Abstract

The world of business recognizes technologies that displace pre-existing ones as disruptive. Programmable computers could be seen as the innovation that arose in response to disruptions caused by the World War II. They are also the disruptive technology of the twentieth century that have disrupted how one thinks about data, from collection, to search and storage. They have created entire new disciplines of big data, data analytics, informatics etc. The disrupter of this century on the other hand is the COVID-19 pandemic. Both these disrupters have impacted global society with far reaching consequences on economic and health security as well as the continuum of defence and security. Such disruptions cannot be ignored, they demand solutions. The presentation will speak to questions such as whether ideation and innovation are essential for countering disruptions? Is there interdependence between Disruption, Ideation and Innovation in the context of emerging threats? What role does data play amongst these three terms? Is the price of data an emergent disruptor? Or are data combing and exploitation the means to an innovation end and thereby to facilitate societal resilience against disruptions?