21 October 2025

Season 7, Post 40: Everything disrupted everywhere

To write about and then invest in future trends implies a love of disruption. As the economist Josef Schumpeter noted, disruptive innovation is critical to progress. What better way to pass the time than attend a ‘disruptive tech’ conference? A skyscraper in the City of London served as the venue for panels and presentations from some of Europe’s most exciting (and mostly private) companies. Here are the key highlights.

The quantum computing discussion was by far the best attended event of the day. Your author was not surprised. We discussed in this year's post #22 that if AI is the current hot topic in tech, quantum has the potential to be the next big thing. As one panellist put it, quantum processes can “enhance” AI. While the exact mechanisms are still emerging, the promise of optimisation and improved problem solving is tantalising. More practically, when quantum is applied to materials science, it may represent a “playground for engineers” and “revolutionise all industries.” A recent Bain report suggests the market potential for quantum could be between $100bn and $250bn.

The defence and space industries may be two that could benefit from quantum advances. Given the ongoing war on the edge of Europe, this session was also well-attended and the discussion lively. The key takeaway: governments need to be more proactive and pragmatic in their decision-making and embrace more technology. Procurement processes can and should be accelerated. We were also left in little doubt that space will potentially be the next battleground in warfare. As we discussed earlier this year, compromise satellites and you have a big problem. Mission-critical data such as geo-location may simply not be available.

Closer to home, technology is also poised to revolutionise the healthcare sector. Developing new drugs is both time-consuming and expensive, typically taking a decade and costing around $2bn. Fewer than 10% of candidate drugs make it to market. Healthcare is “becoming more of a data exercise,” we were told by one of the speakers at the event. AI technology can improve drug discovery rates and also make hospitals more efficient. However, as with any other technology, two challenges remain: scaling effectively and finding appropriate talent.

22 October 2025

The above does not constitute investment advice and is the sole opinion of the author at the time of publication. Past performance is no guide to future performance and the value of investments and income from them can fall as well as rise.

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Alex Gunz, Fund Manager

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