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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Fachliteratur
- Sprache: Englisch
Leverage technology to propel humankind toward a better future
A New Age of Reason: Harnessing the Power of Tech for Good provides a roadmap for integrating emerging world-changing technologies, such as AI/robotics, chips/sensors, and quantum computing, to solve some of today’s thorniest and most pressing problems like climate change and world hunger.
The author offers inspiring examples of companies using technology to positively impact humanity. The book provides an actionable playbook to transform your organization around this mission, including how to develop a tech for good strategy, how to evolve the C Suite to deliver on this mission, how to market it, as well as measure outcomes. The author also discusses the latest technology breakthroughs delivering positive world outcomes, such as:
- Extending a surgeon’s “eyes and hands” via robotics surgical systems to improve patient outcomes
- Computer vision tech that enables farmers to maximize crops to feed our burgeoning population
- AI/robotics that identify and fight wildfires
Bringing together a collective of major thinkers on this subject and providing guidance for a better future, A New Age of Reason: Harnessing the Power of Tech for Good is a timely read for all executive leaders seeking to harness the new wave of technology to solve key societal problems and have a positive impact on the world.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Foreword
Dedication
Introduction
PART 1: Technology, Humanity, and a New Age of Reason
CHAPTER 1: A New Wave of Technology to Better Humanity
Science, Reason, and a Passion to Impact Our World
Looking Ahead
CHAPTER 2: Agtech and Deere: Tech for Good at Its Best
Deere Leading the Agtech Revolution
Deere Q&A
Tech for Good Takeaways
Notes
CHAPTER 3: Technology and the Planet
A Wave of Climate Change Solutions
A New Collaboration Among the Public and Private Sectors
Every Company Will Become a Climate Company
IBM's Efforts to Accelerate Sustainability
A Global Recruiting Company's Innovative Approach to Sustainability
Aquent Q&A
Tech for Good Takeaways
Notes
CHAPTER 4: Innovations for a Healthier Population
A Medical Renaissance
From the Digital Divide to the Great Equalizer
MIT Solve's Mission for Social Impact
Tech Reshaping the Healthcare Model
Tech for Good Takeaways
Notes
CHAPTER 5: Timing Is Everything
The New Imperative: Find Your Company's Soul
Re-Imagining the C Suite
Re-Inventing How We Work
Innovation and the Moral Corporation
Notes
PART 2: The Potential for Great Leaps
CHAPTER 6: The Seventh Wave of Modern Computing
The Seven Waves of Technology
Wave 1: The Mainframe Era
Wave 2: Minicomputers
Wave 3: Personal Computers and Client/Server
Wave 4: Software and the Enterprise
Wave 5: Web and Search
Wave 6: Social Media and the Cloud Movement
Wave 7: Humanity
Notes
CHAPTER 7: AI Enriching the Human Experience
Generative AI Finally Reaching the Promised Land
Leaping Forward with AI
Impacting Education
Transforming Science
Advancing Medicine
Fueling Sustainability
Robotics Enhancing Humanity
Notes
CHAPTER 8: Chips and Sensors Everywhere
Powerhouses in the Chip Ecosystem
RISC-V Democratizing Innovation
Chips Powering Today's World
Fueling Tech for Good Efforts
Advancing Healthcare
Sensors, Life's Detectors at Work
Notes
CHAPTER 9: The Promise of Quantum Computing
What Is Quantum Computing Anyway?
A Brief History of Quantum
The Emerging Potential of Quantum Computing
Quantum's Promise in Drug Discovery and Life Sciences
Quantum's Potential in Fighting Climate Change
Quantum's Potential to Transform Manufacturing
Quantum's Potential Machine Learning Entanglement
The Promise of a Quantum-Powered Future
Notes
CHAPTER 10: Sustainably Powering Our Future
A Brief Look Back at Energy Systems
Early Experiments with Renewables
Feats in Engineering and Physics Advanced Energy Systems
The Electrification Challenge
Imagine Life in a Greener Future
The EV Movement
Electrifying Our Power Systems
Solar Energy Advancements
Batteries as the Missing Link
Decentralized and Optimized Grids
The Promise of Fusion
Potential Future Decarbonization Innovations
Infrastructure Choices Shaping Future Energy Systems
Navigating Our Uncertain Future
Notes
CHAPTER 11: The Surging Biological Systems Wave
The Modern Technology of Biology
Unraveling the Double Helix and Replication
Recombinant DNA and Antibodies
Mapping and Cloning
Editing the Genome
Key Biological Systems Enhancing Our World
Enhancing Human Health
TCR-T Immunotherapy
Gene Editing
Longevity
Feeding the Future
A Material Impact
Accelerating Technological Development
Notes
CHAPTER 12: Harnessing Technology's Potential
The Key Role of Communications
PART 3: Humanity and Technology: The Path Forward
CHAPTER 13: Becoming a Tech for Good Organization
Embed Tech for Good in Your Company's DNA
Ignite a Passion for Problem Solving
Embrace Curiosity and Imagination
Re-imagine the C Suite
Widen the Problem-Solving Table
View Technology as the Great Enabler
Steep Values in Strong Ethics and Morality
Galvanize Your Culture Around Good
Notes
CHAPTER 14: Key Questions to Find Your Pathway
What Do You Want Your Legacy to Be?
