Once a year FORTUNE magazine publishes their list of the 500 richest companies in America. This year, in addition to the regular list, they asked Peter Schwartz of Global Business Network to do some prognosticating about which firms will make up the top ten in 2054. Global Business Network has provided consultation services for many FORTUNE 500 companies as well as the CIA.
Regrettably there’s no cryonics company here, but there are a couple of companies that would interest cryonicists. Here’s a condensed version are his very educated guesses: (The full text is in the April 5th issue)
AmazonEbay. Amazon and eBay merged in 2015 to become the worlds largest Transaction Envelope Company. (TEC) The TEC would know everything about you , since the day you were born. In the vastly wealthier and universally connected world of 2054, most shopping for anything is virtual. In addition to being able to supply goods and services, it’s also provides banking, credit card and insurance services. Everyone would have their own digital shopper (DS,) a cross between a butler and a personal accountant which they could access any place, any time.
Your DS knows everything about you, your tastes, spending habits, even your financial prospects. It’s estimated AmazonBay’s transactions between it (a TEC) and DSs will gross 10 trillion dollars by 2054. Some of the smaller TEC’s are Bank of Wal-Martia and ProvidiPenny.
Toyota. Nothing too radical in automobile appearance, but under the hood things are very different. Propulsion systems vary from fuel cell to turbogenerators, and are much more powerful than today’s engines. Although the world’s population has stabilized at around eight billion, in each decade in the new century, both India and China have seen 100 million people climb out of poverty and into the market for a car. Recognizing the huge economic shift towards Asia, in 2024 FORTUNE renamed it’s list a "global" one and moved their main offices to Honolulu.
Sinogazzon. Created in 2025, it’s a merger of Exxon, Gazprom, a Russian gas producer and Sinogaz, a Chinese gas producer. Oil production peaked in 2035, and began it’s decline in 2040. At which time hydrogen derived from natural gas began to replace gasoline. Largely due to Exxon’s technological leadership, Sinogazzon is a world leader, with huge gas projects in Australia, Antartica and Qatar.
Sinobiocorp. Unlike the U.S. and Europe where people were skeptical about bio-enhancement, Asia embraced it. Vast aging populations in China, India and Japan created a market hungry for biological advances. Sinobiocorp, formed in 2010, is the world leader in drugs, agriculture and bioindustrial processing. After losing its economic leadership to Shanghai, Hong Kong has become China’s center of pleasure and high end living. Hong Kong has become the center for the most advanced health care in the world. With life spans pushing 150, Sinobiocorp provides services that include tissue regeneration to reverse aging, tissue realignment to reverse appearance, and complete cloning.
Indosoft. Not long into the new century, the American computer giants began to be dominated by their Indian talent. Over time the center of action moved from the U.S. to India. In 2030 Microsoft and Oracle merged, changed their name to Indosoft and moved their headquarters to Mumbai.
While world famous for their intelligence and competence, the Indian programmers are losing their jobs to artificial intelligent units (AIU,) causing the company’s management to wonder if at last they are in danger of putting themselves out of work. As more intellectual activities are taken over by AIUs, the debate on I-sourcing will increase.
IBM. In 2023 IBM introduced the BohrBox the first quantum computer for office use. Rendering today’s computer hard drives obsolete, bean sized capsules of gas can hold trillions of times more information than today’s computers. In 2035 IBM dominated it’s field by buying HP, which had acquired Intel a decade earlier.
Because of the endless drive for productivity, intelligent devices are imbedded in nearly everything and able to communicate with one another. Nearly all technology is accessible through voice recognition, in this new network marketplace IBM’s income is from "bit fees," a small fee for each bit of the unimaginably huge amount of data moved for it’s customers.
Pattelco. At one time an Indian software company, it bought the remnants of AT&T in 2025, and put the long distance company’s name into it’s own. At that time it launched the telepresence (TP) industry. Nearly every room, public and private, at home or at work, is now equipped with telepresence devices. TP makes virtual travel possible because of its ability to convey the experience of another location convincingly, and for people at the other end to experience you as present.
Nestle. Nestle dominates the field of nutriceuticals, the new class of foods that combines agriculture and drugs. The company focuses on "making well people even better." They have a new line of chocolate cookies with stem cell memory boosters, their frozen food meals are programmed to automatically lower cholesterol and dissolve trans fats. Their cosmetic division, L’Ore-All features a lipstick containing the recommended daily dose of 100 vitamins and minerals.
Nanobotix. Based in Palo Alto, Nanobotix has been the pioneer in manufacturing at the atomic level. Except for steel, cement and a few other commodities, most manufacturing is done using nanotechnology, the process of building anything molecule by molecule. In 2042 the company introduced its most advanced product, the desktop factory. Resembling an early laser printer, it has a transparent cylinder where the operator can see the object appear as the nano assemblers do their work. The prognosticators make no mention of the medical benefits of nanotechnology, which most people feel is the key to revival for today’s cryo patients.
News Corp. In 2010 this company led the trend in making all types of media available on demand-movies, newspapers, books, music. Its latest entry in ubiquicasting is the company’s media telepresence (MTP) service. For a substantial bit fee, advanced computer technology virtually embeds a person in an event or a situation.
As profitable as the service is, the company’s biggest revenue producer is the ownership of sports teams and their distribution rights all over the world. Rupert Murdoch, the firm’s CEO, who died in 2027, at the age of 96 spent the last ten years of his life entering everything he had ever known and as much of his persona as he could into a state of the art
IBM 2.4 petabyte quantum bubble array.
Insiders say Murdoch is now, if possible, even more of a force to be reckoned with for one simple reason---he never sleeps.
Apparently the prognosticators never considered that Murdoch might like to return to this life with the benefit of cryonics, instead choosing eternity in a virtual world.