Location
United States
Areas of Expertise
Distributed Ledger Technology
Expert Bio Darlene Damm is a pioneering force in the impact technology industry, widely recognized as one of its earliest visionaries and co-founders. She co-founded two of the world's first impact technology companies in aerospace and drone transport, and as Faculty Chair and Vice President of Community and Impact at Singularity University, she taught and mentored thousands of founders and executives who went on to build transformative impact technology companies across AgTech, FoodTech, EdTech, ClimateTech, GovTech, HealthTech, and beyond. Darlene has held leadership, strategy, and advisory roles with Singularity University, Ashoka, and the World Bank, and has delivered keynotes and talks at the United Nations, the World Food Programme, SXSW, Google, Salesforce, Intuit, Walmart, Sony, and Aramco, as well as TEDx stages in Vilnius and Budapest. Her thought leadership has been published in Harvard Business Review, Forbes, the OECD Forum, the Qatar Foundation, and GRIT Daily, and her groundbreaking work in drones, rocketry, and impact technology has been featured by TechCrunch, Fast Company, Wired, Popular Science, NPR, Le Monde, and 60 Minutes, among others. Darlene holds a bachelor's degree from Stanford University and a master's degree from Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and she is a patent holder in drone technology. She has served as an advisor to the UN World Food Programme Innovation Accelerator, a mentor in Google's impact accelerator, a judge for Stanford BASES, and a member of the Biden Administration's Working Group on Cross Border Trade. Named a social impact hero by Authority Magazine, Darlene is also the author of Your Dream Job is Here: The Impact Technology Revolution and the New Jobs Saving the World, a definitive guide to building a career at the intersection of technology and global impact.
Sessions How You Can Use Exponential Technologies to Help Solve the World’s Social Problems
Machine Learning, Community, Blockchain, Globalization, Social Policy
Around the world, countless people, companies and organizations are now using exponential technologies to make the world a better place. From trillion dollar companies to lone innovators in refugee settlements, more and more people are on a mission to solve the social and environmental challenges they see around them.
This 90 minute session will first introduce you to a variety of impact technology solutions coming from start ups, large companies, nonprofits, and community organizations around the world. After learning how they are tackling social problems in education, employment, the environment, healthcare, clean energy, hunger and more, we will dive into a short workshop exploring how you might change the world.
During the workshop we will help you identify the social issues you most care about, how you might use technologies to solve them, and the approach you might want to take. Where are you in your life? Do you want to quit your job and start an impact technology company? Or do you want to help your kids launch a community project? Perhaps you want to be an investor in an impact startup or a technology advisor. Perhaps you just want to learn more.
Then we will discuss some concrete ways to get started.
The good news is that today there are more ways than ever to contribute to making our world a better place, and you can make a difference in a way that is also aligned with your personal and professional goals.
Impact in Action Panel Discussion
Community, Public Good, Globalization, Social Policy
In this session, participants will hear first hand from social entrepreneurs from around the world who are using exponential technologies to solve challenging social problems in the field. This 45 minute panel discussion will help participants understand the day-to-day challenges social innovators face in trying to solve difficult problems such as entrenched poverty, hunger, failing education systems, war and conflict and more. At the same time, it will showcase how innovators are using exponential technologies to finally make a dent in solving some of these problems, and how innovators in the most unlikely of places are using some of the most advanced technologies on the planet to create change. Participants will leave with a new mindset about who can solve social problems, how fast exponential technologies are spreading solutions around the world, and how we can best approach solving social problems in this day and age.
Exponential technologies have been a game changer for social impact. Because of their falling costs, ability to scale, and ability to solve sophisticated problems, we now have the power to solve social problems that were previously too expensive or too complicated to solve. In fact, many of the world's top businesses now sell products good for people and the planet. At the same time, we are also seeing a new generation of grassroots innovators with an internet connection, including those living in poverty and war zones, rolling out their own tech solutions to local social problems. Will they be able to uplift themselves and their communities and end some of our world's most horrific social problems once and for all?
We will explore the rapidly changing landscape of social impact and technology and journey with the world's social innovators as they try to take advantage of the latest technologies to drive change. We will explore questions about how they use technology to scale, whether they are taking a for profit or nonprofit approach, and how they protect their communities from the negative consequences of technology.
This session is excellent for companies or individuals hoping to get more involved in social impact, but who are not sure where to start, as well as participants who are simply overwhelmed by the large number of social problems facing our world and eager to learn about solutions that might help.
How You Can Use Exponential Technologies to Help Solve the World’s Social Problems
Around the world, countless people, companies and organizations are now using exponential technologies to make the world a better place. From trillion dollar companies to lone innovators in refugee settlements, more and more people are on a mission to solve the social and environmental challenges they see around them.
This 90 minute session will first introduce you to a variety of impact technology solutions coming from start ups, large companies, nonprofits, and community organizations around the world. After learning how they are tackling social problems in education, employment, the environment, healthcare, clean energy, hunger and more, we will dive into a short workshop exploring how you might change the world.
During the workshop we will help you identify the social issues you most care about, how you might use technologies to solve them, and the approach you might want to take. Where are you in your life? Do you want to quit your job and start an impact technology company? Or do you want to help your kids launch a community project? Perhaps you want to be an investor in an impact startup or a technology advisor. Perhaps you just want to learn more.
Then we will discuss some concrete ways to get started.
The good news is that today there are more ways than ever to contribute to making our world a better place, and you can make a difference in a way that is also aligned with your personal and professional goals.
This talk provides participants with an introduction to industry-building. While it previously took entrepreneurs a century to launch a new industry, today's exponential technologies allow entrepreneurs to launch new industries in a few years or less. Yet, no one teaches founders or corporate leaders how to build industries. This talk, based on the speaker's experience pioneering the drone transport industry in 2011 and helping other founders and innovation leaders launch new industries at Singularity University, will help you understand 1) How to come up with an idea for a new industry 2) How to align industry building with multiple market opportunities and build your markets as you go 3) How to work with regulators, policymakers and the public to ensure your new idea is launched and 4) how to think about industry building if you are already an established corporation.
