Message from Mark Majewski
President & CEO, intelliFLEX
I’m thrilled and honoured to be this organization’s next CEO during what I believe is a pivotal moment in the history of Canadian electronics.
From Nortel to BlackBerry, Canada has a tradition of electronics excellence. We punch above our weight class. But even the largest, most powerful companies can’t go it alone – we all require the support of others, and the wider community, to set the stage for our successes.
And that’s where I believe intelliFLEX has a large role to play: as a connector for the wider electronics industry, so we can all help each other in creating something bigger than ourselves. By collaborating and continuing to build a connected community, we all win.
IntelliFLEX has already done an admirable job in this regard over the past few years. But more needs to be done.
Because right now there’s a huge opportunity in front of us. The Internet of Things, which is all about connecting the cyber world to the physical world, offers unprecedented opportunities for companies in flexible, printable and hybrid electronics (FHE) to add value and increased functionality to ordinary items. intelliFLEX can be a catalyst for research, development, and commercialization, but that can only happen if we’re a cohesive community.
I look at intelliFLEX, individual companies, and even the Canadian FHE and technology industries in general as building blocks. On their own they can be effective. But when combined with other cutting-edge companies, industries, organizations and research, they cease being single blocks and instead become parts of something far bigger and more powerful.
Our innovation alliance can also play a huge role as an expert resource on the broader ecosystem and funding environment, helping to match the right companies with the right support. Growing our ecosystem successfully isn’t just about our members’ goals – it can’t be. It’s also about giving funding organizations, partner companies, and other stakeholders what they’re looking for, because it’s a competitive landscape out there. Ultimately, we need to commercialize the transformative and disruptive technology our member companies work on every day and prove that it creates jobs and prosperity.
Indeed, the seamless connection of the physical world to the cyber world must focus on customers instead of products, to ensure we’re commercializing the right things to solve real problems.
Because times are changing. It has been reported that 40 per cent of all Fortune 500 companies will be gone – their business models extinct – within the next decade, thanks to digital disruption. That’s a startling fact. And while no one wants to see business models fail, it’s crucial to realize that these disruptive technologies are coming at us fast. Faster, I think, than some of us realize, even those of us in the technology industry.
To be able to truly capitalize on this next wave of technology disruption, growing our ecosystem is vital. And that’s why I’m so excited to be a part of intelliFLEX.
Sincerely,
Mark Majewski
President & CEO, intelliFLEX
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