By Madeleine Hillyer.
The World Economic Forum announced its 2021 Technology Pioneers, young and growing tech companies taking on top global concerns with innovative technologies and business models. From artificial intelligence (AI) to fintech, the 2021 Tech Pioneers cohort is using new tech to protect the climate, improve healthcare and much more.
“The 2021 cohort of Tech Pioneers includes many future headline makers at the forefront of their industries,” said Susan Nesbitt, Head of the Global Innovators Community, World Economic Forum. “These companies show great potential to not only shake up their industries but offer real solutions to global problems. They’ll bring great value to the World Economic Forum’s mission of improving the state of the world with their participation in the Technology Pioneers community.”
This year’s Technology Pioneers are emerging leaders in a wide range of industries that span healthcare, cleantech, AI, logistics and more. While at the cutting edge of their industries, many Technology Pioneers are also addressing global societal issues by using new tech to improve education options, address climate change issues and others.
Ceretai, for example, is a Technology Pioneer helping media companies uncover stereotypes and representation gaps in their content through automated diversity and equality analysis. Banyan Nation is using technology to support circular economy climate solutions in India. Century Tech is supporting personalized education options through combined innovations in learning science, AI and neuroscience.
This year’s cohort has the highest gender diversity yet, with over 30% of companies led by women. There are also 26 economies represented this year, with the United Arab Emirates, El Salvador, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe represented for the first time. All the 2021 Technology Pioneers are bringing great innovation to their regions.
FlexFinTx, for example, is building self-sovereign digital identities to help the over 400 million Africans that lack proper forms of identification. Meanwhile, Cambridge Industries is addressing climate change by developing sustainable city infrastructure to support waste-to-energy products.
Following their selection as Technology Pioneers, this year’s companies will join an impressive group of alumni that include many household names, such as Airbnb, Google, Kickstarter, Mozilla, Palantir Technologies, Spotify, TransferWise, Twitter and Wikimedia.
The 2021 cohort will also be invited to participate in World Economic Forum workshops events and high-level discussions throughout their two years in the community.
Following their selection as Technology Pioneers, this year’s companies will join an impressive group of alumni that include many household names, such as Airbnb, Google, Kickstarter, Mozilla, Palantir Technologies, Spotify, TransferWise, Twitter and Wikimedia.
The 2021 cohort will also be invited to participate in World Economic Forum workshops events and high-level discussions throughout their two years in the community.
The 2021 Technology Pioneers include:
From Europe
- Aave, United Kingdom: Built Aave Protocol, an open source and non-custodial liquidity protocol
- Adhara, United Kingdom: Providing liquidity management and international payments for decentralized financial networks
- Avrios, Switzerland: Empowering companies to own the true cost of mobility
- Carbios, France: Green chemistry company providing an industrial solution to PET recycling
- Century Tech, United Kingdom: Developing AI-based learning technologies
- Ceretai, Sweden: Media diversity partner supporting companies with diversity strategies and insights
- CloudNC, United Kingdom: Making manufacturing autonomous
- Enapter, Italy: Providing green hydrogen technology through anion exchange membrane electrolyser manufacturing
- EnginZyme, Sweden: Developing the definitive technology platform for sustainable chemical production
- Greyparrot AI, United Kingdom: Waste recognition to increase transparency and automation in waste management
- Hydrogenious, Germany: Enabling high-performing hydrogen value chains globally.
- Parity Technologies, United Kingdom: Employing the blockchain pioneers who launched Ethereum, now building Polkadot
- Polymateria, United Kingdom: A new scalable solution for the plastic pollution pandemic
- Powell Software, France: Digital workplace solutions that improve the employee experience
- PQShield, United Kingdom: Protecting information for the quantum era
- Riaktr, Belgium: Developing software enabling telecom employees to make better data-driven decisions
- Senseon, United Kingdom: A full-stack cyber-defence capability for the future, today
Source, World Economic Forum WEF, June 15, 2021
https://www.weforum.org/press/2021/06/world-economic-forum-announces-100-new-technology-pioneers-in-2021-cohort
The World Economic Forum believes that innovation is critical to the future well-being of society and to driving economic growth. Launched in 2000, the Technology Pioneer community is composed of early to growth-stage companies from around the world that are involved in the design, development and deployment of new technologies and innovations, and are poised to have a significant impact on business and society.
https://www.weforum.org/communities/technology-pioneers
The Global Innovators Community is an invitation-only group of the world’s most promising start-ups and scale-ups that are at the forefront of technological and business model innovation.