What Actions Can You Take That Reflect What's in Your Company's Soul?
How Can Technology Accelerate and Augment This Effort?
Does Your Company Have the Ecosystem to Deliver on This?
Are You Choosing a Tech for Good Effort That Can Elevate Your Brand?
CHAPTER 15: Has Marketing Disappeared?
Ignite the Power of Storydoing
AI Is Reshaping Marketing
Other Ways to Measure and Track Your Progress
Treatment of Data
Notes
CHAPTER 16: Putting Innovations on the Path of Good
The Three Es: Ethics, Engagement, and Evolution
Exploring the Three Es in the Context of Generative AI
Establish Ethics for Responsible Innovation
Ethics and Brand Reputation
Government AI Regulatory Efforts
Engage for Better Outcomes
eVTOL Engaging Government, Business, and Consumers
Prepare for Rapid Evolution
The Pathway for Businesses
Notes
CHAPTER 17: A Time for Reason
Big Data for Social Good
Closing the Digital Divide
Veracity of Information
Equal Access to Healthcare
Doing Your Part to Fight Climate Change
Delivering on a New Age of Reason
Notes
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Index
End User License Agreement
List of Illustrations
Chapter 2
Figure 2.1 An example of Deere's use of advanced innovations that help farme...
Chapter 4
Figure 4.1 The da Vinci surgical systems are designed to help surgeons perfo...
Chapter 9
Figure 9.1 This photo taken during the 1927 Solvay Conference shows many of ...
Chapter 10
Figure 10.1 Solar energy has grown dramatically over the last 15 years. Sola...
Figure 10.2 New forms of transportation are likely to reshape both urban and...
Chapter 11
Figure 11.1 The CRISPR gene editing technology enables scientists to edit st...
Figure 11.2 Mycelium is the root-like structure of a fungus or mushroom and ...
Guide
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Foreword
Dedication
Introduction
Table of Contents
Begin Reading
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Index
End User License Agreement
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A NEW AGE OF REASON
HARNESSING THE POWER OF TECH FOR GOOD
LARRY WEBER
FOREWORD BY DAVID KIRKPATRICK
Copyright © 2024 by John Wiley & Sons. All rights reserved, including rights for text and data mining and training of artificial technologies or similar technologies.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Names: Weber, Larry, author. | John Wiley & Sons, publisher.
Title: A new age of reason : harnessing the power of tech for good / Larry Weber.
Description: Hoboken, New Jersey : Wiley, [2024] | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2024014710 (print) | LCCN 2024014711 (ebook) | ISBN 9781394216604 (hardback) | ISBN 9781394216628 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781394216611 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Technological innovations—Social aspects. | Technology—Social aspects.
Classification: LCC T173.8 .W445 2024 (print) | LCC T173.8 (ebook) | DDC 303.48/3—dc23/eng/20240501
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024014710
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024014711
Cover Design: WileyCover Images: © MarySan/Adobe Stock, © Bubball/Getty ImagesAuthor Photo: © Racepoint Global
Foreword
We live in a sea of technology – it surrounds us and affects every aspect of our lives, mostly in ways we could not live without. But it's too easy to take this blessing of capabilities for granted. Most of us have become so habituated to technology's marvels that we barely even notice them. It's easier to get annoyed when our smartphone battery runs out or a wire doesn't work, for example, than to feel grateful for the truly astonishing feats the device enables for us the rest of the time. None of us will leave home without it. But the smartphone is just one of innumerable amazing technologies that grace our lives.
