Following in Uber’s footsteps

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Following in Uber’s footsteps

The fourth industrial revolution, which was proposed as an alternative plan to overcome economic crisis at the Davos Forum in January, led to tremendous attention and discussion. As we face the paradigm shift of the fourth industrial revolution ignited by ICT, Korea hopes for a new opportunity to join the rank of developed nations. The fourth industrial revolution is expected to remove seven million jobs and create two million new jobs. While it would bring great fruits to active movers, it would bring a much harsher reality to less dynamic workers.

Nokia, Sony and Motorola were industry leaders at a certain time, but they failed to read the changes and had to step aside. GE declared a switch from manufacturing industry to software, and companies like Apple and IBM constantly attempt transformations, and they managed to overcome changes and survive.

In the waves of the fourth industrial revolution, what companies do we need to pay attention to as Korea hopes to become the first mover?

Lately, CNBC named Uber and Airbnb as the disruptive innovators to lead the fourth industrial revolution. Ride sharing service Uber topped the ranking. It started with imagination, creativity and an innovative idea. How about people share the personal vehicles that are not in use? It took the creative idea of establishing an innovative business model by integrating the imagination with existing platforms. It secured customers who are Apple, Google and Facebook users and utilized Google Maps for vehicle operation. In only five years, the disruptive and innovative service surpassed 100-year-old Ford and GM in market value, and currently, it is competing against Google in self-driving and robot cars.

The refreshing imagination, creative ideas and disruptive innovation to integrate technologies to make life more convenient and happier are the core competitiveness to lead the fourth industrial revolution. The most important issue of the creative economy innovation centers, the K-ICT Device Lab and research institutes at universities, is how to nurture talented people with flexible and creative ideas to combine and create various technologies and how to help the overcome failures and maintain passion and challenging spirit.
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