1995年，在很多人还不知道电子商务为何物时，IBM就预先提出“e-business”战略理念，此后网路时代的兴起，企业开始兴建网站，购买IT基础设备。这推动了IT基础设施走入普及阶段。

2002年，网际网路泡沫破灭后，IT走下神坛，引发了业界对“IT不再重要”的争论。此时，IBM又适时地推出了“e-business on demand”——重点在“on demand”。当客户开始捂着钱包说环境不好，我不买IT设施了！而IBM则巧妙地说没关係，我可以根据您的需求提供服务，你可以像用水用电一样需要多少买多少。

有意思的是，前两个理念，还包括几十年前的大型机战略，被IBM称为三次“登月计画”，而这次IBM的新理念成为“智慧星球”——不是“月”就是“星”，咋一听起来，很大很空，甚至，刚开始时，IBM内部人也不一定很懂。，事实上，IBM每次理念的提出和随之“传教”式的推广，都成为了产业的风向标，引领了整个IT业跟随IBM的脚步而调整和前行。

如果说，前两个战略理念——“电子商务”和“电子商务随需应变”，IBM的着眼点是企业，而现在“智慧星球”的着眼点更广——也许IBM发现，企业信息化、电子商务的实现，光靠自己企业自身无法实现，这需要不仅包括企业自身，还包括政府、社区等整个社会、整个生态链共同来实现。就像网上购物，美国很容易实现，是因为用配套的环境支持。而我国因为支付问题、信用等问题，难以普及——这已经不是技术问题。所以，就像钱大群在演讲中所谈到的要实现“智慧型星球”的挑战比以前实施“电子商务”和“电子商务随需应变”都要大很多，“不是一个企业可以做到的，要彼此合作，比如，你要解决一个水污染问题的时候，水污染的上游说我做了，下游说我不管，或者下游做了上游不管都没有办法，只有在一起共同协作才能解决这个问题。”

IBM最精明和老到之处，每次战略理念的推出，都很高屋建瓴，出发点都是别人，而落脚点却是自己——IBM不仅可以提供谘询（点子），还可以提供整套的解决方案。这实际上是作为产业引领者的IBM做生意的方式。在把金融行业的钱赚得差不多以后，IBM近几年开始把触角伸到电信、医疗、交通、製造等各行各业，而要打动像医疗、交通等国家基础设施部门的“钱袋”，情况更为複杂，需要的是系统工程。IBM适时提出了这个新理念——智慧型星球，正是基于这样的背景。

如果说，IBM以前的理念主要是“忽悠”企业，现在“智慧星球”的提出则更重要的是与政府部门合作。此时，国家4万亿投资基础设施的计画推出之时，IBM推出的“智慧型星球”战略，强调“实体基础设施和信息基础设施不应该分开建设，而应该是统一的智慧型基础设施”也正是IBM此理念的精髓之处。在现在经济危机背景下，IBM新战略的卖点则是降低监管风险、提升效益，更加节能、更加绿色等，这几点，钱大群演讲中阐述的“智慧型星球”的例子都有提及——这正是急政府之所急、想政府之所想。

It is a pleasure and an honor to be here today in this distinguished assembly, and at this extraordinary moment: a major political transition in the United States, the global economy in flux, our financial markets restructuring themselves—and an acutely felt need for leadership.

Our political leaders aren't the only ones who've been handed a mandate for change. Leaders of businesses and institutions everywhere confront a unique opportunity to transform the way the world works.

We have this chance for reasons no one wished. The crisis in our financial markets has jolted us awake to the realities and dangers of highly complex global systems. But in truth, the first decade of the 21st century has been a series of wake-up calls with a single subject: the reality of global integration.

Two years ago, I published an essay in Foreign Affairs that described the changing structure of the corporation, which I felt had been largely left out of the discussion on globalization. I described the emergence of a new kind of corporation—the globally integrated enterprise, which was replacing the multinational.

Today there is growing consensus that global integration is changing the corporate model and the nature of work itself. But we now see that the movement of information, work and capital across developed and developing nations—as profound as those are—constitute just one aspect of global integration.

In the last few years, our eyes have been opened to global climate change, and to the environmental and geopolitical issues surrounding energy. We have been made aware of global supply chains for food and medicine. And, of course, we entered the new century with the shock to our sense of security delivered by the attacks on 9/11.

These collective realisations have reminded us that we are all now connected—economically, technically and socially. But we're also learning that being connected is not sufficient. Yes, the world continues to get "flatter." And yes, it continues to get smaller and more interconnected. But something is happening that holds even greater potential. In a word, our planet is becoming smarter.

This isn't just a metaphor. I mean infusing intelligence into the way the world literally works—the systems and processes that enable physical goods to be developed, manufactured, bought and sold... services to be delivered... everything from people and money to oil, water and electrons to move... and billions of people to work and live.

