As a member of the press attending a World Economic Forum (WEF) conference, I was surprised by how welcomed I felt.
A Mouthpiece for the Few? Reporting on the “Downtown Abbey” Economic Forum
Adam Byrnes
Adam Byrnes is an MBA and MS candidate at the University of Michigan’s Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise. At Michigan he is focused on the intersection of entrepreneurship, innovation, and sustainability. Prior to his graduate studies, he held various roles private, public, and non-profit sector roles including: working on multiple (mostly successful) political campaigns, developing public policy at multiple government levels, managing relationships with over a hundred elected officials for a large electric utility, and developing a strategic plan for an urban ecology non-profit in San Francisco. Passionate about technology commercialization, Adam has recently worked for three early-stage start-ups, including one in Bangalore, India working to provide renewable energy to the 400 million Indians without access to electricity. In his free time Adam enjoys photography, backpacking through national parks, and getting purposely lost in a neighborhood bookstore.
Recent Posts
The F-Word [Failure] Comes to the World Economic Forum
Let’s face it, failure sucks. Failing is neither particularly fun nor particularly rewarding. And yet entrepreneurs do it all the time. According to a recent study from Harvard, three-quarters of venture-backed start-ups fail. At the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting of the New Champions last week, failure and the resilience required to bounce back from it were discussed as necessary requirements for future entrepreneurs.
Increasing Population – the Elephant in the Forum
Population was on the mind of many attendees of the World Economic Forum’s 7th Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Dalian, China this week, even if the word was rarely spoken. The theme of this year’s meeting was “Meeting the Innovation Imperative.” Implicit to the theme, however, was the fact that the imperative for innovation is driven in large part by a bloated global population that reached seven billion in 2011 and is on its way to nine billion by 2050.
Entrepreneurs Help Motor City Become Mobility City
DETROIT, US – How does a bankrupt city with a declining population and dwindling public finances provide transportation for its residents? Detroit’s answer to that question has increasingly been to leverage private investments and entrepreneurial ideas. A few of these entrepreneurial ideas are homegrown. Nearly six years ago local investors developed the M1 Rail concept, the city’s first-ever light rail. The $140 million project, funded almost entirely by private investment, breaks ground later this month and will start operations in the late 2015.