The Promise Of Accelerating Growth In Technology

Part of being a successful contrarian investor is being able to watch trends, see how the world is changing and adapt to it. The small changes of today will grow into large shifts tomorrow. In the world of innovation the new breakthroughs of today will serve as building blocks for advancements henceforth. Clearly, no one knows specifically what the future entails, nevertheless by watching trends you can anticipate how the world will shape up over the then couple of years

Technology is not only changing and becoming more advanced nevertheless the rate of the change is as well increasing. According to inventor and futurist Ray Kurzwiel, advancements in innovation are growing exponentially. You can see this exponential growth in the semiconductor industry. In 1965 Gordon E. Moore predicted that the number of transistors that can be placed inexpensively on an integrated circuit would double about every 18 months. In spite of early critics and naysayer the rate of growth in computing power has only increased over the past decades; now doubling every 12-14 months.

Despite all these advancements it may not feel like research is growing exponentially. Sure, new computer models are being released every year. However we rarely see new revolutionary technologies, or do we? Part of the reason we may not feel the rapid growth of technological innovations is because we look at the world from a day-to-day perspective. Not much happens from day-to-day and once a new innovation has emerged we quickly take it for granted and we feel that it has been around all along.

But radical changes are taking place although we don't notice them in our busy lives. You may appreciate these changes more by looking at the progress made over the last five, ten, and twenty years. For instance, if someone would have told you 20 years ago that there would be a virtual network connecting everyone on the globe, or that people would carry pocket size device that with a press of a button can access nearly all human knowledge, many would probably not have believed you.

The chart below shows the rapid growth in innovation

The chart below shows the rapid growth in innovation. Just while the last 100 years the progress in innovation has exploded, and we should expect this growth to continue. The internet has made the distribution of information available to virtually anyone; fostering an environment for collaboration and sharing of ideas. Just in case, there are currently more engineers and scientists in the field today than all the accumulated engineers and scientists throughout history. The combination of these two variables will lead to greater growth in the field of science with evermore discoveries and innovations.

We may be closer to new scientific breakthroughs than most people realize. In a not so distant future; innovations currently in infant stages, in computer innovation and biotechnology will emerge and change the world beyond recognition. The building blocks are already in place, serving as a foundation for new innovations. I see the following trends emerging over the years and decades to come.

Computers are becoming smaller and smaller. They have shrunk from gigantic mainframe computers the size of a house in the 1960s, only available in universities and government laboratories, to desktop computers, laptops, and now smart phones. At the current rate of change, computers will in the near future be small enough to fit inside your clothing.

Moore's law is after all alive and then and the rate of growth is only increasing in speed; now doubling nearly every year. Just last year, a innovation revolution occurred, with the advent of the Tri-Gate transistor, and nearly nobody outside the high-tech world noticed. In May, Intel displayed what they call the Tri-Gate transistor; a three-dimensional transistor in which electrons flow not just in a flat channel nevertheless along three sides of a raised fin. What's significant about this chip is not only its improved computing performance, yet it will be smaller and only use half the power of a regular chip; thereby generating less heat. All this means faster, lighter, and cooler computers. The chip is scheduled to enter the market at times in 2012.

As computers continue to shrink in size the necessity for a different communicate interface is needed. A keyboard and mouse worked then for a stationary desktop or laptop however those tools are not as effective for a smartphone or even smaller devices. Luckily, there are already devices in development capable of communicating with the user through other means just as responding to a user's eye movements.

Google, for instance is already working on glasses with a built in heads-up display that has the ability to connect to a wireless network. It has been rumored by employees at Google that the glasses will communicate with your smart phone through Bluetooth and provide data on your location via GPS and motion sensors. It will connect to Google's cloud and relay information of your surroundings, including locations or friends nearby and objects that they look at, allowing you to make calls, use a number of different applications, and connect with friends.

The video quality is currently at 720p

The video quality is currently at 720p, with a 1080p version in development. The glasses can display content from devices like an iPhone through the use of a special adapter. Otherwise watching movies, the idea is that the glasses could be used for things like presentations, where you want to read a speech during focusing on your audience or for directions to a location during you're walking around.

Computers, smart phones and other electronic devices may be receiving most of coverage by the media, however it is not the only field where research is making a lot of progress. Rapid advances are as well being made in biotechnology and biomedicine. For instance, scientists at MIT developed a double-stranded RNA activated caspase oligomerizer drug last year that can fight viruses as effectively as antibiotics fight bacteria. It is designed to trigger suicide in cells that have been infected by a virus. In lab tests, it was effective against 15 viruses, including the rhinovirus, which causes colds; H1N1 influenza; dengue fever; and poliovirus.

The horizon is in made in nanomedicine

Other progress on the horizon is in made in nanomedicine, which is really the application of nanotechnology to medicine like diagnosis and treatment of disease. There are several applications within the realm of nanotechnology that are making headway.

Nanotechnology and Nanomedicines is for all that in an infant stage with first generation technologies like liposomes and PEGylated used for delivering pharmaceutical drugs and nutritional supplements. Nevertheless more sophisticated nanotechnology is in development.

For example, advancements are being made in research that can be used to treat cancer. One promising new technique, currently in a development stage, involves delivering a drug made up of small packages of nanoparticles to a tumor. Once the packages are surrounding the cancerous cells, ultrasound will be directed at the target, breaking the packages and releasing the drug to killing the tumor. Other unrelated lines of innovation include using antibodies to deliver gold or other metallic nanoparticles to a cancer cell and at the time use radio waves to heat up the metal and burn the cells in the tumor.

Revolution in manufacturing is in accordance with way

A revolution in manufacturing is in accordance with way. It is in its infant stage, however it will likely reach epic proportions in this coming decade. This innovation will turn the economics of manufacturing backwards and change the way products are made, marketed and sold.

Despite relatively unknown, this industry is already generating $1 billion in sales. And the stage is set for massive growth in the years to come. Manufacturers of 3D printers like 3D Systems and Stratasys are both generating more than $140 million per years in revenue, and growing rapidly.

The possibilities for this research are virtually limitless and somewhere hereafter lies the vision that we can instantly download a drawing and manufacture any products, anytime and anywhere. We may then be a decade(s) away from this innovation becoming mature, however once here it will revolutionize the way of commerce, just like the internet did in the 1990's.

How does these emerging technologies relate to investing? These technologies are on the whole in their infant stages nevertheless at some point some emerging companies is going to deliver these products to the market at an affordable price point. And like as not the then and there Microsoft or Apple has already been born.

Huge returns will be made by investors with the insight to find the straightway great innovator. The chart shows the returns of the research leaders of the last decade. Whether companies like 3D Systems, Stratasys, Lumus Limited, or Arrowhead Innovation Corporation will become the new leaders in their field remains to be seen. Still, we should expect to see exciting new technologies emerging over the then and there couple of years.