From Education and Healthcare to Urban Planning and Environmental Change, Here are 10 Companies Showcasing Technology’s Potential as a Force for Good in 2026

AI holds incredible potential, but as with any powerful technology, it needs to be managed carefully. In 2025, experts called for leaders to closely monitor any efforts to achieve a superintelligent AI model that would outperform human intelligence. The environmental impact of AI has also been a key challenge this year as the rising demand for the technology has seen data centers burn through electricity and water resources at a rapid pace.  

While these are valid concerns, they don’t cancel out the technology’s potential to act as a force for good. If we look back through history, the greatest leaps forward in development have been thanks to new innovations. AI is the latest chapter in this journey. 

The difference is how people, governments, and institutions choose to deploy AI and manage its potential risks. 

To illustrate, although AI has an environmental footprint, it can also help us find the answer to many complex ecological challenges at a faster pace. For example, AI is already helping us solve open challenges around weather forecasting, grid optimization and material science, all of which are critical for scaling renewable energy. 

AI’s potential to unlock positive impact for society can also be seen if we look at smart cities. It can help us make urban cities more sustainable, efficient and intelligent through advanced urban planning that improves the quality of life for citizens globally. AI data-driven methodologies have transformative potential for decision-making and policymaking in urban governance, helping us tackle rapid rates of urbanization, rising populations and complex socioeconomic conditions. 

Another example of AI as a force for good that we’ve seen playing out in 2025 can be found in education. Access to a private tutor can greatly improve the educational attainment of young learners, but most families worldwide won’t have the budget to cover this. AI-powered chatbots are helping to change this and democratize access to private tuition that can help students improve on everything from their digital literacy skills to learning English as a second language. The technology is also helping educators to tailor lesson plans and quickly build adaptive materials for the learning needs of each student. 

Finally, the progress of AI to date wouldn’t be complete without looking at healthcare. This year, we’ve moved beyond the initial use cases where AI was used as a diagnostic tool, analyzing MRI scans and data for cancer to find a much more comprehensive, intelligent health care assistant. In 2026, AI is expected to be embedded in the workplace to improve occupational health and support better mental health outcomes by reducing stress and burnout. It is also giving us  24/7 access to a private doctor who can monitor our biometrics and signal when something needs attention with a physical clinic. This is a huge step towards true preventative healthcare that will reduce the strain on healthcare systems and help citizens live healthier, productive lives. 

As we approach the cusp of the new year, here are 10 global companies to follow who are applying AI to tackle the most pressing socioeconomic challenges of our time. 

Deep Care

Data from the WHO shows that nearly one-third (31%) of adults worldwide, which equates to 1.8 billion people, don’t meet the recommended levels of physical activity. The risk associated with sedentary behaviour is a serious cause for concern, correlated to a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, depression and premature mortality, alongside a host of musculoskeletal complications.

German healthtech startup Deep Care is on a mission to develop smart solutions for occupational health and safety through innovative technologies and artificial intelligence. The goal is to empower people to work healthily and minimize health risks associated with the work environment.

Through AI, the company is looking to increase the well-being of individuals through personalized support that takes into account the unique conditions of each workstation. In turn, this promises to tackle the impact of sedentary lifestyles.

The Isa Resilience Coach is a sensor-based assistance system that recognises stress signals in everyday working life in order to take early countermeasures. The product helps to tackle burnout, improve work-life balance and reduce physical risks associated with office work. 

The company’s product, Isa, is already being used by over 250 companies and health insurance companies across Europe. Its Isa Resilience Coach brings the technology forward to consumers. In addition to musculoskeletal and metabolic prevention functions, the new Resilience Coach now extends the system to recognise cognitive and mental stress.

Planno

Divesting from fossil fuels is an ongoing goal for countries worldwide. In 2025, solar adoption figures surpassed all expectations, driven largely by its affordability and accessibility. Major economies like China and the US experienced a solar boom this year, but there has also been an explosion of interest across the Global South. Twenty African countries set national records for solar panel imports in the 12 months to June 2025. 

Planno is the first AI-powered prospecting platform for solar companies to identify and pre-qualify commercial and industrial rooftop opportunities faster, easier, and at scale. Through its proprietary technology and a growing list of strategic global clients, the company is helping to accelerate the transition to renewable energy by uncovering ideal locations for solar adoption that don’t require high upfront investments.

