The centre seeks to unite global manufacturing and supply chain ecosystem leaders to share best practices, ignite innovation and scale the impact of their efforts. In doing so, it plays an integral role in driving the responsible transformation of industry.

To achieve this, it brings together more than 250 partners from business, government, academia and civil society. Through flagship initiatives such as the Global Lighthouse Network and a growing portfolio of collaborative projects, it champions key issues including cutting-edge technology, environmental stewardship and workforce transformation.

It operates across four key areas: resilient value chains, technology and innovation, people-centric transformation, and sustainable systems. The centre works to future-proof global value chains by supporting the development of new industrial strategies that build resilience and promote growth in manufacturing and supply chains. It aims to accelerate the adoption of advanced manufacturing technologies at scale through initiatives such as the Global Lighthouse Network, The Next Frontier of Operations and the Lighthouse Operating System.

The centre continues to promote emerging practices and tools that enhance diversity, inclusion, workforce development and the attractiveness of industry careers. Key initiatives include Frontline Talent of the Future and the New Generation of Industry Leaders. It also identifies innovative solutions to enable circularity and accelerate the transition to net zero across industry. Major efforts in this area include the Industry Net Zero Accelerator, Circular Transformation of Industries and the SME Sustainability Accelerator.

With these programmes as the foundation of its work, the centre achieved success in three priority areas during the reporting period: strengthening its global presence, expanding its influential leader community and the Global Lighthouse Network into a globally impactful platform, and advancing sustainable, resilient, people-centric industrial transformation in a rapidly evolving global landscape.

Among the highlights was the continued growth of the Global Lighthouse Network, with 36 new lighthouses added, bringing the total number of best-in-class production sites and value chains to 189. The network’s criteria expanded to include talent and customer centricity, creating a more comprehensive benchmark for excellence in advanced manufacturing.

To address barriers to industrial decarbonization, the centre unveiled a framework of eight opportunities for public-private cooperation. In response to industry leaders’ shift towards regionalization, it also launched the Beyond Cost: Country Readiness for the Future of Manufacturing and Supply Chains report, including a Global Readiness Index that outlines seven readiness factors to guide manufacturers’ value chain decisions on their production footprint and inform government industrial policy agendas.

The New Generation of Industry Leaders initiative entered its second year, with the latest cohort convening in Boston and Geneva. Following a policy roundtable in Washington, D.C., a new Industry 4.0 career path initiative was announced, aimed at making manufacturing careers more attractive and addressing a projected shortfall of two million workers in US manufacturing.

In a major development, the centre’s community of chief operating, supply chain and procurement officers was restructured with a new, focused mandate to support the technological transformation of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The community expanded strategically and now includes more than 90 chief experience officers (CXOs), along with a new deputies community to operationalize decisions.

The centre expanded its global footprint with new affiliates in Qatar, South Africa and Viet Nam. It convened key community meetings in China, India and the US, and hosted the first Advanced Manufacturing and Supply Chains Forum in Boston – bringing together leaders from industry, government, academia and start-ups to develop strategies for “Resilience and Innovation in the Intelligent Age”.

The centre aims to ensure shared prosperity within the planet’s limits, focusing on strengthening the foundations for a safe climate, resilient ecosystems and human systems that enable equitable economic progress and long-term social stability.

Strategic priorities include driving climate mitigation, adaptation and industry transformation to achieve a net-zero, resilient future that safeguards lives, livelihoods and ecosystems. It seeks to catalyse business leadership, investment and policy change to protect, restore and sustainably manage terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems, and promote nature-positive economies. Finally, it advances the shift to regenerative, circular and inclusive systems of production and consumption within planetary boundaries.

Decarbonization requires technological innovation and unprecedented collaboration across value chains and regions. Over the reporting period, the centre mobilized business leaders and innovators to drive systemic change.

The Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders demonstrated impactful leadership, collectively reducing their absolute emissions by 10% – a reduction equivalent to France’s annual emissions. Meanwhile, the First Movers Coalition harnessed the purchasing power of over 100 companies, generating $16 billion in demand for low-carbon products and accelerating breakthrough clean technologies in hard-to-abate sectors. In aviation, the Airports of Tomorrow initiative united 70 partners, launching the Global Aviation Sustainability Outlook and developing new partnerships to scale sustainable aviation fuels, further supported by the launch of the Green Fuel Forward initiative in Asia-Pacific.

