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Air travel demand is expected to grow at a healthy rate of four percent over the next two decades, reaching an overall travel volume of 7.2 billion passengers per year. Subsiding oil prices and a high volume of travel from Asia Pacific is expected to drive this rise in travel volume. Traffic between emerging markets is projected to grow at over six percent, compared to mature markets in the West, which are tipped to grow five percent or below. Airbus and Boeing has projected fleet requirements of over 30,000 new aircrafts by 2035 in response to the positive outlook.

Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are shaping today’s chemical industry in a significant way. The market is moving toward consolidation, where portfolio realignment is important. Companies are focused on developing their core strengths and are continuously looking for favorable acquisitions to deliver growth and greater shareholder value. During 2017 and beyond, intermediates, specialties, fertilizers and agricultural chemicals will likely experience high growth in M&A activity. Chemical producers across the US will move away from commoditized and price-sen­sitive chemicals to low-volume, high-value, and high-margin specialty chemical production.

BBVA, Spain’s second largest bank, recently shot into the limelight for conducting 50 inter-country transactions via blockchain technology. Developed by the bank’s technology partner Ripple, the transactions hardly took any time for the bank, as peer-to-peer blockchain exchanges need almost no services from a third-party clearing house. Previously, any inter-country, inter-bank monetary transfers took up to four days to settle.

“The only thing that is constant is change.” This often-parroted quote from Greek philosopher Heraclitus remains as relevant today as when it was originally written. While the players on the modern political stage don’t shy away from bold decisions to protect their interests, our current political climate has a host of fresh challenges and opportunities for companies and service providers in the Professional Service segments.

Pressure to reduce the cost of life-saving drugs is the greatest challenge biopharma companies face in 2017. The industry is experiencing a tough year – with demand to reduce prices and bring more transparency in major markets like the US, slow growth rate in the emerging markets, increasing compe­tition from generics, and a strict regulatory environment all being major pain points. The cost of bringing a new drug to market is also increasing, and approvals for new molecular entities (NME) have declined from their peak in 2015.