In 2025, the company has embarked on several key partnerships and expanded the availability of its Geo-AI platform to support the adoption of solar in more locations, ultimately helping to advance the pace of decarbonization worldwide. 

This includes an initiative with SparkWave Energy. By adopting Planno’s AI technology, SparkWave Energy aims to strengthen its rooftop pipeline, identify top-tier sites faster, and optimize project selection as Portugal’s distributed generation market is expected to add more than 500 MW annually in the coming years.

Brands Like Bands 

The rise of AI coupled with tough socioeconomic conditions has seen employee engagement rates plummet. The latest 2025 survey from Gallup showed employees are struggling. 81% of British workers are struggling with low morale, with 27% of leaders noticing higher signals of stress and burnout among employees, according to a 2025 survey from Celonis. In Europe, the employee engagement crisis is draining productivity and morale, with half of workers across 30 European countries reporting excessive workloads and 34% feel their contributions aren’t recognized. 

By leaning into emotion and creativity, Brands Like Bands uses frameworks from the music industry to help companies build truly lasting relationships with their audiences, approach product marketing in an entirely different way, and build people-first cultures that actually address the growing disconnect between employees and corporations.

The Brands Like Bands Festival is the only festival in the world with bands formed in companies. So far, over a dozen editions of the festival have been held with employee bands from companies like L’Orael and Nokia performing alongside major artists such as Muse, Duran Duran, and Post Malon. 

Now, the company is preparing for its most international event yet in 2026, making its presence felt in cities including São Paulo (Brazil), Lisbon & Porto (Portugal), Barcelona (Spain), Florence (Italy), London (England), Berlin (Germany), and Oulu, Finland, for the European Capital of Culture.

The initiative from Brands Like Bands promises to address poor workplace morale and reinvigorate productivity and loyalty in the face of tough conditions. 

Credibl ESG

Credibl is a leading decarbonization platform specializing in Scope 3 emissions calculations. The company provides cutting-edge AI-powered tools for ESG data management and reporting, enabling organizations to navigate sustainability challenges with precision. Its platform offers end-to-end traceability, climate risk management, and comprehensive ESG reporting, seamlessly integrating with existing systems.

As sustainability reporting becomes mandatory for an increasing number of companies worldwide, Credibl’s AI-powered solution is helping businesses maintain compliance, take control of complex supply chain data and build sustainable companies for the long term.

Its AI-powered platform enables businesses to produce accurate, audit-ready sustainability reports that comply with international standards, while providing insights to manage climate-related risks and drive sustainable growth.

The tech platform ensures that ESG isn’t a tick box exercise in compliance, but a framework to meaningfully advance decarbonization initiatives to create a sustainable future and meet net zero goals. 

360 Health Data

Latin America continues to struggle with the burden of limited resources and unequal distribution of healthcare services, particularly for rural populations. In order to improve healthcare outcomes, prolong life expectancy and reduce infant mortality rates, access to the latest research is key. 

In a bid to improve access to medical information in Latin America, Colombian-based company 360 Health Data introduced this year a new platform known as Coralia Health. The platform uses AI and automated tools to translate medical resources and clinical studies into Spanish so that local clinicians can access key insights more easily and intuitively. 

360 Health Data provides physicians with a state-of-the-art data platform to make more informed and personalized clinical decisions. The team is transforming medical knowledge in Latin America, connecting a community of passionate professionals.

By designing a comprehensive knowledge ecosystem, the team hopes to improve the healthcare industry by democratizing access to information. Not only can physicians in Latin America now access cutting-edge data and real-world evidence (RWE) on disease, life science, and drug information in Spanish, but AI is also set to fuel collaboration and engagement within the community. 

Through AI, 360 Health Data is able to translate vast medical resources and the latest healthcare studies into Spanish to break down barriers to knowledge and improve healthcare outcomes for millions.

Ness Digital Engineering

Ness Digital Engineering is a global provider of Intelligent Data and Software Engineering services, specializing in data, AI, and cloud-powered solutions that drive innovation and deliver measurable business outcomes. Ness helps enterprises modernize systems, accelerate product development, and achieve scalable impact with speed and precision.

