The strategic cost of dependency
Why concentrated exposure to critical technologies, materials and infrastructure is becoming a board-level issue across industries.
Read articleRelated macro
Agribusiness and agricultural technology
Build productivity, resilience and growth as agricultural economics respond to climate pressure, resource constraints and technological change.
Discover the macroEditorial overview
Articles
Seeing the blind spots before they become strategy failures
How stronger collection, source validation and challenge mechanisms can reduce executive exposure to weak assumptions and misleading signals.
Read articleFocus
Telecom operators still face the problem of turning network investment into growth
AI, network APIs and sovereign digital infrastructure create new opportunities, but connectivity economics remain difficult to escape.
Chemical producers face a structural capacity problem, not just another weak cycle
New capacity, soft demand and regional energy differences are pushing commodity chemicals toward prolonged margin pressure.
Strategic challenges
How much agricultural risk can technology actually remove from the field?
The challenge is separating useful precision and biological innovation from solutions whose economics fail under real farm conditions.
How should food companies plan when input volatility moves faster than pricing?
The challenge is protecting availability and margin while agricultural, energy and logistics costs transmit unevenly through the value chain.
POV
Semiconductor sovereignty cannot be bought simply by building more fabs
Real autonomy requires an ecosystem across design, equipment, materials, manufacturing and packaging, not isolated domestic capacity.
The next insurance advantage may come from deciding faster without pricing risk worse
AI can compress underwriting and claims cycles, but speed becomes dangerous if judgment and governance do not improve with it.
Strategic impact
AI-mediated commerce could change how retailers compete for consideration
Machine-readable product data, value clarity and fulfillment performance may matter more as digital agents influence purchase decisions.
Digital public infrastructure can make services less dependent on institutional boundaries
Interoperable data, identity and AI can enable services organized around citizen needs rather than fragmented agency structures.
What we observe
Mobility strategies often celebrate autonomous miles before proving unit economics
Technical deployment does not guarantee attractive economics when fleet capital, remote support and low-density demand remain expensive.
Health systems often digitize existing workflows instead of redesigning care delivery
Technology adds limited capacity when administrative burden, fragmented pathways and role boundaries remain structurally unchanged.