. Therein, the SATW covers technological developments in the field of cybersecurity that will be of relevance for (political) Switzerland in the next five years. The technological developments range from cloud computing, dependency and complexity to internet of things and information warfare.
Download the Technology Outlook 2021