Nature loss, impacting 75% of the Earth’s land, poses significant ecological and economic risks. Yet, transitioning to nature-positive business models could unlock $10 trillion annually by 2030. The centre continues to work to unlock these opportunities while protecting and restoring precious terrestrial and marine ecosystems.

The centre launched the CEO Alliance on Nature, engaging business leaders to embed nature-positive practices into operations. It also published guidance for eight industrial sectors on how to reduce their impact and transition towards nature-positive models.

The Ocean Action Agenda continued to advance a regenerative blue economy, supporting over 550 innovation start-ups, catalysing more than $5 billion in private investment for ocean health. It also unveiled a white paper, Investing in Mangroves: The Corporate Playbook, for mangrove restoration.

The 1t.org movement continued to inspire action, with 92 companies pledging to protect, restore and grow nearly 10 billion trees in 143 countries and contribute to the creation of the world’s largest tropical forest reserve. In agriculture, the Tropical Forest Alliance continued to drive the shift towards deforestation-free supply chains, with a new task force in China securing 1.5 million tonnes of certified sustainable soy from Brazil.

The centre champions circularity, innovation and partnership to steward Earth’s precious resources. The Global Plastic Action Partnership (GPAP) expanded national partnerships to 25. Initiatives such as Circularity in the Built Environment and the Circular Innovation Ecosystem accelerated the shift to circular supply chains, with the latter recognizing 13 startups for traceability innovations. The First Movers Coalition for Food is scaling demand for sustainable agriculture, while the Food Innovation Hubs network connected over 250 innovators across six countries. The centre launched the Water Futures community to address rising water stress across food systems, industry and urban resilience.

Transformational change requires bold initiatives and convening power. The centre’s leadership communities help boost ambition and accelerate collaborative action. In this spirit, the GAEA (Giving to Amplify Earth Action) initiative, which has secured approximately $200 billion in aggregated capital, stayed on track to become the largest market signal of philanthropic and impact capital.

The centre seeks to support individuals and organizations to securely benefit from ongoing digital and technological progress. To achieve this, it provides an independent and impartial platform to reinforce the importance of cybersecurity as a strategic imperative and drive global public-private action to address systemic cybersecurity challenges.

Its three priority areas of work are building cyber resilience, strengthening global cooperation and navigating cyber frontiers. It seeks to achieve these by promoting best practices and developing solutions to enhance cyber resilience throughout industry ecosystems (building cyber resilience); facilitating public-private partnerships to address challenges collaboratively (strengthening global cooperation); and identifying and explaining the cybersecurity risks and opportunities of emerging technologies and an increasingly interconnected world (navigating cyber frontiers).

Among the centre’s highlights from the reporting period was its Annual Meeting on Cybersecurity, which convened over 150 experts to collaborate towards advancing equity in cyberspace. The meeting was also instrumental in strengthening support for the centre’s ongoing initiatives.

Its Global Cybersecurity Outlook 2025 examined the cybersecurity trends expected to affect economies and societies in the coming year. It underscored the growing complexity in cyberspace, which is characterized by geopolitics, emerging technologies, supply chain interdependencies and cybercrime sophistication.

During the reporting period, the centre brought together more than 50 public and private organizations to share knowledge and identify systemic solutions to counter cybercrime at scale, as part of its Partnership against Cybercrime initiative. In the same vein, its Cybercrime Atlas initiative developed a framework for operational collaboration and best practices to support the success of anti-cybercrime partnerships.

As part of this work on implementing the Disrupting Cybercrime Networks: A Collaboration Framework in different regions, training exercises were co-hosted with INTERPOL in Bangkok, Thailand and Panama City, Panama.

Alongside this, the centre focused on strengthening cyber resilience in industries undergoing a fundamental transformation, considerably heightening cyber risks. This involved working with more than 200 cybersecurity leaders to develop and scale up solutions and promote effective cybersecurity practices across industry ecosystems.

In January, the centre launched a Centre for Cyber Economics (CCE) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in collaboration with the Global Cybersecurity Forum, as part of the Forum’s Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution Network. CCE will develop robust, evidence-based frameworks to enhance global cybersecurity resilience and economic stability.

