It seems I’m not the only one getting old, especially in the Asia Pacific region which, as can be seen from the latest infographic from Visual Capitalist below, will soon be home to 1 billion people over age 65. A more detailed breakdown can be found here.
Of course this is nothing new. We’ve known for years that the effects of China’s one child policy and the retirement of the post WWII ‘baby boomer’ generation (1946-1964) would create this kind of distortion and put pressure on Governments to fund the needs of a rapidly ageing population (pensions, healthcare, aged care etc.) from the tax revenues of a dwindling working population. The question remains: ‘what are we going to do about it?’
As the saying goes ‘every problem is an opportunity in disguise’ and so I’m doing my bit by leading Australia’s HealthTech industry to Asia to tap into the large and growing sources of capital available to world class innovation and technology which can be commercialised and scaled into the Asian region. I led two missions in 2023 and my next one will be next month (more details here) and I’m delighted to say that we’re starting to see some good results.
Australia has an excellent reputation for innovation and technology, especially in biotech, life sciences and medtech, mainly because of our great Universities. What’s required is more funding – grants, incentives and early stage capital – which is in short supply. Asian Governments, investors and technology parks are cashed up, motivated and ready to invest in and support high quality HealthTech innovations. So what are we waiting for?!
