Potential use of technological forecasting in planning materials research

The potential use of technological forecasting in planning materials research and development activity is discussed. The various methodologies for forecasting have been revi-ewed and examples of some forecasts in the area of mater-ials are presented. The relevance of these forecasts to Indian scene, and the need for developing our own fore-casts are outlined. (The authors are with the Technologi-cal Forecasting and Research Management Cell of Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. This paper is based on the talk delivered by Shri P.K. Rohatgi at NML)