Mad Hedge Technology Alerts!
The future is here.
No code or low code will bring a raft of new innovative tech companies to market, and we are in the early innings of this transformative development.
What is no code?
No-code is an approach to designing and using applications that requires zero coding or knowledge of programming languages.
This type of software hits us at a perfect time when the home office is beginning to become ubiquitous.
The self-service movement that empowers business users will support the creation, manipulation, and employment of data-driven applications.
If we turn back the pages of history, companies need an army of software programmers to develop even the measliest application.
That was then and this is now.
Fast forward to today and automated technology doesn’t only include cutting-edge industries like automotive cars, but also software on laptops that can be rejigged by individual entrepreneurs.
That’s right, one person with no coding experience will be able to design, develop, and offer a real-life application with meaningful business value without the help of expert programmers.
The research data backs up my thesis with research firms projecting a 23% increase in the global market for this type of technology.
During the pandemic, low-code/no-code tools saw steady growth due to their effectiveness in addressing some of tech’s most complicated challenges.
The essential need to digitize workflows and enhance customer and employee experiences will be a boost to the efficiency of commercial and operational teams.
No-code platforms have evolved from just facilitating mundane tasks to making it possible for a broader range of business employees to truly own their automation and build new software applications with no coding while increasing organizational capacity.
A few risks that larger companies might consider is that even for remote developers building new applications, governance is paramount.
IT staff will need to install guardrails in place and have those built into low-code/no-code platforms to maintain consistent levels of security across the organization.
Cybersecurity solutions need to be integrated into this workflow by training every employee at the organization on security behavior and using compartmentalization and limited access to prevent opportunities for mistakes.
Hard landings are hard to recover from and some can be crippling to the business model.
For no-code companies, harmonizing workflows is a key requirement for success.
In a low-code/no-code organization, departments should be able to work without silos and communicate freely across functions.
Elevated performance enabled by low-code/no-code tools will mean that the number of useful apps hurling toward the marketplace will be more and merrier than ever before.
Higher performance will no doubt usher in a new renaissance of efficiency and even better performance.
This also puts a 3 or even 4-day workweek squarely in play.
Many of the best tech minds in the world have supported the concept of working smarter instead of working harder.
A low code/no-code standard will allow for these achievements to take place.
The cratering of costs to start and run a tech firm is affected too.
Deploying startup capital to pay for other expenses will make it easier for successful incubation.
This will ultimately mean that this new type of tech company will need to embrace the fusion of IT and business staff, empowering them with composable applications to speed up the time to market for new solutions.
Low-code/no-code, APIs, and other tools are enabling companies to integrate new applications into their existing tech stack in a more seamless manner with a lift-and-shift approach vs. a rip-and-replace.
At the entrepreneur level, individuals will be able to harness the technology to build $100 million companies with a snap of the fingers when it wasn’t possible to do it before.
This is finally a chance for the little guy to recapture their moxie in the vast and sometimes overwhelming business world.
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
December 20, 2023
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(FUTURE OF AI PATENTS AND LAW)
(CHINA), (NEURALINK)
The world is rapidly shifting into a new paradigm where not only do people invent, but people also build artificial intelligence that can invent.
This will have massive ramifications for the business world and the tech industry which is the avant-garde of the business world.
Recent decisions from South Africa and Australia that an artificial intelligence machine can be listed as an inventor on a patent could spur these two locales into being one of the most competitive tech scenes in the world.
The U.S. and Europe will need to figure out what it means to be an inventor.
Registering A.I. as an inventor could potentially mean that multinational corporations won’t shoulder the blame if some sort of insidious experiment with A.I. goes horribly wrong crushing half of mankind.
It also opens up the possibility of some “A.I. invented” app triggering 1000X growth delivering prosperity to half of mankind.
The wide range of possibilities is enough to keep one up at night, and the deeper knock-on effect is that A.I. is now prime for game time.
The rapid acceleration of not only the quantity of A.I., but the increasing quality of A.I. means that countries will need to make some high-stakes business decisions on where A.I. fits into the law and patent system.
Courts in the U.S. and U.K. are expected to issue rulings later this year, and policymakers are gathering information on how to deal with the rising use of AI.
Another piece to the puzzle is how China will treat A.I. and the knock-on effects on American consumers and American businesses.
This sub-sector has been identified as one of the “must-win technologies of the future” by the U.S. administration.
China also leads in AI as it relates to facial recognition and has a database of 1.3 billion citizens to pull data from.
China is pursuing a centrally controlled strategy with hyperlocal implementation. Values and goals are set from above, and resources are made available.
At the local level of municipalities, cities, and provinces, regional administrations compete for the new AI clusters.
The result is a national and regional administrative state that works closely with research, investors, and industry to build a successful AI ecosystem.
In either case, American companies need a verdict and the initial framework of how to treat A.I. in terms of who owns the patents and what that means, or they risk falling behind places like China which is hell-bent on being the first A.I. superpower.
Imagine if all companies were protected from anything negative that AI manufactured and not only with social media.
One could understand how investors could win out big time if a flood of capital nosedived into controversial projects that became money generators.
Big tech has the capital and connections in Washington to advance the initiative.
Another project that comes to mind that would benefit from AI law is Elon Musk-supported Neuralink.
Elon Musk wants everyone to get brain surgery. Specifically, he wants everyone to get a brain implant — the brain-machine interface created by his company, Neuralink. He says it will be able to solve any number of medical conditions — including paralysis, anxiety, and addiction.
A project like this is high risk — a lot could go wrong with it.
But what if the law was set up to just allow investors to write off the externalities and fiscal costs of a failed project?
These rulings also have massive consequences in where the new Silicon Valley migrates to and if the rules are favorable in South Africa, what’s stopping Facebook from exploring an opening of a Cape Town subsidiary?
Not much is the answer.
The issue of inventorship is just a small part of the dilemma over how to deal with AI, such as what types of AI software are eligible for a patent and who owns the massive amounts of data required to “teach” the machines.
A decision clarifying which AI inventions are eligible for patenting would be impactful.
Ultimately, AI is a high-stake game that gets more important by the day and so far there has been nothing detrimental that will affect the fortunes of big tech and their quest for higher share prices.
