Welcome to our monthly curation of emerging technology news tidbits and trends that help inform the research we do for our Avanade Trendlines program. Let’s discuss any thoughts you have in the comments.

Technology: Seeking emerging trends from sports
“When 1/100 of a second can be the difference between winning and losing, every advantage counts. The latest technological swimwear includes the Adizero XVIII suit, which Adidas developed in part by analyzing biomechanical data from testing in a wind tunnel. The suits, which are lightweight and water repellent, include a compression system with bands that are designed to return energy to a swimmer while helping her swim in a straight streamline.”

Why should you care? What’s fascinating about observing sports, especially high-performance endurance athletes, is that you can begin to see several emerging trends come together. What started with analytics is quickly advancing, with the best athletes today using products that fuse AI and biology, giving us an early peek into what’s to come. The companies building these products will eventually make these features available to the general public.

Do you chip? #chipping
This is not about golf or ensuring you can find your pet. “Technology continues to get closer and closer to our bodies, from the phones in our pockets to the smartwatches on our wrists. Now, for some people, it's getting under their skin. … The chips are designed to speed up users' daily routines and make their lives more convenient – accessing their homes, offices and gyms is as easy as swiping their hands against digital readers.”

Why should I care? Technology is defining who we are. Outside of the idea of inserting microchips into your body, there are three main themes to watch here: 1) how we continually want to ease the friction in our lives; 2) the future of digital identity; 3) the advances in nanotechnology with miniscule microchips. Technology and biology continue to merge.

Profile: Sukhinder Singh Cassidy on placing women on tech boards
Singh Cassidy is president of StubHub and “previously served as president of Google Asia Pacific and Latin America, building the company’s presence globally. In 2015, she also launched theBoardlist, a talent marketplace dedicated to placing women on the boards of tech companies, and she has been a leader in diversifying the industry.”

“There are a number of seats in the boardroom, versus just one seat as CEO,” she explained. “That makes the boardroom the perfect place to gather diverse perspectives.” Listen to this great podcast interview.

Why should you care? There are two fascinating aspects to Singh Cassidy’s story. The first is her work on theBoardlist, which is making progress, but sadly their research shows that only 7% of board seats at private tech companies are filled by women. The second is that StubHub is a secondary marketplace for entertainment tickets and is a retailer transforming into an entertainment company. StubHub was very early in mobile (think ticket entry) and is now broadening those experiences in venues and through the purchase process with new types of technology like immersive experiences. The company’s whole business will be changing what used to be just a simple transaction of buying a ticket.

How to build a city of the future
“Shanghai has provided one of the world’s largest and most rapidly growing urban populations with a quality of life and a breadth of infrastructure unmatched by any other megalopolis. It has done so in less than three decades. … There has never been urbanization of this scale in the history of the world. All of the world’s great cities are struggling to cope with growth and, generally speaking, they have no clue how to provide a decent quality of urban life to newcomers in such numbers. Yet, in a highly imperfect profession, Shanghai provides perhaps the best example of megascale urban planning that works.”