“…the greatest benefits of globalization
will accrue to countries and groups that
can access and adopt new technologies.”
New technology applications will foster dramatic improvements in human knowledge and individual well-being.Such benefits include medical breakthroughs that begin to cure or mitigate some common diseases and stretch lifespans, applications that improve food and potable water production, and expansion of wireless communications and language translation technologies that will facilitate transnational business, commercial, andeven social and political relationships.Moreover, future technology trends will bemarked not only by acceleratingadvancements in individual technologies but also by a force-multiplying convergence of the technologies—information, biological, materials, and nanotechnologies—that have the potential to revolutionize all dimensions oflife. Materials enabled with nanotechnology’s sensors and facilitatedby information technology will produce myriad devices that will enhance health and alter business practices and models.Such materials will provide n\
ewknowledge about environment, improvesecurity, and reduce privacy. Such interactions of these technology trends—coupled with agile manufacturing methods and equipment as well asenergy, water, and transportation technologies—will help China’s andIndia’s prospects for joining the “FirstWorld.” Both countries are investing inbasic research in these fields and are well placed to be leaders in a number of keyfields. Europe risks slipping behind Asiain creating some of these technologies.The United States is still in a position to retain its overall lead, although it must increasingly compete with Asia and may lose significant ground in some sectors.