IT innovations can help mitigate climate change: Expert

The Peninsula:

Hargadon stressed this in his talk last night as the speaker of Connected Speakers Series of the Supreme Council of Information and Communication Technology (ictQatar) held at Four Seasons Hotel.

His talk explored how innovation really happens, what some of the latest innovations in ICT are, and what to expect for the future.

Hargadon, who is also the founding director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and the Center for Energy Efficiency at UC-Davis, uses past energy revolutions as a lens to view the present and future.

He believes in the notion that “what can we expect—and from whom” are the critical and most often misunderstood questions around innovations in energy. In his presentation, Hargadon answered these questions by combining historical research, innovation theory, and current trends.

Hargadon cited a case in point that more energy has been used in the modern times yet more than half of it, particularly coal energy with 61 percent, have been wasted that efficiency can help address this problem.

In the most part of his presentation, Hargadon explained the three criteria for thinking innovation which are innovation as not about the idea on how some technologies were invented in the distant past, that innovation is about connecting not inventing and technological revolutions set their own course.

Professor Hargadon’s research focuses on the effective management of innovation and the strategic role of design in managing technology transitions, particularly in the development and commercialization of sustainable technologies.

He has written extensively on knowledge and technology brokering and the role of learning and knowledge management in innovation.

His research has been used to develop or guide new innovation programmes in organisations as diverse as Hewlett-Packard, Avery Dennison, Clorox, Edmunds.com, Mars, Canadian Health Services, and Silicon Valley start-ups

This was the second event in ictQatar’s Connected Speaker Series. The first event featured Dr Soumitra Dutta, who discussed the Web 2.0 revolution and how social networking is changing the way we communicate both personally and professionally.