Technology change has the potential to bring about shared prosperity and clever answers to the biggest problems facing the planet. However, its exponential pace runs the risk of overwhelming current institutions, leaving us vulnerable to unavoidable risks. This risk is increased by geopolitical crises, growing polarisation, and an impending climate crisis.
Leaders must act quickly to take advantage of the chance to use technology for good. They should be prepared for the following five developments in the upcoming year.
1. Green tech at a tipping point
The cost of solar and wind energy has significantly decreased over the past ten years as a result of ongoing technological advancements, making renewable energy sources more affordable than fossil fuels. By 2050, it is predicted that switching from fossil fuels to renewable energy will enable economies all over the world to save $12 trillion.
In 2023, governments and top business figures will concentrate on expanding current green technologies and creating new ones. Both the catastrophic scenarios that were once thought likely and the target of limiting global warming to less than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels appear to be getting further away.
Green hydrogen, a new clean-burning energy source that enables energy from renewable sources to be captured and transported long distances — from regions with abundant wind or solar energy resources to energy-hungry areas thousands of kilometres away — is one of the most promising technologies we can expect progress in.
Following the recent proof of concept that it can produce more energy than is required to initiate the fusion process, nuclear fusion is another green technology to watch in 2023. These most recent findings are probably going to encourage more research to advance the technology, bringing us closer to a time when nuclear fusion could provide nearly limitless, secure, and clean energy, even though we are still years away from producing energy at scale.
2. Hyper-connectivity and cyber-resilience
Globalisation is in retreat as a result of economic and geopolitical dynamics, which are also causing cyberspace to fragment along with rival political factions. The structural forces of technological development are, however, pushing for greater connectivity rather than less. The Internet of Things (IoT) will have 15 billion connected devices by the end of the year, and by 2030, that number is predicted to double. The rapid rollout of 5G coverage in 2023, which will enable devices to communicate more quickly and perform better overall, will be a key factor driving this trend.
The risks of a collapse due to an accident or an attack are increasing exponentially as a result of our dependence on connected devices and infrastructures. Governments and regulators should intensify their efforts to make sure connected devices adhere to the most recent cybersecurity standards. One example of this is the European Union moving forward with its proposed EU Cyber-resilience Act and the Biden administration launching a cybersecurity labelling rating programme for Internet of Things devices.
3. Quantum computing R&D
The future of computing looks to be in quantum computing, which uses subatomic particles to develop new techniques for processing and storing data. Quantum technology is expected to operate orders of magnitude faster than the best processors currently in use, which will speed up the process of solving complex problems.
Despite the fact that quantum technology is still in its infancy, massive government and industry investment indicates that hardware and software development will likely advance quickly in the upcoming year, and quantum products will likely start to hit the market. Business and government leaders will intensify their efforts to comprehend and reduce the risks that the technology poses, from impeding current cryptography to changing the nature of war.
4. Gene editing goes mainstream
CRISPR-Cas9, the gene-editing technology whose creators were awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, has primarily been employed as a research tool to comprehend the significance of particular genes and discover new medicines. Since the first patient underwent gene-editing therapy three years ago, the technology has been applied to treat conditions such as sickle cell disease, congenital blindness, and heart disease. Early research indicates that diseases like Alzheimer’s and chronic pain may also be treatable with CRISPR, despite the fact that its primary use-cases are diseases with a single gene mutation.
In 2023, it’s likely that gene editing will become more prevalent in medicine and other fields, generating a multi-billion dollar industry and creating difficult moral conundrums.
5. Artificial intelligence everywhere
By the end of 2022, a new discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of artificial intelligence (AI) was sparked by OpenAI’s interactive conversational model Chat GPT, which drew more than a million users in just five days. The amount spent on AI is expected to surpass $500 billion in 2023, which will lead to rapid advancements in generative and adaptive AI.
Without requiring developers to rebuild it, adaptive AI can continuously retrain its models to learn from and adapt based on new experiences, producing faster and better results. Neural network models are used in generative AI to produce new things. Consumers find text-to-image and text-to-video generators appealing, but they also raise serious issues with the spread of misinformation, the dangers of harmful content, copyright laws, and algorithmic biases. Over the next year, regulators and online watchdogs will examine this.
When things work in new ways, they also break in new ways, as the late French cultural theorist Paul Virilio noted. We also created the shipwreck when we created the ship. The stakes are high and the same is true for new technologies.
This should not make us fear technological advancement, but rather humble and aware that advancement is hard-won and easily lost. The great imperative of our day and age is to accelerate technological change and introduce new technologies at scale to address the most pressing global challenges. Our reward will be stronger, more resilient economies and societies if we are successful in meeting that challenge.
