Unicorns, Hype, and Bubbles
22 October 2024Synopsis
New technologies are an investment minefield. Putting money behind them means taking a risk on unproven ventures, often from inexperienced (and potentially unscrupulous) developers.
While some will lead the investor to fantastic gains, many others turn out to be mere bubbles – a flimsy veneer of excitement and hype with little profitable at the core.
But ignoring these technologies can be even worse, as this can mean failing to capitalise on the next great step in innovation. From cryptocurrencies, blockchain, the metaverse, Web3, and NFTs, to self-driving vehicles, delivery drones, solid state batteries, eVTOLs, and more, technology bubbles have been inflating and popping for many years. Each time a bubble pops, tens if not hundreds of billions of investment dollars disappear with them.
Unicorns, Hype, and Bubbles arms the reader with the tools required to differentiate between bubbles and genuine, sustainable technological revolutionaries.
Under the expert tutelage of Jeffrey Funk, you will learn:
The economics of modern businesses and how they lead to bubbles forming.
How to assess new technologies to sift viable investments from hype-driven bubbles.
That you can be a far better judge of new technologies than so-called “industry experts”.
How to identify exciting new opportunities in a world of money-losing startups.
Details
22 October 2024
9781804090886Reviews
“I love tech, but not so blindly as to have overlooked the fact that it attracts an absurdly large proportion of available investment, and where the investor hype is often misplaced, mistimed or both. On the principle of ‘always invert,’ I don’t think you should merely read this excellent book, but also keep it within easy reach on your desk.”Rory Sutherland, Author of Alchemy and Vice-Chairman at Ogilvy UK
“This book explores how we often exaggerate the impact and value created by high-tech innovations, along with startups and at least some of the academic research and media reports. It is a thought-provoking review of technology fads and fashions, from the sharing economy to artificial intelligence and much more.”Michael A. Cusumano, SMR Distinguished Professor and former Deputy Dean, MIT Sloan School of Management, and Co-Author of The Business of Platforms
“Jeff Funk is an all-too-rare critical analyst who has seen beyond the fads, hype, and jargon to uncover critical weaknesses in the foundations and performance of our so-called innovation economy.”Daniel Sarewitz, Emeritus Professor of Science and Society, Arizona State University
“A wonderful book that is both educational and entertaining. Jeffrey Funk does a masterful job explaining how groupthink, greed, and hype lead to bubbles that gum up America’s great engine of growth—entrepreneurs with good ideas starting small businesses that sometimes grow into very large businesses.”Gary Smith, Fletcher Jones Professor of Economics at Pomona College and Author of more than ten books including Distrust: Big Data, Data-Torturing, and The Assault on Science
