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Innovator Founder and Editor-in-Chief Jennifer L. Schenker
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In a special address delivered at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2023, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Europe’s ambition is to become the world’s leader in clean tech. “The story of the clean-tech economy will be written in Europe,” she promised.
That plan may already be dead in the water. This week’s headlines included a story about Marvel Fusion, one of the few European start-ups trying to deliver zero-carbon fusion power, is being pushed by investors to move to the U.S. as American officials attempt to lure clean-energy businesses across the Atlantic. “The pressure is increasing day by day, also by our existing investors, to potentially move to the U.S.,” Moritz von der Linden, founder and chief executive of the four-year-old German company, told the Financial Times.
The investor pressure is partly due to the $1.4 billion that the U.S. government has earmarked for its domestic fusion industry but also because U.S. officials from several states are attempting to attract foreign groups to America by touting deep tax breaks and subsidies available to them from the U.S's Inflation Reduction Act.
“The recent technology advancements on both sides of the ocean are amazing,” Heike Freund, Marvel Fusion’s Chief Operating Officer, told The Innovator. (Freund is pictured here with Marvel Fusion co-founders Georg Korn and von der Linden) “We see the U.S. being very bold and courageous supporting private innovation like fusion. Europe now has to step-up and match the pace.”
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Nestled between vineyards in Bönnigheim, a town with a population of around 8,000 in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, stands a castle that serves as the headquarters of Hohenstein Group, a family-owned business which for more than 70 years has specialized in clothing sizing, textile standards and quality assurance for the apparel sector.
But it would be a mistake to think that this Mittelstand company is stuck in the past. Behind the turreted castle is a campus that contains, among other things, a lab where experts on textiles have been working on digitizing the sector for years, developing digital fitting innovations such as 3D and 4D body scans (see the photo). Now, Hohenstein is augmenting its in-house expertise with artificial intelligence and computer vision technology developed by Munich-based startup Sizekick to recommend the right clothing size in fashion e-commerce.
Hohenstein has invested €1.3 million in the startup. Its collaboration with Sizekick provides some valuable insights on what it takes to become a future-ready small and medium-sized business. |
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Who: Vilas Dhar is President and Trustee of the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, a global, $1.5 billion philanthropy that aims to advance the frontiers of artificial intelligence, data science and social impact. He is also Co-Chair of the Global AI Action Alliance at the World Economic Forum and an expert contributor to OECD.AI. He spoke on several panels at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos Jan.16-20, including one on AI and Climate Adaptabiiity moderated by The Innovator's Editor-in-Chief.
Topic: Why it is crucial for civil society to help develop and have access to AI tools and how corporates can help.
Quote: "Companies can make a huge difference when they share their knowledge and resources with the non-profit world. In addition to furthering positive social outcomes, there is also a business case for it – companies can use some of the data collected by non-profits to better understand and develop business in new markets." |
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U.S. startup BiasSync uses a SaaS platform to help corporates more effectively assess, measure, and mitigate unconscious bias in the workplace. Clients include PepsiCo, Toyota, and NASA.
“We know that a top risk in 2023 is talent retention and recruitment issues preventing companies from reaching their operational targets,” says co-founder and CEO Michele Ruiz, citing the U.S.'s National Association of Corporate Directors recent survey of over 1,300 C-Level executives. “Inequitable environments are at the core of the Great Resignation,” she says. “The work we do helps mitigate toxicity, improve retention and reduce the risk of litigation.” |
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Number of customers impacted by a data breach of U.S. wireless carrier T-Mobile's postpaid and prepaid accounts. It's the second major cyber attack in less than two years and comes months after the carrier agreed to upgrade its data security to settle a litigation related to a 2021 incident that compromised information of an estimated 76.6 million people. The company identified malicious activity earlier this month and said it contained it within a day. T-Mobile said no financial information was exposed but basic customer data - such as name, billing address, email and phone number - was breached and that it had begun notifying impacted customers.In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing T-Mobile admitted that a “bad actor” obtained data through a single Application Programming Interface (API). In two separate lawsuits last weekend – one in Florida and one in California – plaintiffs allege the breach occurred due to T-Mobile’s negligence and careless acts and omissions, including failure to encrypt customers’ information, according to a Bloomberg Law report. |
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