The Future in the News: Ford seeks new ideas from futurists

The Detroit News has a great piece on how Ford is using futurists to help with some of their recent business woes and plan for the markets of the future. They quote me about how this kind of thinking has a long, illustrious history, especially at Ford.

What was really fascinating about this article was talking with its author, Bryce Hoffman, about how Michigan will actually be a manufacturing center of the highest level of automotive technology for years to come — but unfortunately, this may leave some of the traditional factory workers out of the loop. Instead of employing hundreds of thousands, most of the world’s auto companies will do R&D out of Michigan, drawing on the state’s world-class knowledge base. Then, once the bugs are worked out of new technologies, the lower-value-added manufacturing will be farmed overseas, and Michigan will start again on the next cutting edge.

(Bryce, you’ve got all the makings of a great futurist yourself!)

As in South Dakota, this transition to a knowledge economy promises to be both fascinating and difficult.

-Garland

Labels: economic development, Futurists, Manufacturing