Globally Disruptive “Wildcards” That Are Potential Company Killers and Governmental Game Changers. Do we anticipate or react?

Globally disruptive “Wildcards” that demand exploration by the private sector through “Immersive” scenario driven wargames, role playing, professional facilitation and out briefs, both written and oral that drive real strategy development, and initiative-taking crisis mitigation.

  • A major Pan-Asian Nation rising with a zero-sum perspective and behavior: Unflagging drive towards global hegemony and control of other countries natural resources including critical rare earth minerals, other nations debt, infrastructure funding, mindshare, and aggressive offshore containment of critics of said country.
  • A.I. and technology, that’s continuously impacting humanity that is already out of “control.”
  • Use of nuclear weapons, and implications thereof. If Covid was catastrophic, what about the psychological impact of nukes popping off? How do we plan for what is no longer a “never event.”
  • Global psychological dysfunction and addiction to “smart devices” and social networking that are in fact destroying generations beginning in 2008 with the introduction of the iPhone, the rise of Facebook and other social platforms that drive dysfunction and narcissism at global scale. Will Gen X and Gen Z have the social skills to lead other humans, take care of the aging, let alone themselves?
  • Water: Supply, distribution, production, and purification and private vs. public vs. private citizen interests. Where is this going and who is really in control?
  • Suffocation of ultra-high-tech innovation due to constraints in seed and early-stage capital.
  • Longevity and age reversal: What is it and what does it mean and why it matters.

Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming can assist.

Case Studies

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Case Study and Scenario 1:

COVID:

Where Wargaming Could Have Helped Prepare and Respond to Covid. 

The Scenario and Reality:

Covid. Surfaces in Wuhan. Then, spreads regionally quickly. In parallel, international flights from Wuhan spread lethality to APAC, Europe, and North America, and in a matter of months shutting down a massive segment of the post-industrial economy. We knew such an event was probable after SARS-1 and US Government planning and preparation.

Thinking ”out of the box/comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

  • What would it have been worth to electronics, auto manufacturers and countless others to have explored contingency planning BEFORE COVID? Trillions?
  • Why didn’t the commercial real estate industry plan for such an event? Because they did not have the tools, perspective, or guidance to “see it.” We can change this in the future.
  • Why did not employers anticipate the “post-pandemic” possibility of employees simply choosing to no longer come to work because they no longer see the “value” of “work,” and many are mentally ill and unable to work.

The Scenario and Reality:

What happened to the integrated response in USA between White House, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Centers for Disease Control (CDC), The National Guard, the States, and the Private Sector?

  • It all disintegrated based on partisan politics, corruption, and balkanization at the local and state level. Innovative solutions were ignored, and big pharma profiteered. Could we have thought through this?
  • Why didn’t we flood the market with tests? Answer. Testing made politicians look bad. Could we have anticipated this?
  • Why were we in lock-down for 2 + years killing the economy, real estate, and mental health of the nation?
  • The airlines and corporations refused to understand, or manage their approach, causing permanent damage to operations, morale, productivity, and overall health.
  • Why did corporations refuse risk mitigation services and “return to work” strategies when they knew productivity was suffering massively by nobody in the office and workers not even domiciled in the USA?
  • Cheap, informed, and effective solutions and risk mitigations strategies were not embraced by the private sector nor the media.
  • Why was covid mitigation “pay to play” for testing and treatments?

“Supply chain” interruption and using Covid as the excuse. We learned our supply chain is fatally flawed. However, was/ is it due to Covid/ post Covid?

  • When “Just in time,” ultra-low inventory models were implemented, the ideation of greater profits and lower overhead was all that was discussed. Nobody explored the downside risk as they simply could not see it. We assist in opening an organization “lens” to alternative architectures.
  • The private sector now knows the government won’t/cannot solve the big problems.

Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

Case Study and Scenario 2:

Aging and Longevity

The Scenario and Reality:

What does it mean for companies, the global economy and all countries and levels of government if the progression of aging slows, diseases of inflammation downshift /contract, life expectancy increases, and the drivers of aging are altered in a manner that improves health-span and can also extends human life?

  • If we can extend life by just 1 year for most humans, impact in the trillions USD annually.
  • Research now indicates that aging is a disease that can be treated by technologies and therapies that can mitigate aging at the cellular level for some and billions are flowing into space.
  • We can now reduce the impact of inflammation related diseases that drive aging and mortality.
  • We can reduce stress on healthcare systems by reducing demand for services.
  • We have identified leaders and technologies that show immense promise.
  • Billions or trillions can be added annually to the global economy by reducing healthcare costs directly and indirectly for governments, individuals, providers, and payors (insurers). What is the impact?
  • How are healthcare providers, payors, pharma, and durable medical goods providers planning for gaming this out? What is the impact on the entire healthcare ecosystem and supply chain?
  • Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming can assist.

