by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Globalization, Innovation, Physical Intelligence, software, Writing and Podcasts
Software Is the central nervous system of the global economy and its demise is greatly exaggerated. There’s a growing narrative thatsoftware is becoming commoditized. Large language models write code. Autonomous agents assemble applications. The barriers to building digital products appear to be collapsing. If software can be generated instantly, then software itself must be losing value.
This conclusion fundamentally misunderstands how technological disruptions develop and expand. Software is becoming the infrastructure layer of modern civilization. The economic, industrial, and geopolitical systems being constructed over the next three decades will not run on software. They will run as software.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Innovation, space, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Space is no longer a frontier. For most of the modern era, space has been misunderstood—not technologically, but economically.
Space was a destination rather than a system and a heroic engineering challenge rather than an industrial platform with a continuous operational, and commercial potential. Many early “commercial space” narratives sought to impose venture logic on a domain that remained structurally dependent on government capital, prestige economics, and one-off missions. The result was predictable: excitement without durability, valuation without cash flow, and ambition without a stable market. Now, space is about economic persistence: building businesses that treat space not as a product but as a technological and economic stack – a physical layer supporting a stack of software services and networks.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Book Chapter, drug discovery, energy, Green Energy, Innovation, Robotics, Technology, Writing and Podcasts
As the era of artificial intelligence is here, it’s easy to fall into the trap of despair and fear over the loss of control and the worry that artificial intelligence is about to unleash killer robots and enslave humanity. Either that, or Artificial intelligence will improve lives, expand access to education, advance healthcare, and advance climate science, among many other improvements. Luckily, AI’s benefits greatly outweigh its costs. Nothing is free, and everything comes with a price (there are always both sides to the ledger), but the extraordinary benefits that artificial intelligence can unleash are worth the effort. It would be a mistake to slow down, pause, or restrict research, development, and AI applications. AI will not destroy the world — and it is more likely to save it.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Innovation, Physical Intelligence, Robotics, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
The wheel was a great invention. But not until it was combined with other wheels to create a usable cart was it an innovation. The wheel was a breakthrough; a moving, stable cart was a system. Systems create intelligent, scalable, and disruptive technology. Innovations are not new technologies. Breakthroughs are necessary, but it’s systems that are the solution. The value created by AI in the physical world is not scaling software. It is focus, discipline, and constraint within effective systems. The systems that endure will not be those that promise universality, but those that dominate specific economic niches, involve humans strategically, and survive year ten of operation.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Innovation, Physical Intelligence, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Robotics and related technology are ready for deployment, but the industry hasn’t crossed the threshold into full-scale production. Computational breakthroughs in stunning demonstrations are attention-grabbing, but the realities of industry quickly take over. There is a gap between robotics and artificial intelligence (“physical intelligence”) as it transitions from potential to hardware delivery in a demanding industrial setting. Physical AI and its integration into robotics may become one of the largest markets in history. But it is an industrial problem whose solution is not on a software timeline. In other words, its commercial deployment requires much more systems integration and real-world constraints than a software slide deck contemplates.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, energy, Globalization, Innovation, Investment Principles, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Markets destroy the comfortable assumption that tomorrow behaves like yesterday. They reward those who can identify when the system’s structure changes and punish those who try to fit new realities into old frameworks. That is why the conventional idea of “what something is worth” has become less relevant than how systems evolve. Investors who cling to formulas intended for stable conditions will always be surprised by nonlinear disruption. Nowhere is this more obvious than in AI and energy, where the variables are not just changing, the equations themselves are being rewritten.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Innovation, Investment Principles, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
The selloff in technology stocks this week startled some investors. It shouldn’t have. The signals of an AI bubble have been flashing for some time: billion-dollar raises for companies with no product, multibillion-dollar valuations for companies with no revenue, and nine-figure offers made to individual researchers. The AI race is building products that are economic complements to one another—you need the turbines that power the grids, that power the chips, that run the models, that power the products. And you need firms to build their growth and hiring plans around the expectation that ever more of their work will be done by AI. AI is in a bubble, companies will fail, and capex is unsustainably high. The real question is whether the infrastructure being built now will unlock a technological era that outlasts the speculation that paid for it.
History suggests yes. The pattern repeats because the pattern works. The bubble is not the danger. Missing the moment is.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Economy, Innovation, Investment Principles, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Artificial intelligence is no longer an engineering discipline. It is an economic one. The companies that win will be those that understand: Ambition requires capital. Capital requires compute. Compute requires global-scale infrastructure. Infrastructure requires a strategy measured in gigawatts and billions, not teams and timelines. This is not just the future of technology — it is the new architecture of global competition.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Globalization, irrationality, Science, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
We are on the precipice of technological innovations that could potentially disrupt humanity, but they will not happen overnight, nor will they be out of our control. We have the time and hopefully the perspective to make wise choices.
It’s happened before.
A little over 100 years ago, and within a few decades, the automobile, the airplane, the telephone, and the electrical grid remade the physical and social fabric of life. For the first time, distances collapsed. Cities and homes glowed with electric light. Factories ran with continuous power. Communication traveled instantly across continents. People traveled unimaginable distances in hours rather than weeks or months.
What had been science fiction for centuries became everyday reality, and people felt both awe and dislocation. We can learn from the past, as the scale of disruption from that era was likely far greater than what we are experiencing today.
The Total Perspective Vortex is a form of torture because the truth of one’s insignificance is unbearable. Perhaps that truth is found in the disruptive innovations we admire and fear, the humanity that may be lost in this sea of technological innovation, and our anxiety about our own irrelevance.
We have a deeper responsibility. It’s happened before; perhaps humankind can make better use of the new era of disruptive innovation and our expanding powers more wisely.
In other words, get a perspective.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, China, Innovation, Public Policy, Technology, Writing and Podcasts
The US is still ahead of China in artificial intelligence. However, perhaps the key to China’s success lies in its open-source model ecosystem, combined with aggressive development in semiconductor design and manufacturing. Our world is not static, and the world of artificial intelligence is where momentum matters. AI can potentially be transformative, and although current geopolitical rhetoric does not allow for cooperation or collaboration, AI progress and innovation are ultimately a global collaborative effort. If done correctly, it benefits many more and it does not come at the expense of any one nation. That should be the AI Action Plan.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Globalization, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Artificial intelligence is driving technological disruption and economic transformation. It is a unique opportunity and, like PCs, the Internet, mobile, and cloud computing before it, AI is driving a new supercycle. Unlike previous technological revolutions, the current transformation is exponential, creating new industries and markets and impacting existing economic structures, costs, distribution, and employment. While productivity and economic growth are expected to surge, the most significant opportunity arises for capital owners, and therefore, investors. AI will be the most significant economic catalyst of the 21st century, fundamentally altering how we work, innovate, and create value.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Book Chapter, Science, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
With better models, more effective benchmarks, and a framework for constant improvement, now is the time to focus AI on complex, innovative, and transformational tasks. Essentially, AI and models should focus on hard tech. Hard tech refers to businesses rooted in advanced engineering and scientific innovation, often involving the development of physical products or systems that address complex challenges. Beyond drones, robots, and AI-driven hardware, the following are prominent examples of hard tech opportunities across industries. AI-driven hard tech is creating new business models and industries, such as personalized medicine, autonomous logistics, smart infrastructure, and agentic AI platforms that autonomously manage complex operations, reshaping the competitive landscape and unlocking new avenues for value creation. As a result, businesses and professionals who embrace interdisciplinary skills and continuous learning will thrive in the hard tech ecosystem.
