Fast-paced technological advancements are driving major changes in the global technology scene. These include raising the need for processing power at an exponential rate, drawing in management teams and the general public, and speeding up experimentation. As nations and businesses compete to establish leadership in the development and use of these critical technologies, these advances are taking place against the backdrop of intensifying international rivalry.
The 13—a “baker’s dozen”—frontier technology trends that have the potential to revolutionize international business are examined in detail in this year’s McKinsey Technology Trends Outlook. Today’s executives must scale new solutions, manage growing complexity, and foster trust in a world where the distinctions between centralized and decentralized systems, as well as between digital and physical, are becoming increasingly hazy. By showing how others are beginning to use these cutting-edge technologies now, the insights in this research can assist business executives in determining which of these technologies are most pertinent to their organizations.
Our examination of the quantitative metrics of interest, innovation, equity investment, and talent that support each of the 13 trends, as well as the underlying technologies, uncertainties, and issues surrounding them, yielded these conclusions. (Please refer to the “Research methodology” sidebar for additional information about our study.)
This forecast emphasizes revolutionary patterns that are spurring creativity and tackling important issues in many industries. In addition to being a potent technological trend in and of itself, artificial intelligence also serves as a fundamental amplifier for other trends. As AI both speeds up advancement in specific fields and opens up new opportunities at intersections, its influence increasingly manifests itself in conjunction with other trends.
Examples include improving energy systems, speeding up robot training, and advancing scientific discoveries in bioengineering, among many other areas. This year, applied AI and generative AI are evaluated jointly because the development of AI solutions in the market increasingly incorporates elements of trends we previously researched individually.
