Executive Update

Curt Hall

Technological and economic developments are accelerating the exploration of the cosmos and leading to the formation of a next-generation space economy that promises to significantly impact life on Earth and in outer space. This Amplify Update examines commercial developments in conjunction with key trends in emerging technologies and how they are helping to accelerate space exploration.

Advisor

Sylvester Kaczmarek

AI is increasingly being used for tasks in space like satellite repair, spacecraft maintenance, planetary-surface exploration, and data processing. However, there is a risk of system compromise, either through cyberattacks or internal failures. This Advisor explores AI-driven space systems and ways to mitigate the risks associated with them.

Advisor

Cynthia Clark

In this Advisor, Cynthia E. Clarke delves into climate strategies for boards of directors, including avoiding greenwashing, staying up to speed on potential regulatory changes, reporting on the risks of transitioning to net zero, and having a dedicated team accountable for ESG reporting to ensure information accuracy.

Advisor

Ani Melkonyan Gottschalk, Maximilian Palmié

This Advisor explores the relationship between urban density and transport-related energy consumption and offers strategies for decarbonizing urban transportation systems.

Article

Sk. Riad Bin Ashraf, Denis Daus, Tobias Kuester Campioni

Sk. Riad Bin Ashraf, Denis Daus, and Tobias Kuester-Campioni delve into transport-oriented development (TOD) by describing a proposal to municipal authorities in Dortmund, Germany, to help the city achieve its sustainable development objectives. Although Dortmund has a comprehensive public transportation system, it’s not convenient enough to discourage private car use, especially given the city’s urban sprawl. The proposal includes adding micromobility hubs at major transit points; installing AI-based adjustable bus routing; adding pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly infrastructure; and adding high-density, mixed-use development near transit hubs. Finally, the authors point to TOD projects in India, China, Indonesia, and Australia that can serve as examples for urban planners as they work on their sustainable development objectives.

Article

Kerstin Kopal, Dirk Wittowsky

Kerstin Kopal and Dirk Wittowsky holistically examine the interaction between societal benefits and public health aspects. As integrated as these functions are, public health concerns are usually included too late or not at all in urban planning processes today. The authors use a survey on walkability conducted in 2021 in Essen, Germany, to show how cities can identify key relationships between the built environment and healthy mobility behavior. The goal is to promote active mobility interventions by city planners; along the way, Kopal and Wittowsky describe how walkability data can be used by stakeholders like real estate companies and public transportation operators.

Article

François Joseph Van Audenhove, Hans Arby

François-Joseph Van Audenhove and Hans Arby look at recent MaaS trends and detail four causes for slow progress: lack of demand, offerings that don’t match demand, suboptimal enablement, and lack of viable business cases. The answer, they believe, lies in cities setting priorities to help extract value at the system level. Van Audenhove and Arby advocate for a comprehensive framework that includes framing dimensions (e.g., mobility patterns and system characteristics and creating the right conditions for mobility service providers) and enabling dimensions (e.g., integration support, regulations that allow open collaboration, and systems to ensure learnings from experimentation are extracted and shared). “One size fits all” is not the answer for MaaS, write the authors. Rather, comprehensive approaches and increased collaboration between public and private stakeholders are needed.

Article

Christian Müller, Jochen Gönsch, Louisa Albrecht, Max Staskiewicz

Christian Müller, Jochen Gönsch, Louisa Albrecht, and Max Staskiewicz explore dynamic pricing mechanisms for car-sharing services. Their data-driven model predicts future vehicle movements and the expected profit of each vehicle, then uses machine learning and AI to combine various data sources. This results in different prices for the same vehicle for different customers, depending on their location, thus rebalancing cars in the pickup/drop-off zone without the operator having to relocate cars (adding emissions). According to the authors, an extensive computational study and a case study showed the approach outperforms all benchmarks, saves providers operational costs, and improves sustainability via clear decarbonization benefits.

Article

Andrea Lorenzini

Andrea Lorenzini explains how SUMPs can help local and regional authorities meet targets set out in the European Green Deal. Six laboratories (in Belgium, Romania, the UK, Lithuania, Italy, and Greece) were set up to show how cities can develop the next generation of SUMPs and “put mobility at the heart of sustainable urban transformation.” These labs are finding a need for strong coordination and collaboration at the local and regional levels (including cross-sectoral links), and Lorenzini describes what this could look like. He points out that achieving net zero carbon by 2025 will require radical changes in transport and governance, followed by a periodic realignment of local planning objectives, partnerships, and frameworks with the high-level policy goals set at EU, national, and regional levels.

Article

Ani Melkonyan Gottschalk

Innovative technologies such as MaaS, blockchain, big data, Internet of Things, augmented reality, AI, autonomous driving, and digital twins are being implemented to decarbonize transportation and mobility systems. This issue of Amplify highlights the potential of technologies and new actors to develop mobility services so innovative that they can transform the current system into a more widely accepted, sustainable, resilient, and integrated model.

Advisor

Curt Hall

GenAI appears to be lowering the barrier to entry for developing sophisticated cyberattacks and scams. However, the technology also offers solutions to help meet the threats imposed by hackers, cybercriminals, and state actors. This Advisor examines the evolving GenAI threat and solution landscape.

Advisor

Natacha Prudent, Mary Crossan

DEI has evolved from “nice to have” to a mission-critical component ensuring an organization’s progress and competitiveness in the global market. The questions in this Advisor serve as a guide to activate transcendence and drive, which are important character traits for leading DEI efforts.

Advisor

Francesco Marsella, Petter Kilefors, Maximilian Scherr, Ralf Baron, Satya Easwaran

In this Advisor, we explore a key trend revealed through ADL's CEO Insights research analysis: while a shift has occurred in ESG priorities, approaches to it have matured, and most leaders still see its importance.

Advisor

Michael Marus, Curt Hall

Cutter Expert Curt Hall recently spoke with Michael Marus, CIO of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). FSC has been testing and applying blockchain since 2021 to enable sustainability with forest-based materials and has found that blockchain’s traceability helps it achieve integrity and credibility for its certification system. This Advisor presents an excerpt from that interview.

Advisor

Francesco Marsella, Petter Kilefors, Maximilian Scherr, Ralf Baron, Satya Easwaran

In this Advisor, we explore findings from ADL’s 2024 “CEO Insights” study, including the first trend uncovered by research: CEOs are positive about the medium-term economic outlook and confident about future company growth.

Advisor

Margaret O'Gorman

In this Advisor, Margaret O’Gorman offers some initial steps leaders can take to help their companies start a nature positive journey: raise awareness in the organization, explore the organization’s relationship to nature, assess for impacts, and plan interventions.

Executive Update

Eva Zabey

This Amplify Update discusses ways to extend the momentum created by the adoption of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) — aka “The Biodiversity Plan” — and identifies business action as critical to the mission of halting and reversing nature loss by 2030.

Advisor

Curt Hall

This Advisor explores the rise of digital experience management (DXM). When implemented successfully, DXM can facilitate better engagement with existing customers, assist in acquiring new customers, and help differentiate a brand from its competition.

Advisor

Kimberley Young Milani

This Advisor delineates how character is defined and positioned within a leadership context. Based on extensive research conducted by the Ian O. Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership, character can be understood through two foundational frameworks: the Effective Leader framework and the Ivey Leader Character Framework (ILCF).

Advisor

Sara Cook

This Advisor offers two more pieces of advice for creating intersections between corporate ambition and action for nature. These steps can help a company move from understanding its nature-related dependencies to understanding its opportunities.