10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Each year, according to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Technology_Review ), MIT Technology Review publishes three lists …

• Innovators Under 35 (formerly TR35)
• 10 Breakthrough Technologies
• 50 Smartest Companies

All three lists are valuable to anyone interested in identifying promising start-ups. This year’s list of the top 10 Breakthrough Technologies came out a few weeks ago.

The three technologies that caught my eye are highlighted below.

But, first, here is a three-point strategy you might want to consider going forward …

• Look at the 10 Breakthrough Technologies list
• Subscribe to MIT Technology Review. This will give you easy access to each of the annual lists (https://www.technologyreview.com/ )
• Once you subscribe, take the time to read, or at least to browse, each bimonthly issue.

Energy is of particular interest to me. As such, here are the three technologies that stood out to me. Some of the firms of interest that are listed are …

SiFive
https://www.sifive.com
SiFive is a fabless semiconductor company and provider of commercial RISC-V processor IP and silicon chips based on the RISC-V instruction set architecture. SiFive's products include cores, SoCs, IPs, and development boards. SiFive is the first company to produce a chip that implements the RISC-V ISA. Wikipedia

SemiFive
https://semifive.com
SEMIFIVE, hand in hand with global innovation leaders, is growing as a leading partner for future SoC designs, and thereby becoming: The New Global Hub of Custom Silicon. Founded in Seoul in 2018, SEMIFIVE is basing its foundation on Korea’s semiconductor design competency that was amassed for more than 20 years.

BYD
https://www.byd.com
Founded in 1995, BYD started out as a battery maker and entered the automobile business in 2003. https://asia.nikkei.com
("Build Your Dreams" Chinese: 比亚迪股份有限公司) is a publicly listed Chinese conglomerate manufacturing company headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. It was founded by Wang Chuanfu in February 1995. The company has two major subsidiaries, BYD Automobile and BYD Electronic. https://en.wikipedia.org
BYD is a major Chinese automaker based in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province. It sells vehicles under the BYD brand.

Redwood Materials
https://www.redwoodmaterials.com
Redwood Materials, Inc. is an American company headquartered in Carson City, Nevada. The company aims to recycle lithium-ion batteries and produce battery materials for electromobility and electrical storage systems. Redwood Materials was reported to have a valuation of about $3.7 billion as of July 2021. Wikipedia

Li-Cycle
https://li-cycle.com
Li-Cycle, which became a publicly traded company in 2021, said it had more than 100 battery suppliers, including a partnership with Ultium Cells, a joint venture between General Motors and the South Korean battery company LG Energy Solution. Li-Cycle also has strategic partnerships with the mining giant Glencore and Koch Industries, the privately held conglomerate with extensive fossil fuel operations. Together, those two businesses have invested $300 million in Li-Cycle. (https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/21/business/energy-environment/battery-recycling-electric-vehicles.html)

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A FEW OF THE MIT TOP 10 TECHNOLOGIES 2023

Computing
A chip design that changes everything: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Computer chip designs are expensive and hard to license. That’s all about to change thanks to the popular open standard known as RISC-V.
By Sophia Chenarchive page
January 9, 2023

WHO
RISC-V International, Intel, SiFive, SemiFive, China RISC-V Industry Alliance

WHEN
Now
Ever wonder how your smartphone connects to your Bluetooth speaker, given they were made by different companies? Well, Bluetooth is an open standard, meaning its design specifications, such as the required frequency and its data encoding protocols, are publicly available. Software and hardware based on open standards—Ethernet, Wi-Fi, PDF—have become household names.

Now an open standard known as RISC-V (pronounced “risk five”) could change how companies create computer chips. Chip companies such as Intel and Arm have long kept their blueprints proprietary. Customers would buy off-the-shelf chips, which may have had capabilities irrelevant to their product, or pay more for a custom design. Since RISC-V is an open standard, anyone can use it to design a chip, free of charge.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/01/09/1064876/riscv-computer-chips-10-breakthough-technologies-2023/

TIP: Google: RISC-V International

RISC-V is an open standard Instruction Set Architecture (ISA) enabling a new era of processor innovation through open collaboration
RISC-V enables the community to share technical investment, contribute to the strategic future, create more rapidly, enjoy unprecedented design freedom, and substantially reduce the cost of innovation.

RISC-V International is the global non-profit home of the open standard RISC-V Instruction Set Architecture (ISA), related specifications, and stakeholder community

More than 3,100 RISC-V members across 70 countries contribute and collaborate to define RISC-V open specifications as well as convene and govern related technical, industry, domain, and special interest groups.