Larry Weber wants us to stop and marvel. But more than that, he sees the gifts of tech as an inspiration. He believes in the almost infinite potential of innovation to improve our companies, our lives, and our societies.
Even as we collectively face the myriad crises of global warming, threats to democracy, ongoing wars, and fears about the potential downside of artificial intelligence, Weber sees amazing new pathways to progress.
Yet, we also all live, today, in a sea of pessimism and fatalism. Everywhere, even well-informed people increasingly feel paralyzed, even hopeless. Considerable numbers of young people are so demoralized they are starting to say they don't even want to bring a child into a world they see as blighted and degrading.
In this book, Weber makes the case that they are simply not seeing what's happening. He is a relentless, committed optimist – or, as he calls himself, a “techno-optimist.” Combatting society's endemic fatalism is a big part of Weber's mission. As he enthuses near the end of this bracing book, “We are on the cusp of a new era where technology has finally evolved to deliver amazing benefits to the world.”
For Weber, this is no idle claim. He has come to that confidence, as he recounts, through decades of close observation of what actually happens in the tech industry. He's served tech companies for many years as a senior counselor and advisor on communications and strategy. The book sparkles with recollections of time spent with visionaries like Steve Jobs and Tim Berners-Lee, who created the world wide web and the first internet browser. Weber recounts many stories about the vast progress that technological innovation has enabled and can enable in the future.
But alongside his optimism about technology, Weber also is enormously optimistic about the power of business. He's written this book to inspire businesspeople to think differently about their work as business leaders, so that they can leverage the potential of technology to help construct a better world. It's a handbook for how to create value in a world infused with deeply-promising technologies. Weber believes embracing tech can help companies remake themselves for the world's benefit.
This is urgent, because companies and business generally face urgent pressure to demonstrate the social value of their organizations. For alongside that fatalism about the future, many in modern society also hold a deep cynicism about the role of business, or even its culpability in bringing us to what they see as the world's sorry state. People will no longer tolerate inaction in any realm; they are so upset and worried.
Weber gives business leaders a call to arms, not to fight back but to inspire – to methodically find ways to turn companies into engines for social good. It is the mission of our age. But it's not easy. Tech is complicated. Luckily, Weber is good at explaining it.
For over a decade I ran a conference and media company called Techonomy. It was dedicated, among other things, to the notion that every company is a technology company. When we began in 2010, that idea was seen by most business leaders as radical, even nonsensical. Today, it is practically a given. Larry helped me understand that from the beginning. He was a big part of the Techonomy community, which I always deeply appreciated. He knew even then that every company was a tech company. And he believed that every business leader has a critical responsibility to engage with and embrace technology, regardless of their industry.
With this book, he has finally set out to explain just what that responsibility means. He is an advocate of what he calls “the moral corporation.” It's all about contributing to a better world. Companies that do so will thrive, he argues. His message is meant for business leaders who are rethinking the direction and ethos of their companies – a process he believes is indispensable and urgent. Business leaders are in a spectacularly good position, he argues, if they take stock of the transformations and possibilities all around them.
Much of the book is devoted to carefully explaining and assessing a range of important technologies that are poised to deliver spectacular value to the world. Artificial intelligence tops the list, unsurprisingly. But Weber also explains the importance of cloud computing, quantum systems, emerging energy technologies, and the potential of biotech. But even more importantly, he explains, they can all increasingly work in concert. The combination of all these now-highly-evolved capabilities bequeaths the world far more potential than could any one alone. Now, he writes, we have “tools to solve problems that seem unsolvable. They can impact our world in ways never before possible, evolving us into this new era: A New Age of Reason.”
More than once Weber recounts a famous line spoken by one of his mentors and heroes, MIT's Michael Dertouzos: “Technology should be our slave.” Weber wants leaders to learn to willfully and consciously take advantage of technology's power. In his many decades advising tech leaders, he has seen the perils of techno-determinism – the passive deployment of powerful technologies without clear ethical oversight. Several times he mentions the cautionary example of Facebook, a company I wrote an entire book about and now deeply criticize. It moved fast and broke things, to paraphrase its longtime mantra, and the world paid the price. But such heedlessness is neither inevitable nor necessary, he argues.
