recap of WFBSC Images courtesy of Debbie Lefever Macro Trends Identified As The International BSC Community Gathers WFBSC event identifies the biggest impacts to hit facility service contractors in coming years. By: Rich DiPaolo, editorial director I Imagine a world where you wake up and look in the mirror to read news, emails, messages and other important information as you brush your teeth. In this new world, as drones fly overhead and automobiles com-municate traffic issues with each other, many professional cleaning workers are replaced by more efficient robots, and a facility’s count-less sensors define what is clean. According to information shared by industry, technology and financial leaders at the 20th Congress of the World Federation of Building Service Contractors (WFBSC), which was held April 6-9, 2014, in New York City, not only is this world possible, it will soon be realized and building service contractors (BSCs) can either adjust or dissolve. Exponential Technologies The event’s first keynote speaker and author of the New York Times best-seller, Abundance – The Future is Better Than You Think, Dr. Peter Diamandis discussed technology’s imminent impact on the facility services industry and inventors. During his presentation entitled, “Innovations & Breakthroughs on the road to Abundance,” Dr. Diamandis provided an overview of how quickly exponential technologies and the business world are changing today. He noted that we are currently in an age where startups are re-placing long-standing, well-funded companies. Quoting Richard Foster of Yale University, Dr. Diamandis shared, “The average lifespan of a company listed in the S&P 500 has de-creased from 67 years in the 1920s to 15 years today.” Further, he added, if companies, such as BSCs, are not ahead of exponential technologies they are likely to be crushed by these in-novations. Examples of exponential technologies he noted include: Com-putation/networks; artificial intelligence; robotics; 3D printing; synthetic biology; and digital medicine. “The technologies that are in the lab and coming to market in this decade or the next decade are going to be converging,” explained Dr. Diamandis, adding that exponential entrepreneurs are using these technologies to level the playing field against larger corporations. “And, the notion is, if you don’t disrupt your-self, someone else will.” Dr. Diamandis offered several critical insights during the keynote, including: The only constant is change and the rate of change is in-creasing; standing still equals death; your competition is no longer the multinational overseas and it is the explosion of exponentially empowered entrepreneurs; and your mindset matters (a lot) … what’s yours? According to Dr. Diamandis, BSCs must be open to change and stop thinking in traditional, linear ways. Service providers must evaluate their most pressing chal-lenges and understand that there is a technology to help solve those issues. Automation And Information Alfred Kärcher GmbH & Co. KG’s Markus Asch continued the tech-nology discussion during his presentation entitled, “Technology Today and In The Future.” First, he provided some statistics to help the audience realize the scope of the cleaning industry. “This industry is a substantial industry. It’s an industry of about $200 billion revenue and, what I think is even more impressive, an industry of more than 17 million people employed worldwide. Name me another industry of a similar size and of similar capabil-ity,” challenged Asch. Asch also noted some key industry challenges, such as a lack of standards. “To put it in a very simple question: What is clean?,” he chal-lenged the audience, adding that for this very reason, people tend to commoditize the task of facility cleaning. www.CMMOnline.com 25
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