2018 Predictions — TL;DR

We had some fun coming up with our #2018predictionsin5words. Intrigued? Read on for the slightly expanded TL;DR versions.

“Brands must take a stand in 2018. Existing companies will promote their values, and a new generation of mission-driven brands will flourish. As the retail landscape consolidates and demands differentiation beyond convenience and price, politically charged and socially conscious consumers — millennials especially — will exert their power in the only way they feel able: with their wallets.”

—Patricia Nakache, General Partner, @pnakache

“AI changes everything for developers, with two particularly big impacts. First, AI expertise will be required as more time is spent building and working with machine learning algorithms. Second, machine learning is going to drastically change the nature of a developer’s job by impacting the way they write and deploy code.”

— Dan Scholnick, General Partner, @dschol

“Online advertising, which is being besieged by fraud, fake bots and ad blockers, will become even less effective in 2018. As a result, authentic conversations replace annoying ads. Brands seeking to scale with reach outside of the Google/Facebook duopoly will seek two-way dialogue with their customers and prospects.”

— Ajay Chopra, General Partner, @ajaychopra

“In 2018, financial services will start to become omni-present as a seamless and almost undetectable part of everyday life. We’ll see an increase in the number, complexity and types of these products with financial services everywhere via APIs, capable of integration into virtually any digital experience.”

— Schwark Satyavolu, General Partner, @schwark

“In recent years, companies aggressively recruited millennials — the largest generation in the US labor force–only to see them leave at record rates. To decelerate the expensive exodus of talent, HR tech focuses on retention in 2018. The right solutions will stem from the bottom up, not the CHRO-level down, and a whole new HR stack for both recruitment and retention will emerge.”

— Karan Mehandru, General Partner, @kmehandru

What are your #2018predictionsin5words?