EXECUTIVE SUMMARY THE AAL VIBES ARE GOOD
With the publication of the new AAL Strategy Document, projects starting to deliver their products to market and a successful Forum packed with ideas, Peter Saraga of the AAL Advisory Board believes things are heading in the right direction
I
think there are two things to consider now. First of all, we don’t just think about the elderly as people with needs because they have frailties; we are now talking much more about what older people want and what they desire. So, they are not a problem to be dealt with, they are people, many of whom have money, with both needs and desires that have to be
met. This means that there is a genuine market and it is developing fast. Secondly, there is a great need now for AAL projects to bring their
products into this market. So are we going to see the products in this market begin to take off? That’s hard to predict, but in my opinion, the vibes are that we are beginning to see the kind of things you’d expect to see happening when markets start to take off. Of course, we have been talking about this market potential for a long
time now and these things are very difficult to predict. Let’s take computer games as an example. In the early days, when we had electronic games like Pong and other things, they went through a long period when little things happened but nothing that important. But then at some point, games started to become very big business and this, as with many things, was a something to do with the combination of the nature of technology – technology becoming capable of doing the things you actually want it to do – social change and price. It’s hard to pinpoint an exact moment when it all happened, but it did and games became big business. I think that if you now look at the AAL market
Peter Saraga
and the kinds of products there are in it, the timing of this change that I am speaking about is affected by the demographic change that is taking place. And we know about this change because we know how many people are getting older, so we know that we are on a curve of increasing demand – demand driven by a real need. So I believe we are about to see a big change and a huge market developing fast for AAL products. It’s very important that all stakeholders, SMEs, entrepreneurs, end
users and older people, are engaged in this process now, so the interactive nature of the Forum this year is a very positive step forward.
increasing demand – demand driven by real need”
“We are on a curve of
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