What’s it like in 2026/2036?

A while back, in looking at the larger trends that would be emerging in the next few decades, we walked through a few themes. Some of the themes lead to potential positions that we could currently take (ie. BYD and TSLA) and others are still a few years out. As we’re all local Chch residents (currently), here’s a gist of some of the thoughts along those lines.

What’s 2026/2036 looking like?

A few technologies would have reached maturity by then.

1) Virtual Reality

- full immersive in high fidelity is capable. Virtual environments can be as hyper real. Cities no longer providing key interaction point, more for serendipity and training.

- cities with greater environment that is wired up has advantage (Canterbury / Otago / Wellington)

- Cities play a stronger role by creating niche social events — ie. Coachella, SXSW

2) Drones

- Autonomous, self learning, adaptive, responsive, cost efficient for delivery, repeatable tasks (garden management, patrol, planting, harvesting, pest management) — reduces cost of management of area (Canterbury advantage)

- Home management simplicity encourages greater outdoor / physical activities

- Self sustainability and local growing are much more possible

- Larger parcels of land increase in value

3) Self driving vehicles

- Distance commute no longer a barrier — arrive refreshed or completed communication work, reflective work, ad hoc support

- Valuation of land parcels further away from cities become valuable

4) Pervasive broadband

- Still highly contested though most towns are connected now

- Remote areas still a costly aspect though mobile tower models may be able to appear via self subsidisation as individuals exploring the arbitrage of other technological advantages would self invest in such infrastructure

- Requires local council process — this is more of a 2–3 decade point of action than something achievable in 10 years. May be the achilles heel for the idea outdoor lifestyle and tech tipping point bottleneck

5) Solar energy + battery tech

- Costs are more efficient than coal / hydro / wind

- Fully sustainable for heating / power

- Strong disruption to existing utilities

6) Ecosystem combination effect

VR + Drones + Pervasive Broadband + Solar = remote telepresence / remote automation

Drones + Self Driving = remote self sustainability

Pervasive Broadband + Self Driving + Solar = Always on / outdoor research / total connected

all above = risk exploration in undersea, mountain, underground, fault line, geo-thermal