The 12th edition of the World Economic Forum’s Top 10 Emerging Technologies report (the first dates back to 2011) was published in June 2024. It aims to identify 10 technologies likely to have a significant impact on economies and societies. More than 300 experts from the Forum’s Global Future Councils Network and over 2,000 chief editors from leading institutions contributed to this edition via the Frontiers network.
The emerging technologies on the 2024 list were selected through a survey based on four criteria: novelty, relevance, scope and transformative power for societies and economies. The 10 identified emerging technologies are:
- AI at the service of scientific discovery, for example in the understanding and treatment of diseases, innovation in materials, and human body knowledge.
- Privacy protection technologies such as synthetic data, created artificially and therefore free of sensitive or personal data, but with characteristics very close to real data.
- Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS), which transform ordinary surfaces into intelligent components for wireless communication.
- High-altitude platform stations, which use balloons, aircraft or airships to extend mobile network access to remote regions or to help monitor large areas.
- Detection and communication integrated into a single system, to reduce duplication and the need for multiple pieces of equipment. The main goal is to optimise the material, energy and financial efficiency of systems, while enabling new applications, for example in integrated agriculture, town planning or environmental conservation.
- Immersive technologies for the building sector, enabling architects and construction professionals to improve the accuracy, durability and safety of projects, by verifying the congruence between the physical and the digital.
- Elastocaloric, based on materials that release and absorb heat under mechanical stress, offering a sustainable alternative to current cooling technologies.
- Carbon-collecting microbes, which convert emissions into biofuels and could contribute to efforts to mitigate climate change.
- Alternative livestock feed based on single-cell proteins, algae and food waste.
- Genomics for genetically modified organ transplants.
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N.B.: this article has been translated from French by DeepL, and revised by the author and Futuribles.
