MWC, the mega global assembly of future of technology comes to an end today. Owing to my health condition, I avoid attending such events that demand lots and lots of traveling, especially walking through the halls and lobbies. But always follow such events very closely. I am sure the participating brands which are present in India will have an after show in India for a wider audience to catch a glimpse. That’s easy to manage.
Nevertheless, the technology companies have been busy all this week showcasing the future of tech and how tech will further integrate in our lives. As I have been maintaining, we have been so far interfacing with technology. But the era that we are getting into, integrates us within a tech ecosystem. Humans being the centrepiece, tech is all around! We are increasingly immersing into technology. Of course, there are both the sides of the coin – good and bad. I am not going to get into that discussion.
Talking especially from the consumer tech point of view, whatever has been showcased so far marks the beginning of a luxurious tech era. While it’s a great thing to see where industry is banking on ultra luxuries powered and propelled by an array of smart and intelligent technologies, its at the same time leading to a technology polarisation. This polarisation is towards affluence. From economics and prosperity point of view, its heartening to see that the technology companies are foreseeing overall economic prosperity of humans worldwide who can invest in such ultra-premium technologies. At the same time, it’s taking away the technology ecosystem from one of the major and fundamental duties of solving the problems of masses and bridging the gap between already polarised world from economics perspective.
MWC 2024 is only a reflection of the sentiment. The consumer electronics brands are finding it a lucrative opportunity to go for premium and luxury user cohorts who have the capacity to pay and also brings in a growth promising revenues. Back home, we are already seeing its impact. As a point to prove, the smartphone brands that were serving sub ₹10,000 segments are already exiting it and stepping up to lucrative meadows. We still have the economic classification of developed, developing and third world countries. Though its not now talked much and perhaps we have become sensitive of not differentiating and profiling humans like this, but its still etched in our minds affecting a lot of our thought process. The tech is seen as an important enabler of a level playing field that could help the lagging nations to speed up growth and prosperity. With the thought process reflected at the MWC 2024, its going to create a tech driven compartmentalisation of the world. This time not defined by geographies or demographics, but within same nation, society and community. I wouldn’t call it digital divide as that’s used in a different parlance. It’s indeed a digital ridge.
The past 2 decades have been mostly about creating technologies that have resulted in becoming necessities. The continuous incremental innovation kept on adding the element of comfort, which still brings in a lot of overall value. This necessity and comfort got so much close that it almost overlapped, as depicted in the above figure. Now we are seeing an offshoot or an extension that’s getting beyond comfort and entering into the luxury zone. That’s where the price paid to own has a premium, which results in super profits for the brands making these products and at the same time invoking diminishing marginal returns. There is not much real value but perceived value, often associated with emotional factors including social status, etc.
This is not a healthy trend. Not just for emerging economies like India but even for mature economies like US where technology becomes a reason for unsustainable lifestyle leading to much more economic issues, eventually a crisis. So far, the acceptance and penetration of technology has been catalysed by the fact that it had a direct bearing on improving the life standard either through raising the income or reducing the costs. It would also increase the efficiency and productivity which also fetches the similar results. People of all ages, gender and backgrounds have simply loved technology for this charismatic ability. But, if we continue this trend of overdoing glamour and fantasying tech, we are only reducing the potentiality of tech to impact the prosperity and wellbeing of humans.
All through my life I have been an evangelist and technology first person. For any problem, I try to find out a solution through technology. So, I am not against innovation or the urge of technology companies to showcase their capabilities. But these have to solve the problems of humans and other living beings. There is a huge responsibility on tech companies of changing the macro dynamics of the world which cannot happen if equal attention is not paid to all the hues of the socio-economic strata. Else going this way will get momentarily a wow from all of us, fetch super and spike profits for a few years and then again down the drain. The technology companies, especially the consumer tech brands need to think long term value creation objectively.