RISC-V combines a modular technical approach with an open, royalty-free ISA — meaning that anyone, anywhere can benefit from the IP contributed and produced by RISC-V. As a non-profit, RISC-V does not maintain any commercial interest in products or services. As an open standard, anyone may leverage RISC-V as a building block in their open or proprietary solutions and services.

Open source and global standards have a long history of success because they have a license framework that ensures anyone, anywhere can have ongoing access to them.
https://riscv.org/
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Climate change
The inevitable EV: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Electric vehicles have been available for decades. Now they’ve finally become mainstream.
By James Temple
January 9, 20

WHO
BYD, Hyundai, Tesla, Volkswagen

WHEN
Now
Electric vehicles are transforming the auto industry.

While sales have slowly ticked up for years, they’re now soaring. The emissions-free cars and trucks will likely account for 13% of all new auto sales globally in 2022, up from 4% just two years earlier, according to the International Energy Agency. They’re on track to make up about 30% of those sales by the end of this decade.

A mix of forces has propelled the vehicles from a niche choice to a mainstream option.

Governments have enacted policies compelling automakers to retool and incentivizing consumers to make the switch. Notably, California and New York will require all new cars, trucks, and SUVs to be zero-emissions by 2035, and the EU had nearly finalized a similar rule at press time.

Auto companies, in turn, are setting up supply chains, building manufacturing capacity, and releasing more models with better performance, across price points and product types.

The Hongguang Mini, a tiny car that starts a little below $5,000, has become the best-selling electric vehicle in the world, reinforcing China’s dominance as the largest manufacturer of EVs.

A growing line-up of two- and three-wheelers from Hero Electric, Ather, and other companies helped EV sales triple in India over the last year (though the total number is still only around 430,000). And models ranging in size and price from the Chevy Bolt to the Ford F-150 Lightning are bringing more Americans into the electric fold.

There are still big challenges ahead. Most of the vehicles must become cheaper. Charging options need to be more convenient. Clean electricity generation will have to increase dramatically to accommodate the surge in vehicle charging. And it will be a massive undertaking to make enough batteries. But it’s now clear that the heyday of the gas-guzzler is dimming.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/01/09/1064889/the-inevitable-ev-10-breakthrough-technologies-2023/
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Battery recycling
Recycling is vital to prevent today’s growing mountains of discarded batteries from ending up in landfills, and it could also provide a badly needed source of metals for powering tomorrow’s EVs. Companies are building facilities that will reclaim lithium, nickel, and cobalt and feed these metals back to lithium-ion battery manufacturers, helping reduce the cost.

TIP: Google: ev battery recycling
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Race to the Future: Electric Cars Are Taking Off, but When Will Battery Recycling Follow?

Many companies and investors are eager to recycle batteries, but it could take a decade or more before enough used lithium-ion batteries become available.
New York Times [EXCERPTS]
By Niraj Chokshi and Kellen Browning
Dec. 21, 2022
Niraj Chokshi and Kellen Browning reported this story from Reno, Nev. Chokshi also traveled to Rochester, N.Y., and Browning to Adelanto, Calif.

Sales of electric cars and trucks are taking off, and the auto and battery industries are investing billions of dollars to upgrade and build factories. These cars could help address climate change, but batteries pose their own problems. Raw materials can be hard to mine, are often found in countries with poor human rights records and require processing that leaves behind noxious waste.
Fortunately, those battery ingredients are also highly reusable. And now a race is on to collect and recycle used lithium-ion batteries. Venture capitalists, automakers and energy companies are pouring money into dozens of start-up recycling companies in North America and Europe.

Among companies recycling batteries, Redwood stands out. The company was founded by J.B. Straubel, a former top Tesla executive, and has raised more than $1 billion from investors, it said. Redwood sees itself primarily as a producer of battery materials — made from recovered or mined metals — and has established recycling partnerships with Ford Motor, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo. Redwood also recycles scrap from a battery plant run by Panasonic and Tesla, near Reno, Nev.

It could take many years for recycling to become a thriving industry in the United States. Relatively few electric vehicles are on the road, and most are new. Smartphones, laptops and other electronics also contain lithium-ion batteries, but they are difficult to collect and there are not enough to meet the growing needs of the auto industry.

But lawmakers and environmental groups want recycling to take off quickly to cut carbon emissions, protect the nation from an overreliance on foreign producers and promote the safe disposal of batteries.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/21/business/energy-environment/battery-recycling-electric-vehicles.html

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Jean Steinhardt served as Librarian, Aramco Services, Engineering Division, for 13 years. He now heads Jean Steinhardt Consulting LLC, producing the same high quality research that he performed for Aramco.

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