AI billionaires will get richer
Artificial intelligence start-ups have already minted dozens of new billionaires last year. Despite fears of an AI bubble bursting, there is no stopping the astronomical growth of the sector. There are now 498 AI unicorns, or private AI companies with valuations of $1 billion or more, with a combined value of $2.7 trillion, according to CB Insights. Expect the list to get longer.
Two companies, meanwhile, have shown no signs of slowing down: OpenAI and SpaceX, valued at $830 billion and $800 billion, respectively, though both those figures may rise to $1 trillion. In October last year, there were reports of OpenAI laying the groundwork for an initial public offering. If that happens, many of its backers, like Microsoft and its own employees, will become significantly richer.
AI will have a cult following
The chasm between AI believers and non-believers will go deeper. In some areas, the technology will prove transformational, like coding and customer service, but AI models will largely get more powerful, not necessarily useful for organisations. A recent MIT study found that 95 per cent of companies’ AI pilot programmes failed to provide a return on investment.
AI models continue to make errors, legal professionals are yet to figure out ways to use the tool reliably and newspaper and magazine readers are rejecting AI-generated writing. It will not stop AI from reaching niche corners.
Large companies need to come to terms with a fact — scale alone does not create value; it is about having clear goals and clear measurement metrics. Can companies find a way beyond misaligned expectations?
Year of smart glasses
The success of Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses has proved the genre is here to stay, encouraging Google to re-enter the fray. The company, in fact, is a pioneer in the genre, releasing Google Glass in 2012, but a couple of years later it stopped producing the Google Glass prototype. It was succeeded by two Enterprise Editions, but the sales of those were suspended in 2023.
This time, Google plans to launch the first of its AI-powered glasses in 2026 through collaborations with Samsung, Gentle Monster and Warby Parker.
The company will release audio-only glasses that will allow users to speak with the Gemini AI assistant. It also said there will be glasses with an in-lens display that show users information such as navigation directions and language translations. The glasses will be built on top of Android XR, Google’s operating system for its headsets.
The smart glasses will compete with the Meta Ray-Bans and a rumoured offering from Apple. Rumours suggest that Apple is working to unveil its first set of AI smart glasses as soon as 2026.
Google’s first attempt at smart glasses failed because it was not attractive to wear and the display technology was still not perfect.
Get ready to pay more
Be it PCs, budget smartphones or mid-tier phones, buyers will feel the pinch as a global memory shortage is adding to the price tag. The problem may persist till 2027.
The memory used in smartphones and PCs comes from the same suppliers that provide LPDDR RAM for phones, DDR RAM for PCs, and NAND flash modules (used in smartphones, SSDs and microSD cards) for both categories. When AI companies buy these components in bulk, suppliers prioritise them. Complicating matters further is the demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM), which comes packaged with high-end GPUs such as Nvidia’s Blackwell Ultra chip. Since selling HBM is more profitable, production plans are increasingly focused on this component.
“First, the move to cutting-edge 3nm and 2nm foundry nodes has nearly tripled chip manufacturing costs. Second, the global AI server boom has swallowed up the supply of high-end memory (DRAM/HBM), driving component prices up by 20–30 per cent. It is a classic supply squeeze coupled with a demand for much more expensive specs,” Neil Shah, research vice-president at technology market research firm Counterpoint Research, told t2oS.
Companies, in a quest to keep pricing steady, may cut corners, like offering inferior cameras and displays to put in more RAM, which is needed for AI compute.
Foldable smartphones everywhere
The rectangular design of the smartphone slab is getting stale, including for the ageing gadget reviewer. That is why many are looking at a foldable, a phone with a bendable display that flips open like a book to increase its screen size and closes up to sit snugly in the pocket.
Samsung has been enjoying a massive lead in the foldable phone market for several years, but competition is expected to come from Apple. Two things are happening. First, Samsung is graduating from the book-style foldable phone to the Galaxy Z TriFold, which has two screen creases, one for each of its hinges. You will begin seeing the TriFold in some people’s hands in the next few weeks and months.
But the foldable phone still has an issue: a crease is still visible from certain angles. Apple, which only releases a device when it thinks perfection has been reached, may try to make a stab at the foldable phone this year. Rumour has it that the Cupertino HQ-ed company will launch a foldable in September. And it will have zero crease on the screen.
Foldable phones represent a fraction of all phones sold globally. Analysts at IDC forecast a 30 per cent year-on-year growth if Apple were to launch a foldable iPhone in 2026. It will be good for the category and slowly the world will begin a shift to a new form.