The company is also changing how the industry approaches software development thanks to its unique model known as Intelligent Engineering, which leverages AI, data and analytics to improve productivity.

In October 2025, Ness announced the inauguration of its Mexican headquarters in Puerta de Hierro, one of Guadalajara’s most prestigious business districts located in Zapopan. 

The new headquarters will be the first step to building a high-impact, nearshore Center of Excellence for AI-driven Intelligent Engineering in Latin America. This shows that the region is rising the ranks of the global tech industry. It will also help to catalyze tech industry growth and opportunities in both Guadalajara and the region of Latin America. Ness launched its new Center with 50 employees at the end of 2025 but the company has a target to see this figure surpass 200 by the end of 2026 and 300 by the end of 2027. 

By bringing more tech jobs to Latin America, Ness is helping to address global wage inequalities and show that AI helps to stimulate the labor market and create more roles. 

MyUser

In 2025, small and mid-sized businesses have struggled with hiring talent due to limited budgets, weaker brand recognition and fierce competition against large enterprise companies. If this global issue can’t be addressed, the pace of innovation and economic growth will take a serious blow. 

MyUser is helping companies to find the support they need to grow their business without relying on recruitment. 

The enterprise is an autonomous B2B sales platform powered by proprietary AI. It automates the entire outreach motion from start to finish, targeting high-value leads with hyper-personalized copy, and taking care of follow-ups, inquiry handling, and meeting scheduling. 

The company is on a mission to change how businesses grow by making high-quality customer acquisition accessible to anyone with a marketing budget. The platform is built for startups, SMBs, and enterprises looking to supercharge their outreach efforts without the overhead of a more traditional sales process.

Prezent

The “Great Detachment” refers to a growing trend where employees feel detached from their work. For employers, productivity concerns and future talent loss are hidden organizational risks. 

Improving workplace communication is one to address this. Prezent is an AI-powered business communication and presentation productivity platform on a mission to democratize great business communication. 

The team believes that strong communication is the cornerstone of any successful enterprise, and they are building AI-powered tools to enhance the impact and professional appeal of every presentation its clients create.

The company plans to disrupt traditional agency business models and empower companies with AI-fueled communication materials, personalized at scale. In 2025, Prezent AI announced a US$30 million Series B round of funding. This capital injection saw the company’s valuation reach US$400 million, moving it closer to becoming the industry’s first unicorn.

It also marked a key milestone, as Prezent furthers its mission to disrupt the $20 billion agency and consultancy market, the company continues to harness the latest tech innovations to transform how companies create communication materials.

ManagedMethods 

Access to digital technologies has also seen rates of cyberbullying soar worldwide. Students are also suffering from poor mental health associated with excessive amounts of screen time and exposure to unregulated online content. 

ManagedMethods is a cloud security platform specializing in K-12 education, providing easy-to-use cybersecurity and student safety tools for Google Workspace and Microsoft 365. 

The company champions a student-first approach to online safety, using AI-Powered Threat Detection to find risks such as self-harm, cyberbullying, violence, and explicit content, helping to keep students safe when working online, monitoring browsing, cloud apps, and social media. 

The solution also helps schools tackle the onslaught of cyberattacks in an affordable and easy manner, designed for tight school budgets and IT teams needing quick deployment. It offers comprehensive protection, covering web browsing, cloud apps, and third-party app risks while also providing detailed reports for administrators to make informed decisions. 

The platform offers full control and monitoring of data within Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 and connects via API, requiring no proxies, agents, or complex setup, with zero network impact.

Ourself Health

Women’s health research has long been underfunded, in part owing to stigmas associated with conditions that primarily affect women.

Ourself Health is a technology platform that is designed to empower women with more insight and control over their wellbeing. Founded by Adriana Torosian, Ourself enables its users to securely track securely track and centralize cycles, symptoms, hormones, conditions, and life stages in one place. The platform provides a much needed response to under-resourced and increasingly fragmented healthcare systems, helping people to uncover patterns and triggers often missed by doctors and practitioners. 

As an area that’s under-researched and often overlooked for funding, Ourself Health shows how tech can close critical gaps for improving women health. By giving users ownership of their data with the tools to better understand their bodies, this company is fostering more than a productive conversation with healthcare providers. It’s helping to advance a more inclusive and informed approach to health for women around the world.