It all comes down to rethinking business leadership in a time of technological possibility. After charting the six waves of technology that got us here, beginning with mainframe computing, Weber now sees a kind of apotheosis. This new era is one in which tech can be put to service for humanity: “Technology has finally evolved and reached a tipping point in which it can address world problems.” With the perspective of someone who has lived this evolution over many decades, his conclusion is deeply gratifying, and empowering.
It won't be easy for businesses to rise to this challenge. It means planning differently, communicating differently, and organizing the corporation differently. Weber advocates, for example, that every company create new positions like a “chief ethics officer” and even a “chief humanitarian officer.” Take that, cynics about the role of business!
My own career has been spent writing about big companies, the evolution of technology, and its potential to improve society. Thank you Larry Weber for so clearly and passionately arguing for this essential new shift in business consciousness. I suspect his passion and knowledge will be as inspiring for you as it is for me.
—David Kirkpatrick
Dedication
To all the innovators of yesterday, today and tomorrow, humanity thanks you. And to Dawn, Hannah, John, Finn, Julia and Geoffrey, your love and support mean the world to me.
Introduction
For the past nearly five decades, I've had the privilege of having a front-row seat to the many waves of technology that have swept across our world, changing everything in their wake from how businesses operate to how we work and live. My focus during these waves was helping companies create new categories for their breakthroughs and market them to the world. However, I've always held a fascination with how technology can solve so many problems across business and our personal lives.
Today, I'm excited to see this next wave of technology break, as it holds the promise to impact an entirely new level of our world: humanity. Innovations coming from the digital world, the biotech arena, and the clean energy space hold the promise to address some of our most pressing problems, from feeding an ever-growing population with less land to battling against climate change to delivering better outcomes in healthcare. In many cases, it's the integration of multiple technologies that are fueling these breakthroughs.
This pivotal moment we're in now echoes back to the original Age of Reason, a time when the world shifted to focus on science, technology, reason, and the spark of imagination to find new solutions to the problems of that era. We stand at a similar place today, as technologies have finally evolved to give us tremendous opportunities to better our world. We need to apply those very same concepts to deliver on the promise of this era. Naturally, we also need guardrails for new innovations like generative AI, as we've all seen the damage technology can do when it is weaponized against us.
Along with the immense opportunity this wave of technology presents comes responsibility. Companies must find ways to leverage these evolved technologies to deliver outcomes that positively impact our society. This requires new thinking from the C suite, as the executive team's role will broaden to take on new responsibilities and new levels of problem solving, as well as embracing the ethics and morality required to succeed in this new era.
As companies infuse solving world problems into their business strategies, marketing holds the promise of delivering an entirely new level of transparency by enabling customers to experience the good a company is doing for humanity, ultimately building new levels of engagement and trust. As such, marketing can become a powerful, self-fueled force capable of building an irrefutable reputation that will attract all constituents, from customers to investors to talent.
In this book, you'll hear inspiring stories of organizations doing just that. You'll also hear from experts across many fields who offer insights into the promise today's technologies hold to solve so many problems that seem unsolvable. I hope when you read it, your takeaway will be to find your place on the path of “tech for good,” a powerful catalyst that will transform your brand as you contribute to the greater good of humanity.
PART 1Technology, Humanity, and a New Age of Reason
CHAPTER 1A New Wave of Technology to Better Humanity
One of the best parts of my career is that I've had the privilege to sit with CEOs of major companies and ask them this: What do you want your legacy to be? Most often, I get the expected answers around establishing their company as the biggest, the best, or the first. But, every once in a while, I talk to a CEO who really gets it, who sees the bigger picture and has aspirations around the good their company can contribute to our world.
This was the case with Deere & Company. When I asked this of Sam Allen (former Deere chairman and CEO), his answer summed up the essence of what this book is all about … and how I believe every CEO should think. Most people might logically guess his answer would be to dominate the agriculture and construction business by selling more of those green and yellow machines. But his answer showed how Deere thinks and operates on an entirely different level; the company focuses on the impact it can have on humanity. Allen's answer was to help farmers maximize their land to produce more crops so they can feed the world's burgeoning population … and to do all of this in a sustainable way. As lofty as it sounds, that's precisely what Deere is doing.
The “how” is accomplished with innovations that are part of an amazing new wave of technology – one that is ushering our world into an entirely new era. The past several decades have been defined by many technology waves, which have impacted business operations and productivity – personal computing, connectivity, access to information via the web, connecting with each other via social media, and the internet of just about everything.
