Last week the Silicon Valley was abuzz as The Churchill Club held their annual Top 10 Tech Trends event in Santa Clara. The annual event is much anticipated by the Silicon Valley crowd….as well as VC-types as 
it can provide an interesting perspective on what the future might hold for the software industry.
As always, I have my radar up to capture any insights I can from events like these. I could not attend the event, but thanks to some bloggers and news articles, I am able to report what was discussed.
As the 10 trends were presented, four leading industry panelists were on stage to debate the worthiness of each trend.
- Aneesh Chopra, Chief Technology Officer of the United States.
- Steve Jurvetson, managing director, Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
- Ajay Royan, managing director, Clarium Capital.
- Paul Saffo, managing director of Foresight at Discern Analytics
Below is a list of the ten trends on the Churchill Club’s list along with my take on the pace of adoption of each trend. From sources I’ve read, the panelists themselves only agreed on a couple of the trends. Which ones do you agree on?
1) Age before beauty: This trend asserts that the Baby boomer generation will dictate the technology trends of the future. The premise is that this is such a large market that is largely unserved today.
- My take: I don’t agree. Although the retired population is a largely untapped market, it is not one that gets excited about technology trends. They are not digital natives. I don’t see my parents flocking to buy the latest Ipad or the latest 3D TV.
2) The doctor is in: The trend is toward complete automation: a combination of artificial intelligence, the Internet, and very low-cost medical instrumentation to provide high-quality diagnostics and advice—including answering patient questions—online to a worldwide audience.
- My take: I see this trend happening, but the focus will be first on specialized medicine. The trend will be very slow to adopt to a mass market. Privacy, culture, and behavioral issues will make changing over to online medial practices a long road.
3) Made for me: Manufacturing is undergoing a revolution. This trend is about the one-off production of physical goods in widely distributed micro-factories: the ultimate customization of products. It is becoming technically and economically possible to make products that are unique to the specific needs of individuals.
- My take: Consumers and Businesses are all expecting more and more customization of products and services. The enabler of this trend for product manufacturing is the 3D printer technology trend. For services, it is the software and advanced analytics that drive Internet-based services.
4) Pay me now: The trend is technology and business models based on attracting consumers to share large amounts of information exclusively with service providers. Why? Because information can be very valuable. This knowledge is becoming a key asset and a major competitive advantage for the companies that gather it and analyze it. Businesses will become increasingly smarter and more aggressive in convincing us to share our information with them and not with their competitors
- My take: I am not sure about the name of this trend here, but this all ties into the trends of privacy, cloud computing / storage, and database analytics trends. Businesses who figure out how to use analytics to make sense of all the information they gather will know better how to target and customize services to individuals that are most likely to buy.
5) Rosie at last: Rosie was the Jetson’s robot who did most everything for the Jetsons and even had a personality anyone could love. Robots ARE slowly becoming embedded in our environments. They will take full advantage of the cloud and advanced analytics in order to anticipate, understand and fulfill our needs.
- My take: I do see a future for personal robots. See my post: A Primer on the Consumer Market for Household Robots. This will be another long term trend. We are not going to see explosive growth overnight. However, there will be a gigantic industry in the future all around the robot and robot Industry … both for consumers and businesses.
6) Social, really: The rise of true social networks, creating real respectful relationships online.
- My take: The key here is the word relationships. The value of social technology is it can enable better relationships. If businesses can find ways to leverage social technology to form better relationships, then their sales will benefit.
7) Augmented Reality: Augmented reality will become indistinguishable from actual reality.
- My take: AR will transform how we receive and process information throughout the day. The AR trend will take another 15-25 years to take hold in the mass market, but it will take allot longer (1-200 years) to get to the point where AR is indistinguishable from actual reality.
8) Engineering by biologists: practical engineered artifacts, devices, and computers based on biology rather than just on silicon.
- My take: This is all about the convergence of computers, biology, chemistry, and nanotechnology. This is another of the long-term trends that will have profound impacts on human lives over the next 200-300 years, but I don’t see much impact in the next 25 years.
9) Tis a gift to be simple: Cyber defense through wide spread adoption of simple, low-feature software for consumers and businesses.
- My take: The security industry is secure. That is, the need for security solutions will only increase as technology becomes embedded in every part of our business and personal lives. While these solutions may look simple and low-featured, there will be a huge technology capability under the covers.
10) Reverse innovation: the trend for developing countries to turn around the flow of innovation: Silicon Valley will begin to learn more from them about innovative applications than they need to learn from us about underlying technology.
- My take: History has shown us that innovation (agriculture, industrial, military, technology) leads to good things. The quest for innovation will always be an important part of the human journey. Successful businesses must ensure they enable innovation daily, whether that innovation happens in America Valley or in BRIC or in other emerging markets.
For more information about the Churchill Club event
You inspired me and gave me a boost to start my own blog and my basket weaving project.
Posted by: gclub | October 27, 2011 at 05:51 AM
But none of the top 10 tech trends further relates for education.
Posted by: Systems Analysis and Design Courses | December 16, 2011 at 02:45 AM
It's good thing to know. Technology really helps to make mans life a whole lot easier and convenient.
Posted by: Superannuation Funds Australia | December 16, 2011 at 03:27 AM
Yeah I agree with you Superannuation Funds Australia. The technology will make one's life easier and convenient and that's because of electricity.Thanks GOD we have this "ELECTRICITY" it makes technology works.
Posted by: Electrician Indiana | January 13, 2012 at 02:00 AM