Five decades of
our history.
Decade
#1.
The 80s: From conception of FutureAssets to our
first customer in Germany.
1984: Bernd Thomsen establishes a company – no employees, no clients, just an answering machine.His first client: Deutsche Bundespost, known today as Deutsche Telekom.
Private television was on the rise, and prominent consultancies predicted the decline of cinemas. The theory: Why go out when you can watch movies at home? We, on the other
hand, believed that cinemas would continue to thrive due to the social nature of humans. Besides, where is popcorn so delicious and kissing so romantic? With this prediction,
the first FutureAsset (Sociability) was born.
Decade
#2.
The 90s: From national success to global player.
In the 1990s, our firm continued expanding nationally with a number of high-profile clients. Then came international clients in the USA (Paychex New York), China (Sany) and
Japan (Panasonic). We began developing our forward-focused services (futurology) at full speed, investing in Permanent Future Research (PFR)
and Customized Strategic Foresight (CSF). While we didn’t anticipate a favorable future for the music industry’s recorded music sales, we did
identify a changing attitude towards ownership and sharing services - nearly two decades before car-sharing, co-working and many other facets of the sharing economy were
established.
Decade
#3.
The 2000s: From an insider secret to the woes of our CFO.
"We take care of our CIDD!" That stands for: Cultural and Integrity Due Diligence. Since the year 2000, CIDD has enabled potential clients to qualify for cooperation. This
process, which identifies clients we are eager to take on and differentiates them from those who aren’t a good fit, remains a minor source of contention for our CFO: without
it, we wouldn’t have to forego fees. But our commitment to
Quality Economy persists. After all, that's how we remain an insider secret. By the way, Starbucks opened its first store in Germany in 2002 - 13 years after we predicted
the coffee boom.
For our 30th
birthday,
we were evaluated by
30 professionals.
Decade
#4.
The 2010s: From a firm to leading institution.
This decade brought about noticeable change for us, including remote work opportunities (long before Covid-19) and open collaborative workspaces in nine metropolitan
cities. Everyone in our offices operates on a first-name basis. We’re highly regarded for our practices – increasingly so in media, politics, academia, and, of course,
business. All of which is, in part, due to our countless interviews, international government consulting, publications, and teaching engagements. Above all, our success is a
result of our expertise regarding the future – a field in which we are now a leading institution. We’re proud of how far we’ve come!
Decade
#5.
The 2020s: From the future to present day.
By the time the next US president is elected, we will be in our 5th decade of business (as of April 25). Picture this: the year is 2024. We've grown up, all while
maintaining our youth. We continue to push boundaries and, together with our clients, find unique answers to questions never before asked, enabling innovations of the future
to become present day realities. More and more companies are adopting a value-based approach to Quality Economy, one we began outlining in 2000. As a result, they are able to
demonstrate a qualitative evolution of their performance levels and quantitatively better results.