Cybersecurity skills shortages are a major and ongoing problem. As part of the centre’s work to address the demand for a skilled cybersecurity workforce, it unveiled Growing Cyber Talent Through Public-Private Partnerships at the Global Conference on Cyber Capacity Building (GC3B) in Geneva, Switzerland, in May 2025.

The centre hosted a high-level ministerial meeting of the GC3B organized by the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA). Under the leadership of the African Union Development Agency-New Partnership for Africa’s Development (AUDA-NEPAD), this meeting brought together 54 ministers and senior executives to discuss the African Declaration on Cybersecurity Capacity Building.

To support this effort, the centre, in collaboration with the Western Balkans Cyber Capacity Center, held a capacity-building workshop dedicated to strengthening global operational collaboration to disrupt cybercrime and enhancing cybersecurity workforce development. Maraš Dukaj, Minister of Public Administration of Montenegro, opened the event, which brought together over 80 participants from across the Western Balkans.

Finally, the centre collaborated with the University of Oxford’s Global Cyber Security Capacity Centre to develop knowledge that supports organizations in managing the cybersecurity risks associated with the adoption of AI technologies. This collaboration culminated in the publication of the report, Artificial Intelligence: Balancing Risks and Rewards.

The centre seeks to accelerate the transition to a secure, sustainable and equitable energy system that enables positive economic and social development. It achieves this by convening leaders from companies and countries to create insights, co-develop solutions and collaborate to advance energy and material transitions.

It has five priorities and advances them through initiatives, its communities, events and insights. It offers energy and industry transition intelligence about the evolution of energy and industrial systems to better inform energy transition efforts.

The centre helps accelerate power system transformation and the deployment of clean power to support electrification and the growing electricity demand. It similarly seeks to accelerate industrial ecosystem transformation, driving the transformation of industrial clusters to enable the reduction of energy and carbon intensity while also creating jobs and economic growth.

It generates insights into the resources needed for the energy transition, and it addresses critical enabling factors for the transition, such as financing clean energy in emerging markets, harnessing AI for the transition, deploying clean fuels and transitioning coal to clean energy.

These priorities formed the basis of several achievements during the reporting period. The Fostering Effective Energy Transition 2025 report, based on 15 years of benchmarking countries’ energy systems, remains a vital tool for assessing progress, identifying gaps and guiding stakeholders towards more secure, sustainable and inclusive energy systems.

Its Transitioning Industrial Clusters initiative expanded, welcoming 12 new clusters from Australia, Brazil, Colombia, India, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Sweden and the UK. The initiative works with 35 clusters in 16 countries to reduce emissions and drive economic growth. Research from the Unleashing the Full Potential of Industrial Clusters: Infrastructure Solutions for Clean Energies report highlighted the critical role clusters play in scaling clean energy infrastructure.

The centre’s Scaling Financing for Coal Phase-out in Emerging Economies report revealed how to scale up financing solutions for coal retirement in emerging markets and developing economies. The Net-Zero Industry Tracker 2024 provided progress analysis for eight hard-to-abate industrial and transport sectors.

Five Principles for Responsible Deployment of Renewables Infrastructure were developed by public-private leaders. They are designed to guide stakeholders in ensuring that renewable energy projects benefit both people and the planet.

The Network to Mobilize Clean Energy Investment in EMDEs – a coalition of CEOs and governmental ministers – unveiled its Playbook of Solutions during the 2024 G20 and Clean Energy Ministerial Meetings, sharing best practices from 45 emerging and developing economies to increase clean energy investment.

The Clean Power, Grids and Electrification programme released A Collaborative Framework for Accelerating Advanced Nuclear and Small Modular Reactor Deployment, aligning nuclear sector stakeholders around actions to advance small modular reactor (SMR) deployment.

The centre also expanded its regional collaborations, working closely with five Centres for the Fourth Industrial Revolution in Azerbaijan, Malaysia, Oman, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. It convened two Energy Transition Meetings in May and June 2025 in the ASEAN region and Brazil, bringing together over 350 public- and private-sector leaders to advance regional transition efforts and strengthen global collaboration.

It also launched the Securing Minerals for the Energy Transition: Unlocking the Value Chain through Policy, Investment and Innovation report, which identified barriers to investment and innovation to unlock the critical materials supply.