The wave we are in now stands apart from those before it, because technology has finally evolved to impact a much higher purpose: humanity.
Current breakthroughs in AI and robotics, along with leapfrog advances in areas like quantum computing, biological systems, data analytics, sensors, chips, the web, and cleantech (renewables, carbon capture, etc.), have been evolving over decades to reach this point in time. These technologies have built the foundation for a plethora of new innovations that address some of today's most pressing problems, from feeding the world to climate change.
Computer chips that can fight global warming
Smart beehives that protect bees to ultimately help our food supply
Blockchain systems that enable electricity sharing
Computer vision tech that enables farmers to maximize crops to feed our burgeoning population
AI/robotics that identify and fight wildfires
Robotic-assisted surgery that expands the capabilities of a doctor's eyes and hands
Wearable technology for cows so they emit less methane
Carbon capture tech that has removed more than a million metric tons of carbon
Affordable medical diagnostic technology that can be used without electricity or an internet connection to help under-served communities
CRISPR gene editing technologies capable of addressing everything from blood disorders to cardiovascular disease
These are just a few of the advanced innovations available now or just on the horizon. The proliferation of these types of inventions gives us the tools to solve problems that seem unsolvable. They can impact our world in ways never before possible, evolving us into this new era: A New Age of Reason.
Science, Reason, and a Passion to Impact Our World
This moment in time echoes back to the original Age of Reason that took place in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This major turning point in history was a time of new thinking, tremendous innovation, and inspired imagination applied to problem solving, as society embraced science and reason to improve humanity. Enlightened thinkers propelled the popularization of science, which revolutionized many aspects of the world, including communications, transportation, medicine, and the textile industry, along with a better understanding of the mechanics of the human body and the natural world. Among the many discoveries of this era are the law of gravity, the telescope, the steam engine, the cotton gin, and the vaccine, along with a breakthrough understanding of blood circulation – all of which had a profoundly positive impact on society then and are the foundation of many aspects of life today.
Like most innovators, the greats of this era – among them Sir Isaac Newton, William Harvey, Eli Whitney, Edward Jenner – started by asking questions, saw the potential of how science could answer them, applied both reason and the magic of their imagination to “see” what could be, and then set out to create new inventions or theories that changed the world.
This new era presents us with a tremendous opportunity – and responsibility – to follow their lead, applying the combination of today's innovations, reasoning, and the spark of imagination to address today's most critical problems. This is the pressing call for every CEO. Today's business leaders need to think not just about their company's impact on shareholders, but more importantly how their organization can better our world.
Key elements have converged to usher us into this pivotal moment. We are grappling with critical global issues such as the raging battle to save our planet from climate change and the challenge to feed the world. Emerging alongside these problems is this wave of evolved technologies that are enabling our brightest minds to create new, innovative solutions that enhance the well-being of our planet and our population. The last component is a growing financial community focused squarely on investing in these types of breakthroughs to make sure they are brought to market and scaled for impact.
As these components converge, it is creating opportunities for companies like Deere and others you'll read about in this book to heed this clarion call and make a difference in the world. The notion of tech that serves us well, or tech for good, will not only do good for the world, but also create an entirely new value creation for corporations. When companies use technology in profoundly positive ways to benefit our world, their marketing will become a powerful, self-fueled force capable of building an irrefutable reputation that will attract all constituents, from customers to investors to talent.
Looking Ahead
In the next three chapters, we'll explore this wave of technology's impact on three key world issues: the fight to feed our ever-growing planet with less land, the battle against climate change, and the need to evolve healthcare for improved patient outcomes and better working conditions for medical providers. After that, we'll take an essential look at the critical moral responsibility we have to ensure our innovations are used for good and not weaponized against us.
CHAPTER 2Agtech and Deere: Tech for Good at Its Best
You may be wondering why my lead example on a new wave of technology would focus on one of the oldest occupations on the planet, farming. And you may ask why this is even relevant when farmers represent only 2% of the US population. Well, that 2% shoulders the tremendous responsibility of feeding the other 98% of us. And that 98% is expected to grow from 8 billion to 10 billion people by 2050.1
The world's staggering population growth is only part of the issue. The land itself is another critical problem, as US farmland has been declining over the past several decades, in part due to the land being converted into developments to meet the housing demand. According to the US Department of Agriculture, acres of land in farms have continued the downward trend with 879 million acres in 2023, down from 900 million acres in 2017.2 What's more, farmland is expected to continue to decline, while our population continues to grow.