What's making this possible?

First, our world is becoming instrumented: The transistor, invented 60 years ago, is the basic building block of the digital age. Now, consider a world in which there are a billion transistors per human, each one costing one ten-millionth of a cent. We'll have that by 2010. There will likely be 4 billion mobile phone subscribers by the end of this year... and 30 billion Radio Frequency Identification tags produced globally within two years. Sensors are being embedded across entire ecosystems—supply-chains, healthcare networks, cities... even natural systems like rivers. Second, our world is becoming interconnected: Very soon there will be 2 billion people on the Internet. But in an instrumented world, systems and objects can now "speak" to one another, too. Think about the prospect of a trillion connected and intelligent things—cars, appliances, cameras, roadways, pipelines... even pharmaceuticals and livestock. The amount of information produced by the interaction of all those things will be unprecedented. Third, all things are becoming intelligent: New computing models can handle the proliferation of end-user devices, sensors and actuators and connect them with back-end systems. Combined with advanced analytics, those supercomputers can turn mountains of data into intelligence that can be translated into action, making our systems, processes and infrastructures more efficient, more productive and responsive—in a word, smarter. What this means is that the digital and physical infrastructures of the world are converging. Computational power is being put into things we wouldn't recognize as computers. Indeed, almost anything—any person, any object, any process or any service, for any organization, large or small—can become digitally aware and networked.

With so much technology and networking abundantly available at such low cost, what wouldn't you enhance? What service wouldn't you provide a customer, citizen, student or patient? What wouldn't you connect? What information wouldn't you mine for insight?

The answer is, you or your competitor—another company, or another city or nation—will do all of that. You will do it because you can—the technology is available and affordable.

But there is another reason we will make our companies, institutions and industries smarter. Because we must. Not just at moments of widespread shock, but integrated into our day-to-day operations. These mundane processes of business, government and life—which are ultimately the source of those "surprising" crises—are not smart enough to be sustainable.

Consider:

How much energy we waste: According to published reports, the losses of electrical energy because grid systems are not "smart" range as high as 40 to 70 percent around the world. How gridlocked our cities are: Congested roadways in the U.S. cost $78 billion annually, in the form of 4.2 billion lost hours and 2.9 billion gallons of wasted gas—and that's not even counting the impact on our air quality. How inefficient our supply chains are: Consumer product and retail industries lose about $40 billion annually, or 3.5 percent of their sales, due to supply chain inefficiencies. How antiquated our healthcare system is: In truth, it isn't a "system" at all. It doesn't link from diagnosis, to drug discovery, to healthcare deliverers, to insurers, to employers. Meanwhile, personal expenditures on health now push more than 100 million people worldwide below the poverty line each year. How our planet's water supply is drying up: Global water usage has increased six-fold since the 1900s, twice the rate of human population growth. According to the Asian Development Bank, one in five people living today lacks access to safe drinking water, and half the world's population does not have adequate sanitation. And, of course, the crisis in our financial markets: This will be analyzed for decades, but one thing is already clear. Financial institutions spread risk but weren't able to track risk—and that uncertainty, that lack of knowing with precision, undermined confidence. It's obvious, when you consider the trajectories of development driving the planet today, that we're going to have to run a lot smarter and more efficiently—especially as we seek the next areas of investment to drive economic growth and to move large parts of the global economy out of recession.

Fortunately, we now can. We see this in how companies and institutions are rethinking their systems and applying technology in new ways.

Stockholm's smart traffic system has resulted in 20 percent less traffic, a 12 percent drop in emissions and a reported 40,000 additional daily users of public transport. Smart traffic systems are strengthening the competitive positions of cities from London to Brisbane to Singapore—with many more being planned. Intelligent oil field technologies can increase both pump performance and well productivity—in a business where only 20-30 percent of available reserves are currently extracted. Smart food systems—such as one now running in the Nordics—can use RFID technology to trace meat and poultry from the farm through the supply chain to supermarket shelves. Smart healthcare can lower the cost of therapy by as much as 90 percent—as ActiveCare Network is doing for more than 2 million patients in 38 states, whom it monitors for the proper delivery of their injections and vaccines. There are many other examples I could cite. Smart systems are transforming energy grids, supply chains and water management. They are ensuring the authenticity of pharmaceuticals and the security of currency exchanges. And they are changing everything from organisations' business models to how they enable their employees to collaborate and innovate.

And remember, the opportunity to become smarter applies not just to large enterprises, but to smaller and mid-sized companies—the engines of economic growth everywhere. When we think about systems like supply chains, healthcare delivery and food systems, we're really talking about the interactions of hundreds, even thousands of companies, most of them small.