Today we launch The Regenerative Technology Project! A new organization on a mission to accelerate regeneration in the Tech sector.
This has been many years in the making. Maybe a lifetime. I have never found more elegant inspiration than in nature, dating back to my early days in paleoarchaeology, and all the way through my career as a tech industry analyst researching dozens of emerging “digital disruptions” over the past 20 years.
Ecology and biology are more advanced than any other “technical” engineering system we have ever created. What can our modern technological innovation learn from 3.8 Billion Years of evolution’s R&D? A lot.
My work in “digital transformation” pivoted when, while studying regenerative economics with John Fullerton and the Capital Institute, I realized just how far our tech has distanced us from the living systems that support us (and the whole economy). Yes, the “information age” has brought us some truly incredible capabilities and conveniences. But too many of them, and the Big Tech/VC business models that underlie them, have just accelerated our extractive and exploitative economy.
Based on the patterns of living systems, regenerative economics asks how we design an economy that supports the health of the whole more than it harms it. This design wisdom (which is not new and has been practiced for thousands of years, and more recently “validated” through modern ecology, biology, and complexity science) is now re-emerging in across many industries: regenerative agriculture, architecture, tourism, even fashion and finance!
Five years ago, I started on an inquiry: What about regenerative technology???
Tech is usually early to the party, the industry of early adoption. But not this time. Embracing an ecological “systemic” approach would radically shift how we invest, design, build, and interact with tech, and how tech interacts with the world.
The Regenerative Technology Project aims to support the Tech ecosystem to co-create technologies that catalyze healthy living systems: ecological, societal, and economic. If you’re wondering what on earth this could even look like, hop on over to our site where you can browse 75 real-life examples using technologies to regenerate the world.
The Project will initially support the ecosystem in three ways: 1. Education & Advisory 2. Technology Co-Creation 3. Community & Events. (We are also learning and will adapt based on how things evolve!) Stay tuned for announcements on all of the above, starting with a Discovery Dialogue on October 24 with the Capital Institute (register in comments).
I’m proud to launch this work with the one and only Danielle Lanyard, who has been instrumental in bringing this research and emerging digital platform into the world. And who brings an authenticity and heart-centered groundedness, plus decades of experience in sustainability and technology.
Join us to cultivate the soil for regenerative tech!
For the millions working in Tech, and the billions of us using Tech, we and our planet deserve better! In the age of runaway AI, exponential data center emissions, eroding digital rights, extreme data (power) asymmetries, and way too much e-waste, we must remember we can still choose whether our tools improve or imperil our great web of life.