But farmers face more than just those problems. There are also labor shortages, caused by a number of factors, from less interest in agriculture among younger generations to wages to immigration policies that limit the work pool. Climate change is another major factor, as warming temperatures, floods, and droughts have a direct impact on yield. Farmers face all of these issues and more, making the business of farming … and feeding all of us … extremely challenging and unpredictable.
In his 2023 CES keynote, Deere Chairman and CEO John May articulately summed up both the challenge and solution to today's farming. “In the past farmers would grow more by using more. Bigger machines, more horsepower, more seeds, and more nutrients. This approach alone doesn't work today. There's less arable land, less rural labor, less time to do their jobs due to weather volatility, and rising input costs. Technology is the solution to these challenges. Technology allows farmers to create more with fewer resources.”3
This exemplifies how today's innovations are providing solutions to the increasing challenges of farming and of feeding the world. And, what might surprise you is that although farming is one of the world's oldest industries, farmers are actually among the earliest adopters of today's innovations. The next time you fill your plate consider this: It takes everything from AI, robotics, and computer vision to advanced sensing, cloud computing, data analytics, and more to put that food on your table.
Deere Leading the Agtech Revolution
As mentioned in Chapter 1, Deere has been at the forefront of the agtech revolution and has transformed itself into a technology-powered organization bringing game-changing offerings to farmers. Through this mission, Deere is empowering farmers to do more with less so they can put food on an exponentially growing number of plates across the world, both today and for future generations (see Figure 2.1).
As a company nearly 200 years old, Deere has always had innovation in its DNA, from inventing the first steel plow in 1837, and replacing horses with engines by introducing the first two tractors in 1918, to inventing the first all-hydraulic bulldozer in 1958.5
Figure 2.1 An example of Deere's use of advanced innovations that help farmers do more with less is its See & Spray™ technology. The technology enables farmers to only spray herbicides on the weeds, which reduces the amount needed by up to 66%. The technology can “recognize the difference between plants even in conditions that would challenge the human eye. See & Spray has 36 cameras … [that] scan more than 2,200 square feet of land and capture 1.2 billion pixels per second. If you tried to match that level of sensing and processing with human eyes, it would take nearly 6,000 people.”4
Source: Copyright © 2024 Deere & Company
In more recent years, Deere has embraced digital innovations as they came to market, developing applications that have literally changed the face of agriculture. For example, in the late 1990s, Deere saw the tremendous opportunity GPS technology could bring to farming and began investing in this technology. The company later integrated GPS into its tractors so they could drive themselves through a field within an inch of accuracy, and then used GPS technology to collect geospatial data on both the inputs farmers used throughout the year and the crops they harvested at the end of the year. GPS technology is now used by farmers in more than 100 countries.6
As Deere continued on its mission to transform farming, it used connectivity and the Internet of Things to offer farmers the benefits of cloud computing, giving them access to valuable, real-time information for faster and better decision-making. And in 2022, Deere introduced the first fully autonomous self-driving tractor, which features advanced digital innovations like sensors and computer vision.
Deere is also leveraging AI and computer vision that integrates precision tech and cloud-based data with robotics, as well as computer vision and machine learning. These technologies have enabled Deere to revolutionize the planting process. Advanced sensors and robots place each seed in the ground at a scale and precision beyond human capacity, helping to optimize growth. Deere's computer vision technology enables farmers to quickly and precisely apply fertilizer so that only the weeds are hit with the pesticide, maximizing crops growing in their land. Today, Deere has more than 500,000 technology-powered connected machines running across more than a third of the earth's land surface.7 Smarter farming for better yields.
Moreover, the company is doing all of this with sustainability front and center in its mission. Deere's Leap Ambitions effort involves working to reduce carbon emission and resource consumption, recycle machinery and materials, and develop intelligent technology to help customers be more productive and profitable. The company has set goals to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions (direct and indirect) by 50% by the year 2030.8 Since 2017, the company has reduced operational greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 29%. Deere also surpassed its 2022 renewable electricity goal by achieving nearly 59% renewable electricity.9 These are just a few examples of the many sustainability efforts underway at Deere.