The global financial system is confronting new realities as geopolitical and geoeconomic shifts upend existing norms. At the same time, volatile markets and rapid technological advancements are reshaping the global macroeconomic landscape. While these renewed uncertainties present fresh challenges to global financial resilience, they also create opportunities for innovation and collaboration that can support long-term economic growth and development.

Reflecting this dynamic backdrop, the centre aims to provide an independent and impartial platform to design a more sustainable, resilient, trusted and accessible financial system that reinforces long-term value creation and economic prosperity.

To achieve this ambition, the centre is structured around three thematic pillars: financial resilience for institutions and individuals, technology-enabled innovation in finance, and sustainable finance and investing. Guided by these pillars, the centre engages a diverse base of partners year-round through a variety of strategic content initiatives. These include mapping the implications of AI adoption across the financial system, analysing how demographic shifts will affect financial institutions and their clients, and examining the consequences of rising geoeconomic tensions on global finance and the broader economy, among many other areas of focus.

During the reporting period, the centre achieved several key milestones. Supported by more than 25 chief executives and chairpersons of global financial institutions, the Navigating Global Financial System Fragmentation initiative analysed and quantified the costs of fragmentation, as evidenced by the increasing use of sanctions, industrial policies, investment restrictions, divergent regulations, tariffs and other manifestations around the world. Through a series of multistakeholder convenings and interviews, the initiative proposed a set of principles, rules and policy recommendations aimed at protecting the integrity of the global financial system while acknowledging national security and sovereignty concerns.

The 2024 Global Retail Investor Outlook, covering 13 markets and representing a statistical sample of 50% of the global population, was conducted to better understand the evolving landscape of individual investors.

To address the need for more robust data and empirical evidence on fintech, the centre conducted a global survey of 240 fintech companies in The Future of Global Fintech: From Rapid Expansion to Sustainable Growth, in collaboration with the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. The results will inform multistakeholder roundtables with industry leaders, regulators and policy-makers to inform future action.

The centre also supported hard-to-abate economic sectors in their pursuit of financing and policy solutions to drive net-zero transitions. This work included hosting a three-day First Movers Coalition workshop in partnership with the US Department of Energy and the State Department, authoring a corporate playbook for achieving net-zero goals, and a deep dive into key economies. These efforts aim to promote longterm value creation and economic growth while advancing environmental sustainability and energy independence.

Continuing its focus on demographic change and its implications for the financial system, the centre progressed its Longevity Economy initiative. This work promoted financial resilience by identifying and spotlighting impactful start-ups in the longevity space and by connecting them with key stakeholders, including investors and financiers. Over the past year, more than 50 organizations committed to taking tangible action aligned with the centre’s Longevity Economy Principles, which emphasize the development of cutting-edge investment vehicles and products tailored to ageing populations, the expansion of financial education access and the mitigation of demographic disparities driven by socioeconomic factors. The centre was also part of the UpLink Prospering in Longevity Challenge, which aims to build a community for start-ups that promote financial resilience, equitable healthy ageing and lifelong fulfilment.

In March 2025, the centre convened over 170 global decision-makers from 17 industries and 22 countries in Hong Kong under the theme “Financial Services for the Intelligent Age”. Participants from business, academia, civil society, the public sector and innovation communities engaged in 14 sessions to address the most pressing issues facing financial systems today.

Finally, as part of its annual programming alongside the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group Spring and Annual Meetings, the centre brought together financial services leaders, policy-makers, civil society representatives and other experts to discuss and strategize on critical financial and economic issues impacting sustainability and global growth.

The centre seeks to harness technology’s potential for the equitable and human-centred transformation of industries, economies and societies. Its mission is to provide a strategic and future-oriented platform to help make sense of exponential technologies and drive their responsible adoption and application globally.

It focuses on four areas: driving breakthrough innovation, accelerating industry transformation, preparing nations for the Intelligent Age, and harnessing technology for the benefit of people and the planet.

To achieve progress in these areas, it holds events and pursues initiatives. For example, its annual Global Technology Retreat, held in San Francisco, brought together thought leaders to explore ideas, develop partnerships and peer exchanges, and challenge existing paradigms. The event offers a platform for policy-makers and regulators to engage with innovators, anticipating regulatory needs and helping to drive a shared vision.