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Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

Case Study and Scenario 3:

Water

The Scenario and Reality:

Access to “free” water for drinking, household use, industrial applications and agriculture are all at risk. Private sector companies are seeking to control access and pricing. Municipal authorities want to monetize it in the name of conservation and the never-ending water shortage/draught and putting meters on all residences to increase revenue. Hidden, unaccountable bureaucrats are allowing unprecedented amounts of water in rivers to flow into the ocean with the rational that reservoirs are not safe over <50% designed capacity. What is going on and why, nationally, and globally?

  • “Access to water should NOT be a public right,” stated the Chair of a Leading Global Company that makes a market in water. Many corporate leaders are cleverly monetizing and exploiting it.
  • Water has been an historic cause of conflict; 1298 wars have been waged from 2500 B.C. until 2022 A.D. and more will certainly unfold in the near term.
  • First recorded war over water 2500 B.C. Lagash-Umma border dispute. Mesopotamia.
  • Most recent military action involving water February 2022 A.D. Russian troops destroy Ukrainian dam that blocked water [flowing] to Crimea.
    States in the USA are at each other’s necks while we export AG products that consume hundreds of billions of gallons in water used for agriculture. Beef consumes 1,800 gallons of water per pound. One hundred billion gallons annually is used for alfalfa that is exported to China. Agriculture consumes more water in California, much for low value export, than humans.
  • How does a water ecosystem that is increasingly in the private sector impact companies, the overall consumer economy, and the public sector? How is pricing for agricultural goods that are high in water consumption?

“Supply chain” interruption and using Covid as the excuse. We learned our supply chain is fatally flawed. However, was / is it due to Covid/ post Covid?

  • “Clean water is a key factor for economic growth. Deteriorating water quality is stalling economic growth, worsening health conditions, reducing food production, and exacerbating poverty in many countries. Governments must take urgent actions to help tackle water pollution so that countries can grow faster in equitable and environmentally sustainable ways.” World Bank Group President David Malpass

Wargaming Opportunities for Private and Public Sector

  • Our team is exploring and evaluating game changing Water and ALL issues related to its creation, storage, distribution, recycling of dirty water and generating power from waste byproducts extracted from gray and black water.
  • We have identified several “market ready” technologies that can make water easily available everywhere on the planet using water extraction, filtering, recycling, storage, and distribution technologies.

Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

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Case Study and Scenario 4:

Rare Earth Minerals:

The Scenario and Reality:

How do we explore a holistic solution set for forward looking and leaning corporations, investors, and the public sector alike so we can move beyond unidirectional dependency and supply chains that are having severe consequences?

Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

Possible scenarios for wargaming:

  • As a high-tech company or military/space org. what happens if rare earth supply is restricted again?
  • Should laws be passed that nationalize USA based rare earth minerals mines and reserves and prevent exports of rare earth minerals? How do we integrate local, state, and federal agendas?
  • What is the activity in inventing, investing in and deploying next gen mining discovery tech? USA DOE actions? Private sector? Global coalition?
  • Should we prevent sales of mining assets to offshore companies and countries? Reciprocal Risk?
  • Could earth minerals be synthetically created affordably & manmade (moonshot for R A E tech)?
  • What is the 5-to-10-year strategic end game if the dependency and supply chain are interrupted persistently or even semi-permanently due to political/military conflict?

Case Study and Scenario 5:

Artificial Intelligence

The Scenario and Reality:

Uncontrolled artificial intelligence (AI), and other destructive technologies not yet foreseen, (and) a worrying number of risks conspire to threaten the end of humanity. (William MacAskill Foreign Affairs, October 2022). OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently delivered testimony highlighting the dangers of A.I., warning of A.I. driven/enabled disinformation campaigns and manipulation and called for regulation, stating to Congress that AI could “cause significant harm to the world.”

What follows are explicitly excerpted from “The National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI)” Report.

  • “The rapidly improving ability of computer systems to solve problems and to perform tasks that would otherwise require human intelligence—and in some instances exceed human performance—is world altering.”
  • “AI technologies are the most powerful tools in generations for expanding knowledge, increasing prosperity, and enriching human experience. AI is also the quintessential “dual use” technology. The ability of a machine to perceive, evaluate, and act more quickly and accurately than a human represents a competitive advantage in any field—civilian or military. AI technologies will be a source of enormous power for the companies and countries that harness them.”
  • “AI is expanding the window of vulnerability the United States has already entered. For the first time since World War II, America’s technological predominance—the backbone of its economic and military power—is under threat. China possesses the might, talent, and ambition to surpass the United States as the world’s leader in AI in the next decade if current trends do not change. Simultaneously, AI is deepening the threat posed by cyber-attacks and disinformation campaigns (used) to infiltrate our society, steal our data, and interfere in our democracy.”

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Thinking ”out of the box/ comfort zone” + Wargaming could have assisted.

Inverting Global Challenges & Crisis into Global Opportunities