The result of Deere using tech for good has yielded significant quantifiable impacts. For example, the company's intelligent sprayers have helped farmers reduce herbicide use by approximately two-thirds (depending on crop and field conditions). Another example is Deere's current cloud network, which is comprised of hundreds of thousands of connected machines that provide farmers with critical information at their fingertips for better decision-making.10
But this mission has not only been good for farmers and our world. The effort has also had a tremendous impact on Deere's bottom line, with the company's net income growing to more than $10 billion in fiscal year 2023.11 This is proof that a relentless commitment to use technology to solve a massive problem like helping farmers feed our ever-growing population can marry purpose with profit and make a true difference in our world.
From a marketing perspective, Deere has built an irrefutable reputation and produced stories so strong they have universal appeal to all stakeholders. Deere's long and impressive awards list speaks volumes to this. In 2023 and 2024 alone, Deere was ranked #3 in brand reputation in an Axios/Harris Poll (2023), named among Time's World's Best Companies (2023), received CES Best of Innovation in Robotics (2023), named to Ethisphere Institute's Most Ethical Companies List (2024), ranked #1 in Construction & Farm Machinery by Fortune (2024), and ranked #9 in Newsweek's Excellence 1000 Index (2024).12
By transforming farming through today's technology, Deere has also created an entire economy around agtech, paving the way for other innovators to offer solutions. One such company is Indigo. Its Carbon by Indigo produces first-of-its-kind, registry-issued agricultural carbon credits, while supporting farmers in their transition toward more sustainable farming practices. This is one of many great examples of solutions now available that help farmers, the world's population, and the planet.
Deere Q&A
I had the pleasure of speaking with Deere Chairman and CEO John May about the company's impressive transformation from a traditional industrial company to a smart industrial company, leading the agtech revolution and doing so both sustainably and ethically. He shared valuable insights about this journey, including key organizational and behavioral changes, best practices, and lessons learned.
Q:
What would you tell other CEOs about Deere's re-positioning and its use of technology to deliver on that vision?
A:
We've historically been viewed as a traditional industrial company that develops products people use to make a living. I realized around 10 years ago that we could do more. We needed to transition beyond building the highest quality products to also focus on helping our customers do their jobs better, ultimately helping them become more profitable, more productive, and to do their jobs in an environmentally sustainable way.
To realize that goal, we restructured to evolve from a traditional industrial company to a smart industrial company. There were several fundamental changes we made to realize that goal. One was a shift from operating around a traditional matrix of regions and platforms to aligning our business around our customers and their production systems, meaning the kind of work they do. We focused on providing them with solutions that use automation, autonomy, and digitization to reach our goal of helping make them more profitable, more productive, and more sustainable.
Another key change was to centralize all of our technology investments and vertically integrate Deere technology. We also developed better ways to serve our customers throughout the lifecycle of owning our products and solutions. For example, we completely reorganized our parts and customer support functions and offer advanced technologies like predictive analytics to help our customers solve problems before they happen.
Q:
While there's a lot of hype about AI today, Deere is leveraging that technology with tremendous impact for its customers. Tell us a little more about that.
A:
Our use of artificial intelligence, machine learning, computer vision, and advanced sensors enable us to automate machines that deliver productivity and efficiency outcomes customers couldn't produce on their own. Farming, for example, is a very unpredictable business with so many variables – humidity, moisture, temperature, wind speed, the type of seed you plant, and how crops grow, just to name a few. Effectively navigating through all of those variables is nearly impossible without technology.
We saw a huge opportunity to automate this process by using advanced sensor technology, helping farmers make better business decisions than they could make on their own, and then automating farming machines to maximize outcomes. A great example of this is See & Spray™, a technology that “sees” the difference between a weed and a healthy plant, and only sprays the weed with herbicides. This technology can significantly reduce herbicide use, which has a tremendous financial benefit to the customer and reduces environmental impact.
I remember talking to government officials a few years ago who were asking how we could help farmers in their stewardship of the environment since agriculture can have such an impact, given the use of herbicides, pesticides, nitrogen, etc. I knew the best way to do that was to develop solutions that both improve their bottom line and have a positive impact on the environment. That's the wonderful thing about agriculture: we can do both at the same time.
Q:
Is there any wisdom you can share on how a company of Deere's size and scope stays on top of new technologies that deliver both sustainability and better outcomes for your customers?
A:
The most important change we made was to fully centralize our tech stack. That involved taking that function away from the individual product lines because those teams don't have the time or resources to continually search for new technologies, experiment with them, and then leverage our R&D budget to scale them quickly across the enterprise.