It runs several initiatives aimed specifically at driving breakthrough innovation in areas such as AI, bioeconomy, energy transition, mobility transformation and the quantum economy. It seeks to accelerate industry transformation; its AI workstreams under the AI Governance Alliance promote solutions aimed at supporting sectors and enabling their innovation.

In terms of supporting nations to prepare for the Intelligent Age, the centre seeks to support the digitization of public administrations and runs programmes that use digital literacy and governance to tackle online harm. Its work in AI helps develop locally grounded innovation ecosystems and supports adaptive, global policy tools. It also helps define trust standards for emerging technologies, and is involved in helping build a secure, open and interoperable digital public infrastructure.

Through its work harnessing technology for people and the planet, the centre oversees initiatives that use the technology to support farmers in India, seeks to help drive a safe and sustainable space environment, and promotes technologies and practices to mitigate climate risks.

These initiatives form the foundation of the centre’s work, and during the reporting period, it also achieved several additional successes. Among these was the connection of more than one billion people in more than 100 countries to essential digital services in healthcare, education and finance, thanks to the work of the EDISON Alliance, which surpassed its 2025 target.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed with the United Arab Emirates at the Annual Meeting 2025, resulting in the creation of an initiative focused on regulatory innovation, advancing collaborative efforts to ensure government and business are prepared for the Intelligent Age.

A second new initiative, Technology Convergence, was launched to identify and advance the most effective combinations of emerging technologies to enhance value chains, drive innovation and inform strategic decision-making in different sectors. It was launched through the inaugural Technology Convergence Report, which introduced a framework for anticipating cross-sector disruption.

The Technology Pioneers Innovator Communities marked the programme’s 25th anniversary. Since its inception, it has recognized 100 forward-thinking start-ups annually, spotlighting emerging technologies and the entrepreneurs behind them.

The Tech for Climate Adaptation initiative demonstrated how frontier technologies can protect critical value chains like food, energy and manufacturing from climate impacts, helping prevent up to 4% in cumulative GDP (gross domestic product) losses by 2100.

The Forum’s Centres for the Fourth Industrial Revolution grew to 22 members, with the launch of Global Government Technology Centre Berlin and Global Government Technology Centre Kyiv, as well as Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution Medellín, Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution Oman, the South Africa Centre for Industry and Technology, Riyadh’s Centre for Cyber Economics, and the renewal of Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution United Arab Emirates. The focus of these centres is on advancing work on AI, the energy transition, industrial digitization, decarbonization and cybersecurity economics.

The mission of the centre is to support a future where every person, regardless of geography, socioeconomic status or background, can access high-quality healthcare. The centre identifies and scales transformative solutions that build resilient, inclusive and efficient systems, empowering individuals and communities to thrive in health and well-being.

Its work focuses on three foundational priorities. First, improving health and well-being by ensuring access to care at a time when disparities are increasing. Second, advancing intelligent health systems that optimize outcomes through innovation. Third, mitigating health risks by facilitating public-private collaborations to enhance global health security.

This past year marked significant progress across these areas. Notably, the centre launched the Global Activator Network: Breast and Cervical Cancer Coalition, an initiative within the Global Alliance for Women’s Health, aimed at closing the women’s health gap. This coalition unites health ministries and public-private partners to strengthen national efforts to combat cervical and breast cancer, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa.

In January, the centre introduced the Unified Coalition for the Antimicrobial Resistance Response (UCARE Initiative) and the Davos Compact on AMR. These initiatives reflect the urgency of addressing antimicrobial resistance, which causes over one million deaths each year. The centre’s approach spans accelerating research and development, expanding diagnostics and vaccine access, promoting awareness and supporting sustainable practices in agriculture, alongside mechanisms to boost private-sector investment.

The centre also launched the Global Future Council on Neurotechnology, which convened over 700 experts to explore the promise and ethical dimensions of neurotechnology, from cognitive enhancement to medical applications.

In May, the centre launched the Brain Health Action Forum to unlock the full potential of individuals and societies by investing in brain health as a foundation for a healthier, more inclusive and more resilient future.

In South-East Asia, the centre introduced the Healthcare Country Activator for Digital Transformation and Health for All in Singapore, alongside the launch of a Digital Health Activator in India. These efforts aim to strengthen national digital health strategies and promote access for all.

