A year before the COVID-19 outbreak, we argued in Winning the ’20s that the basis of competitive advantage was shifting. The combination of technology-fueled change, the rise of new learning technologies, and declining long-term growth rates, which require accelerated innovation, called for companies to compete on their rate of learning.

The topic of artificial intelligence has come under focus on numerous occasions at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. One particular highlight was the session «Media in the Artificial Intelligence Era: A Survival Guide», which took place in 2018. Guests included Martin Ford, futurist, author of The New York Times Company, and writer of the bestselling «Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future».

The report was prepared as a result of the event «Russian-Canadian Cooperation in the Field of Sustainable Development in the Arctic Region» as part of the ThinkArctic Project, organized by the Roscongress Foundation, the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies, and the Analytical Center for the Government of the Russian Federation.

There is no industry more severely affected by COVID-19 pandemic than aviation.