Davos is a remarkable place, a small Swiss village nestled in the heart of the Alps, which has gained global fame since the launch of the World Economic Forum in the 1970s by an academic. Over the years, it has become an essential meeting place for world leaders. For its January 2024 edition, the teams from Doors Consulting Group were present through their CEO Karen Jouve, who was invited to speak at the Web3 Hub Davos by CV Labs and Phygicode. This was an opportunity for us to share the major trends we observed on-site.

Web3 Hub Davos - When Phygital Meets Real World Leaders for Tomorrow

Invited by Phygicode and its Founder & CEO Andrea Abrams to the Davos Web3 Hub event organized by CV Labs, Web3 hub located at the heart of the crypto valley in Zug, Switzerland, Karen Jouve, CEO and co-founder of Doors Consulting Group, was able to speak at a roundtable dedicated to Web3 and phygital experiences.

This was an opportunity to put into perspective the projects and support provided by Doors Consulting Group to over 40 major corporations since its inception, with a focus on projects straddling the digital and real worlds. To illustrate this, the latest success of the launch of the AMI Paris brand's Web3-powered engagement program, executed in association with the Doors3 teams, demonstrates the potential for retailers to create online engagement while involving physical stores in the mechanics of member acquisition and rewards.

Other ongoing projects at Doors Consulting Group involve positioning immersive experiences that go beyond the concept of the Metaverse in order to offer a high-quality omnichannel customer experience. Immersive worlds thus become new platforms for groups to create connections with their communities by augmenting digital and physical touchpoints.

Moreover, these immersive worlds, coupled with the use of blockchain technologies, offer added value in numerous sectors, such as the automotive industry, where Doors3 is currently assisting the Renault Group. Beyond marketing challenges, phygital use cases are also at the heart of operational efficiency issues, including the development of digital twins that can be considered at different scales: a product, a factory, a company, and even a city, as we had seen with numerous MVPs already developed by the city of Dubai and presented at the last Gitex exhibition.

With the maturing of Web3, 3D, XR, and AI technological infrastructures, the phygital economy is just at the beginning of its development. This economy and these use cases are based on the fundamental principle of linking digital to real, one cannot offer its full potential without the other. Moreover, panelists including Karen Jouve also highlighted the importance of placing humans at the heart of upcoming phygital innovations as a key to project success.

The 3 Main Topics Regarding Tech and Human Touch at Davos

Beyond the Davos Web3 Hub, we had the opportunity to walk down the main street of Davos village, transformed for the occasion into a real open-air tech fair in temperatures hovering around negative ten degrees. A temperature that did not deter key companies from rapidly expanding tech sectors from being present. We noted several signals and trends at Davos:

• Starting with the omnipresence of blockchain and crypto actors, once again proving that these Web3 technologies are gradually finding their place in the global IT ecosystem. We observed the presence of two other forums related to these topics with Crypto 2030 and another, the GBBC forum, particularly focused on regulatory issues with the upcoming implementation of the European MiCa regulation.
• Beyond the forums, we could see the blockchain Hedera aiming to establish itself as the public blockchain for institutional enterprises, and also the Filecoin foundation, which had been set up in the village church of Davos, just a stone's throw from the highly protected congress forum. Many other Web3 actors were present, like Kaiko, Ripple, and many others.
• Another undeniable trend of early 2024 was obviously that of artificial intelligence, present and visible in exchanges but also physically with an "AI house" once again in the heart of Davos. It's worth noting that the discussions on AI demonstrated for the most part a research and need for balance between the use of these technologies and their proper positioning to avoid their pitfalls.

Furthermore, a somewhat unexpected presence in the midst of the Swiss mountains was that of the Gulf countries, represented by their companies Emirates, which proudly displayed the slogan "Impossible is Possible," and Saudi Arabia with the futuristic city project "Neom". With their presence, these initiatives intend to carve out a place in the reflections of the world's top leaders and businessmen.

Finally, not to forget the societal issues present in the debates at the World Economic Forum, on the agenda: gender equality, the future of children in the world, poverty, and human rights.

Key Takeaways to Build 2024 as a C-Level

As a C-Level and business leader, what to take away from the 2024 edition of Davos and what forms our conviction at Doors Consulting Group is that we are witnessing the beginnings of a new digital transformation, supported by the maturity of now emerged technologies such as blockchain, immersive tech, and AI.

The fundamental mistake would be to ignore the potential for transformation of the use cases made possible by these technologies. On the contrary, it is essential to construct tomorrow's use cases with a focus on the challenges of interoperability between the digital and real world, between human and machine, between brands, their customer communities, their employees, and all stakeholders of their ecosystem. In 2024, it will be necessary to build around the notion of trust.

In conclusion, this stay in Davos allowed the Doors Consulting Group teams to reinforce their convictions and development roadmap alongside major corporations that will increasingly seek support in building the future of their companies. Geographically, the Middle East aims to become the global epicenter of innovation, one of the reasons why we are accelerating our development in the region with determination and success. What's exciting is that everything remains to be done in terms of use, even if the first level of maturity and adoption is well validated. We are at the beginning of a significant growth phase from which we have the capacity to make you benefit with a positive and lasting impact.