Centre for Digital Transformation

Event details

13 March 2024
17:30 - 19:30
LT2, Imperial College Business School, South Kensington Campus, Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom
Alumni, Public, Staff

Join us for a book launch presentation and discussion hosted by Professor David Shrier and Imperial College’s Centre for Digital Transformation.

Keynote 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm

Reception 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm

"PROXIMITY How Coming Breakthroughs in Just-in-Time Transform Business, Society, and Daily Life" - Robert C. Wolcott & Kaihan Krippendorff, Columbia University Press. Forthcoming May, 2024. UK Amazon Pre-Order here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Proximity-Breakthroughs-Just-Time-Transform/dp/0231207581/

Robert C. Wolcott, Ph.D. (Adjunct Professor of Innovation, Booth School of Business, University of Chicago & Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University) shares a pivotal concept introduced by his new book.

What if you could have what you want, produced and provided immediately and affordably no matter how customized—with minimal environmental impact? Products, services, experiences on demand, no magic involved. Just-in-time everything, everywhere, all the time.

We call this revolution Proximity, and it’s transforming every industry. Digital technologies push the production and provision of value—products, services and experiences—ever closer to the moment of demand in time and space. Not forecasted demand… real, ready-to-pay-for-it demand.

Few have recognized how pervasive, long-lasting, and profound this trend will be. Wolcott and Krippendorff define Proximity, investigate radical change underway across industries and our lives, and offer unparalleled foresight for business leaders, investors, entrepreneurs, policy makers, and citizens.

The book places rapidly advancing technologies into context—from Generative AI and 3D printing to lab-grown meats, renewable energies and virtual reality—and explores how geopolitical tensions, pandemics, resource constraints and other factors accelerate trends already underway. Wolcott & Krippendorff address the optimistic and the ominous of our rapidly emerging proximate world.

"The implications of Proximity will be felt for years to come. Opportunity awaits."

From the Foreword by Philip Kotler

Event details

13 March 2024
17:30 - 19:30
LT2, Imperial College Business School, South Kensington Campus, Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom
Alumni, Public, Staff

Event details

Date: 13 March 2024
Time: 17:30 - 19:30
Venue: LT2, Imperial College Business School, South Kensington Campus, Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom
Audience: Alumni, Public, Staff