Reflecting on this year’s achievements, the Centre for Health and Healthcare remains steadfast in its commitment to advancing access, innovation and system resilience. Through global partnerships, cross-sector collaboration and a shared sense of purpose, it continues to build momentum towards a world where every individual can access the care they need. The progress captured in this report is not an endpoint, but a catalyst, propelling the centre’s work forward in advancing the future of health.

In a landscape of increasing uncertainty, slower economic growth and labour market disruption, adapting economic systems is critical for shared greater prosperity.

The Centre for the New Economy and Society partners with leaders in business, government and civil society to understand current challenges and future scenarios, develop new ideas and build collaborations that create economic opportunities for all.

It works in three areas: economic and risk foresight, human capital advancement and economic inclusion. During the reporting period, the centre worked with over 400 business partners, over 50 governments, 30 international organizations, and more than 100 academic, civil society and philanthropic organizations to ensure a future where economies and societies work for everyone.

In a year marked by volatility, the centre produced three editions of its Chief Economists Outlook, offering timely short-term analysis. This was complemented by longerterm perspectives, such as the Global Economic Futures: Productivity in 2030 and Global Economic Futures: Competitiveness in 2030. The Future of Growth Initiative convened over 65 champions for quarterly dialogues focused on innovation, inclusion, sustainability and resilience.

The Global Risks Initiative focused on identification and preparedness; the 20th edition of the Global Risks Report 2025 highlighted an increasingly fractured global landscape, while the Global Risks Consortium gathered 25 leaders to address risk interconnections and foresight.

The Future of Jobs Report 2025 provided insights into how technological change, geoeconomic fragmentation, economic uncertainty, demographic shifts and the green transition will transform jobs and skills by 2030. The Future of Jobs Initiative also explored AI-enabled job augmentation and transitions. Through the Good Work Toolkit, partners committed to supporting more than 15 million workers in 2024-25.

The Reskilling Revolution initiative, which aims to empower one billion people with better education, skills and economic opportunities by 2030, reached over 750 million people as of June 2025. The initiative secured new commitments and produced thought leadership on AI in education and a Global Skills Taxonomy Adoption Toolkit.

Efforts to close gender parity gaps by 2030 advanced through the Global Gender Parity Sprint, which gathered over 40 champions. The Global Gender Gap Report 2025 benchmarked gaps across 146 economies, while the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Lighthouses 2025 report shared best practices in organizational inclusion.

The Equitable Transition Initiative championed strategies for building a “people first” focus into the economic transition towards greener net-zero economies. Over 30 champions have joined the initiative, working alongside the Global Future Council on Equitable Transition to co-design a set of country archetypes, data tools (Accelerating an Equitable Transition: A Data-Driven Approach) and policy guidelines (Accelerating an Equitable Transition: Policy Guidelines for Impact).

The centre’s work combines global initiatives and frameworks with localized partnerships. Its national Accelerators Network helps advance policy innovations and initiatives that build new economic approaches for better growth, human capital development and economic inclusion. The accelerator programmes have directly supported 16 million people and mobilized more than $80 million to date to support multiple projects. During the reporting period, new accelerators were launched in Australia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Colombia, Egypt, Guatemala, Indonesia, Malaysia and Rwanda. The centre also signed an agreement with the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) to scale up the network on the African continent, with a focus on economic growth and development.

The centre advances cooperative solutions to global and regional challenges by bringing together governments, international organizations and civil society groups with the Forum’s business partners.

It works in three primary areas: regional collaboration, strengthening trade and investment and facilitating global cooperation. Regionally, the centre convenes public- and private-sector stakeholders to address regional economic, environmental and technology priorities. In trade and investment, it promotes open and resilient markets, eases physical, digital and financial flows, and advances sustainable value chains. In geopolitics, the centre provides insight into trends and identifies mechanisms for strengthening global partnerships and effective development and humanitarian action.

Throughout the year, the centre organized dialogues and produced key analyses, including the Global Cooperation Barometer 2025, which measures international cooperation, and the report From Blind Spots to Insights: Enhancing Geopolitical Radar to Guide Global Business, offering guidance for businesses navigating geopolitical risks.