A great example of the effectiveness and efficiency of this approach is the computer vision we use to autonomously drive a tractor and tillage tool, which uses the same computer and camera we put on the back of a wheel loader, so the driver doesn't accidently run into anything. Centralizing the tech function enables us to more readily identify and leverage this type of efficiency and to fully focus on leveraging technology innovations to deliver some of the best solutions in the industry.
Q:
How does Deere's positioning around technology, sustainability, and customer focus impact employee morale?
A:
One of the things we realized when we bought the AI company Blue River is the tremendous purpose we have in agriculture and construction. Our mantra is, “We run so life can leap forward.” That means empowering our customers to have economically and environmentally sustainable businesses so that they can provide the food, fuel, clothing, shelter, and infrastructure the world needs.
How we solve that is extremely complicated and extremely difficult. For example, developing a fully autonomous tractor that's capable of tilling 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and performing the job better than the customer could by themselves is really challenging, and it excites our employees. Giving them our customers’ most difficult problems to solve, and not overly constraining them, truly energizes our employees.
Q:
What role do customers play in your innovation or your exploration of new technologies and applications?
A:
Our customers are central to everything we do. To that end, we've changed the way we develop products to ensure our solutions fully meet our customers’ needs. If you're a traditional industrial company, you don't put anything out globally unless it is 100% hardened, because the risk is high, and failure is really expensive. As a smart industrial company, we've turned that thinking on its head.
Today, the way we develop products is to embed our production systems teams with our customers. We are literally on their farms, working with customers day in and day out to fully understand their biggest problems. Once we develop technology to help solve those issues, we put it in the customer's hands. When it's in the early phases of development, we have customers test it and give us feedback. We use pilot programs in which our customers pay for the technology. This process is done at a small scale, and we find that if a customer pays for the technology, they're invested in it and give us highly valuable feedback that is very specific. Through this process, our customers help us refine products to meet their needs and solve their problems.
That process is a massive shift from how most traditional industrial companies operate. It requires a mindset shift as well. We accept that solutions may not be perfect out of the gate and might require further improvement. But we also know that by working directly with customers to test and refine our products, we develop solutions that offer breakthroughs in how our customers do their jobs.
Q:
What efforts are you taking to lower your carbon footprint?
A:
A couple of years back, we established what we call our Leap Ambitions. These include not only our business objectives, but also our environmental goals. As we've told shareholders, the government, and other constituents, we are committed to reducing the greenhouse gas impact of our operations and products – Scope 1, 2, and 3. For example, we are actively working a number of programs to address Scope 3, category 11, which is the emissions generated by our products. But what's interesting is that, for agriculture, that represents only a small percentage of the negative environmental impact. Addressing the rest involves changing the way farmers prepare and manage their land.
To help address that, we've committed that by 2030, we're going to help our customers improve their nitrogen use efficiency by 20%. How? By developing tools like ExactShot™, which uses computer vision and robotics to place starter fertilizer precisely onto seeds as they're planted, rather than applying a continuous flow of fertilizer to the entire row of seeds. This can help farmers significantly reduce the use of nitrogen during planting. It's amazing. As our engineers explain, that literally means millions and millions of gallons of nitrogen saved, significantly reducing environmental impact while helping improve our customers' bottom line.
There are so many examples like that one. For instance, we're also working with several large petroleum companies on the development of renewable diesel. We're demonstrating the effectiveness of growing oilseeds as a cover crop that can then be processed directly by refineries to create 100% renewable diesel fuel. This renewable fuel can be used by our customers without requiring any changes to their equipment, creating a circular economy, and reducing their overall environmental footprint.
Q:
Do you have any advice around how to use technology ethically?
A:
One of the things we're really committed to is maintaining the environment of trust and security that we've established with our customers. For example, we've created a cloud-based ecosystem that contains agronomic data for millions of acres. We've been very consistent from day one with our customers that they control the data they share with us, and we will not sell it to anyone, period.
This can include information like what seed a farmer used, what the soil fertility was, and when they put down nitrogen or herbicide. These different data points can explain why a farmer grew 300 bushels of corn on one field versus the field right next to it that only produced 260 bushels. We process and store that data for our customers, but we don't sell it. Our platform allows customers to direct the sharing of data, if they choose to, as part of running their operation. For example, they may choose to share it with someone who does insect treatments on their field to benefit their business.
