by Nicholas Mitsakos | AI Agents, Artificial Intelligence, Innovation, irrationality, software, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
Autonomous shopping agents, co-working and research agents, and coding agents that write, test, and deploy software. The demos are impressive and the announcements relentless, but how much economic value is any of this generating? Almost all AI-related spending is capital expenditure. Companies are buying chips, building data centers, and scaling up cloud capacity. This is spending on AI infrastructure, not productivity from AI deployment. AI is in the infrastructure buildout phase, not the value capture phase. Mass spending is generating minimal returns, but the market has decided to price the dream rather than the earnings. Can any of this translate into economic reality before the capital runs out and political patience expires? Infrastructure, capability, and revenue growth are happening. Productivity is developing. But a significant gap still exists between capital investment and return on that investment. AI is risky, but these investments are not irrational. They are pricing the dream, and the long-term winners remain unclear.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Artificial Intelligence, Book Chapter, Innovation, software, Technology, Writing and Podcasts
For the better part of three decades, enterprise software followed a remarkably stable economic logic. You built a product. You sold access to that product. You charged per seat. You expanded revenue by increasing the number of people required to operate the system. It was elegant, scalable, and wildly profitable. Now, it is breaking. It is the decoupling of software revenue from human labor. The industry continues to frame this moment as a competition between AI and software. That framing is wrong. AI is not competing with software. It is becoming the operating system for work.
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, 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 | Book, Investment Principles, irrationality, Technology, Transformative businesses, uncertainty, Writing and Podcasts
The uncomfortable truth is that the world is becoming more unstable, uncertain, and less predictable. Geopolitical fragmentation, fiscal and monetary distortions, energy transitions amid increasing bottlenecks, rare-earth competition, and technological disruption from artificial intelligence, robotics, and other innovations upend traditional thinking that assumes linearity, stability, and normal distributions.
Ubiquitous access to information means insight is more about filtering the signal from the noise and understanding interconnections among previously unrelated factors.
In other words, better thinking.
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 | Book Chapter, China, Globalization, Innovation, Public Policy, Science, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
The US’s competitive advantage was developing the world’s best educational system, initiating innovative research and development, welcoming the world’s best students to thrive in an unrestricted environment, and accessing unique forms of capital for entrepreneurial ideas. The unique environment that combined academia and entrepreneurship, as seen at places like Bell Labs and Fairchild Semiconductor, was the spark that ignited Silicon Valley, the Life Sciences Corridor, the Innovation District, and the Research Triangle, among others, creating an unprecedented entrepreneurial environment and economic engine. This drove economic growth, disruptive innovation, and greater prosperity. This created a virtuous cycle that enhanced national wealth and economic opportunity. We are undermining all these advantages. The next 20 years will be defined by choices made today. Talent, energy, and technological innovation build the foundation for prosperity. Undermine them, and you guarantee decline.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Book Chapter, China, Globalization, Innovation, Taiwan, Technology, Writing and Podcasts
The sustainability of advanced technologies, unique manufacturing capabilities, global access, and robust supply chains is currently dependent on ill-defined, reckless, and volatile political and economic strategies. Ignoring the reality of the situation and hoping things will eventually work out isn’t a good plan. For decades, the world has relied on Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) to produce the most advanced chips, powering everything from smartphones to artificial intelligence. This dependence has created an unprecedented vulnerability: a single geopolitical flashpoint controls the lifeblood of the global digital economy. The challenges of advanced semiconductor technologies and manufacturing are among the most pressing and significant issues of this generation. The U.S. must acknowledge that a world dominated by a single supplier is unsustainable. It must invest not only in fabs but also in intellectual capital, allied coordination, and long-term technological leaps. There is no guarantee of success. The rivalry with China will intensify, and Taiwan will remain a flashpoint. But inaction is the greater risk. Hope may provide comfort, but only strategy, investment, and execution will ensure resilience. Hope is not a plan.
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 | China, Economy, Globalization, Public Policy, Technology, Trade, Writing and Podcasts
The United States and China play global economic and political chess games. There are numerous moves and defensive and offensive strategies, not only for trade but also for energy and natural resources (rare earths, among the most recent sources of discord), geopolitics (Russia, Ukraine, Iran, and the Middle East generally), technology (Taiwan and AI), and global economic supremacy. It’s a long list, but China and the US drive the outcomes. Let’s be clear, Apple designed the iPhone, but it was China’s manufacturing workforce that made it a global phenomenon. China’s millions of engineers and factory workers accumulate practical hands-on knowledge from experience that cannot be easily transferred. This sustainable advantage creates new industries, including electric vehicles, drones, and alternative energy, with world-leading expertise. In the meantime, America’s engineering expertise has been hollowed out. It is naïve to imagine wrestling China back to the past. The project, now, is to contest its moral vision of the future. Connected, collaborative engagement is the only practical way. China has come a long way, and its trajectory cannot be ignored or dismissed. The U.S. and China will be much better off from this more enlightened, realistic perspective.
by Nicholas Mitsakos | Book Chapter, Green Energy, Science, Technology, Transformative businesses, Writing and Podcasts
A new generation of clean, reliable, and flexible energy technologies, including, geothermal and advanced nuclear energy, is emerging. The story is no longer about clean and renewable energy. Solar and wind have their place, but capital investment and policy incentives are now focused on reliable, low-cost, controllable, domestic energy. For the first time in years, the policy, market, and demand signals are aligned in favor of a portfolio of solutions that are testing the edges of technology and are no longer narrow niches.
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.
