Michael is a top-rated, innovation and trends speaker who has addressed tens of thousands of attendees at gatherings around the world, inspiring them with remarkable insights into changing consumer and business trends.
He’s an expert on disruptions that reinvent markets, in particular social media, technology and marketing trends and innovations that are reshaping our world. His trademark motto is, “I help you catch the next wave before it catches you.”
Michael takes audiences on his trademark “roller-coaster ride through the landscape of now,” during which he showcases innovative brands, ideas and products that leverage “Ubertrend” waves to alter the global landscape.
His incisive people-watching skills have lead to adjunct professorships of innovation and social media at the University of San Francisco and UC Berkeley, where he teaches the anthropological framework of the eight Ubertrends he tracks.
Ubertrends are massive waves that cascade through society leaving many subtrends in their wake, and they provide telltale signs for helping decode the future. His unique skills as a futurist lead the U.K.’s Daily Telegraph to label Michael “America’s most influential trend-spotter.”
Michael is a catalyst who inspires and motivates attendees by challenging their creativity and inventiveness. His informative yet entertaining style fuses the emotional and rational brain to help foster a new culture of innovation.
He has appeared in numerous publications and TV shows, including Access Hollywood, Ad Age, Bloomberg TV, BusinessWeek, CNET, CNN, The Independent (U.K.), The New York Times, PBS, San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury-News, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal and Wired.
A successful four-time entrepreneur, Michael is the founder of four innovative startups, MacWEEK, Atelier Systems, CyberAtlas and ICONOCAST, each an ahead-of-the-wave innovators that helped pioneer such markets as desktop publishing, CRM, internet research and digital marketing.
Michael is the founder of Ubercool Innovation, a consultancy and incubator, and is currently writing his third book, “Ubertrends — How Trends And Innovation Are Transforming Our Future,” to be published in 2018.