During the Annual Meeting, the centre convened its inaugural Resilience Consortium Leadership Group and released its fourth report surveying over 250 executives on managing volatility. The Humanitarian and Resilience Investing (HRI) initiative announced an Africa roadmap with the African Development Bank, and secured an additional $300 million in impact investments in frontier markets, adding to existing commitments of $5.6 billion.

Other highlights included organizing the Country Strategy Meeting – Argentina, engaging President Javier Milei and over 50 business leaders on national priorities and regional developments.

In partnership with the Council on Foreign Relations, the centre launched the Geopolitical Advisory Group, a community of chief geopolitical affairs officers that will meet quarterly.

A significant milestone was the launch of the Leaders for European Growth and Competitiveness community, coordinated with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, and 35 European CEOs. The group focuses on bolstering the continent’s competitiveness in key industries while strengthening external alliances.

Collaborations also included work with Brazil’s G20 Presidency on energy, health, social economy and oceans, and with Colombia’s Presidency of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP16) on topics such as plastics, food and water, and ocean innovation.

On trade, the TradeTech Forum convened more than 300 leaders in April 2025 to work on accelerating the deployment of frontier technologies for global trade and supply chain visibility.

The Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, marking its 10th year, now operates in 25 project countries, engaging nearly 50 global business partners and 2,000 local micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs). The alliance has simplified trade, saving over $213 million and delivering a 240% return on investment.

In Asia-Pacific, the centre continued to work on the ASEAN DEAL initiative to support the advancement of the world’s first such Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA). In South Asia, it partnered with the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas for India Energy Week 2025, where India reaffirmed its commitment to the Global Biofuels Alliance.

In the Middle East, three regional meetings advanced public-private collaboration, including anti-desertification efforts at COP16 in Riyadh. Forum leadership also met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to discuss regional developments.

In Africa, the centre continued convening the Friends of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) community to accelerate implementation of the trade agreement.

In North America, its Dialogue Series convened US industry and union leaders to explore the future of work in technology and advanced manufacturing.

The centre helps businesses and governments navigate an era of accelerating change and complexity by harnessing the power of cities as engines of innovation, talent and long-term competitiveness.

Its initiatives and communities unite leaders across 25 industries and more than 100 national and subnational governments to facilitate local testbeds that reimagine how people live and work, while seeding and scaling up the businesses of tomorrow.

The centre focuses on four key areas of economic opportunity and resilience, advancing public-private collaboration to unlock new growth through the innovation ecosystems, experience economies, place-based strategies and next-generation infrastructure.

The centre’s work with innovation ecosystems accelerates ground-breaking solutions, unlocks new markets and builds engines of inclusive economic opportunity. Through cross-sector partnerships, the centre is reimagining tourism, events and consumer experiences to drive sustainable growth and enhance quality of life.

As part of its efforts on place-based strategies, it partners with global and local leaders to advance high-quality, resilient communities that honour local culture and history, attract investment and talent and promote well-being. Finally, the centre helps mobilize investment in innovative physical, digital and social infrastructure to support future-ready communities and economies.

During the reporting period, leading retail, e-commerce, mobility and logistics companies announced new commitments and a shared ambition for more sustainable and efficient urban deliveries, while also working with governments to embrace new solutions and models that benefit consumers, couriers, companies and cities. These outcomes were enabled by a Forum-led process to convene and align industry leaders around a common ambition and facilitate collaboration with city governments to drive implementation.

Progress was also recorded in the travel and tourism sector, which employs more than 330 million people worldwide. To help sustain rapid growth in the sector, leading companies and experts outlined a vision to reimagine it as a transformative force for good. The Forum convened a broad, global coalition of stakeholders to begin charting a new, more inclusive and sustainable path forward for the industry.

The Davos Baukultur Alliance reached a milestone, having secured the involvement of more than 80 member organizations with operations in over 140 countries, all committing to support a shared vision for advancing more inclusive, sustainable and vibrant communities.

Members of the Global Commission on Nature-Positive Cities released a new strategy blueprint, insight report and a collection of city profiles aimed at informing and accelerating the transition to a nature-positive economy.

The Global Innovation and Impact Council released Shaping Tomorrow: Responsible Innovation for a Brighter Future, promoting a responsible innovation framework, which the Innovation Impact Alliance will use to support a community of pioneer cities working to establish a new model for aligning economic development with urban transformation strategies.