Diminished Reality is here: it’s like Augmented Reality in reverse. Synthetic biologists are working on biological teleportation between Earth and Mars. Amazon has been quietly building a massive healthcare ecosystem in the U.S.
What do these developments have in common? They’re shaping a future unlike the one many businesses and government leaders ever imagined.
The theme for our 14th annual Tech Trends Report is the New World Disorder. The cataclysmic events of the past year resulted in 500 tech and science trends –– a whopping 22% increase since last year. Which means that the future is still in flux, and it’s going to take some time before we get to a new normal.
Highlights
- Researchers are developing a new technique that might someday enable us to upgrade our children before they’re born.
- Most Americans would sign over rights to their DNA data for $99.
- Facial recognition systems now automatically identify people, pets, and even Disney characters. Not even Mickey Mouse is safe from algorithmic surveillance.
- Prescription-strength video games are being developed to treat certain conditions and diseases. The require an FDA approval.
- This year, people will buy and sell synths — digital extensions of real people and synthetic characters — in online marketplaces.
- Rollables are the new foldables: Screens that unfurl and retract are in development, which will change the form factor of many consumer electronics.
- The Internet of Things is interesting, but have you heard of the You of Things? Your body is part of a network called the You of Things. And that network — the you of things — is quickly becoming sentient.
- Fewer than 2% of all people who have had their genomes sequenced are from Africa, which excludes an enormous number of people from the benefits of genetic research.
- Now you can worry about Cloud neutrality: a handful of companies control the cloud and have the sole ability to set pricing, access, and standards. Those companies own the infrastructure and don’t have to make their business practices transparent.
- We’re going to see more of what FTI calls “CDoSing,” a corporate-denial-of-service (CDoS). This happens when a company denies one or more users, businesses or governments the ability to access its platform or services.
- Diminished Reality is like Augmented Reality in reverse. People-cancelling glasses are coming. In the future, we will have noise cancelling buildings, where the buildings themselves dampen the noise of the city.
- This year, people will buy and sell synths — digital extensions of real people and synthetic characters — in online marketplaces.
- A new type of software could be viable for 100 years, making use of AI to dynamically adapt to changes in environments and resources.
- This decade, synthetic biologists will focus on intentional design, improving organisms or constructing new materials from life’s building blocks.
We’ve broken down our analysis into digestible portions. You’ll find key takeaways for executive leaders, startups you should be tracking, guidance for strategy, risk, product and R&D teams, viewpoints from experts in the field, and scenarios describing plausible outcomes.
Our 2021 Tech Trends Report is available for free, and it’s designed to help you confront deep uncertainty, adapt and thrive.
