11 Questions That Will be Answered In 2022
Friends,
It’s been quite a year for all of us. Returns to the office (for some) were started and paused and then re-started — words like metaverse, supply chain, crypto, and web3.0 entered our daily consciousness. If anything, it was another different year…
As we look towards 2022, many questions remain.
To that end, we’ve asked a very eclectic group of thinkers, creators, founders and yes, product managers to predict what questions they think will be answered in 2022. Their answers 👇
AR, VR, and Questions about the Future
1. How does exponentially improving technology from Apple in the AR space impact our home?
Robert Scoble, has been the first to see many technologies and companies from Siri to Tesla, is now focused on helping companies go to market in the Metaverse/Spatial Computing space.
Apple’s AR headset, a $40 billion investment they have been working on for more than a decade, will be one of the biggest product announcements in recent history and will make the Windows 95 launch seem small.
What most people are missing about the Apple headset, is that it will be the best audio headphone for playing Dolby Atmos content (which is 3D audio that surrounds you) and the best visual head-mounted display on the market. The Sony 4K chips it will have are stunning. I saw the 1K ones that they brought an image I haven’t seen on a Meta Quest, which has 2K displays. Proving yet again that specs don’t matter so much.
I’m hearing it is better for watching movies than any TV in existence, including the million-dollar 8K ones that are at the back of most Apple stores. It also will show you your own photos in a new way and let you work on both volumetric things (think of designing a car in 3D) and work on virtualized 2D monitors. As many as you want around you.
But most people will remember it for the 3D football stadium, office, and school it introduces, without the need to ever leave their living room.
Why am I so bullish? Only Apple has a mesh network (ultra-wideband) hooked up to a new AI chip in Apple’s M1. Plus it will have a full MX chip inside, which predicts you will be able to run a full Macintosh on any of the virtualized screens you will have.
Note that we haven’t even started talking about multi-party immersive gaming that will be mind-blowing. Only Apple has figured out how to use array microphones to make it possible for a family to play together in the headset.
2. When we will see the VR tipping point?
Tyler Maloney — Founder/CEO of Lightspeed-backed social media startup Faves
We’ve been talking about VR/AR for almost a decade. Now the tipping point is finally here! The Oculus Quest 2 sold more units than Xbox in 2021 and is poised to gain real traction as a mainstream device. The Quest 2 is the equivalent of the iPhone 1. It ain’t perfect, but it’s good enough to be useful. VR devices will become irreplaceable tools for remote work, gaming, and fitness over the next few years.
3. When we will see Tesla deliver the Cybertruck and on the full promise of FSD?
Robert Scoble, has been the first to see many technologies and companies from Siri to Tesla, is now focused on helping companies go to market in the Metaverse/Spatial Computing space.
The Tesla Cybertruck will be next level in all ways, from how it’s manufactured, to how it drives. Inside will also be Dolby Atmos and new noise-canceling which makes being inside almost silent. I also hear it will be safer, lighter (more range), and have many other capabilities the others won’t be able to match. Particularly in safety and self-driving.
I won’t be shocked if both products kick off entire industries and will be improved for 50 years or more (like, say, personal computers).
What about Tesla’s Full Self Driving (FSD)? It will be fully launched and out of beta. Why do I think it will live up to its promise? Beta users have been praising FSD for a while now and it gets better every few weeks. It’s clear to see what Elon Musk is aiming for: a gigantic 1–2 punch with the delivery of the Cybertruck coupled with truly world-changing FSD.
Fintech and Questions about the Future of Finance
1. When we will see financial inclusion in Fintech?
Theodora Lau, Founder @UnconventionalVC | Author — Beyond Good
The twin forces of improved embedded financial models and the rise of community are powering financial inclusion in the Fintech space.
Embedded finance models and use of AI and satellite imagery to extend financial services (e.g. lending and crop insurance) to farmers in rural areas.
Community Fintechs that can better address the needs of those who are not being well-served by incumbents (e.g. small businesses, immigrants, communities of color, etc.); we have seen a newer crop of fintech startups such as Cheese (Asian Americans), First Boulevard (Black), Stretch (Former Inmates), Nerve (Musicians), and LGBTQ (Daylight). I expect there will be more as the ecosystem becomes more mature.
2. What pandemic-fueled trends were real?
Alex Johnson, writer Fintech Takes
Let’s play a quick game of the good, the bad, and the interesting.
First, the bad. The COVID-19 pandemic won’t be over in 2022. It seems like a virtual certainty that new variants will continue to pop up and we will, as a society, have to deal with them. So, if you haven’t already, please get vaccinated (and boosted)!
Second, the good. The measures taken to deal with the pandemic over the last couple of years have driven a number of interesting shifts in consumers’ behavior. Many of these changes have been good for individual companies (Hi Peloton!) and for consumers themselves (I’m bullish on the long-term positive impact of the Great Resignation).
And lastly, the interesting. As the initial shock of living in a pandemic recedes and we enter more fully into whatever new normal we’re in for, the question I’m most keenly focused on is what pandemic-fueled trends in financial services prove to be permanent and which will revert back to business as usual? Is this actually the end of branches? Will retail investors’ enthusiasm for meme stocks and crypto sustain? Does Gen Z really love BNPL as much as they seem to?
3. Will Crypto be regulated?
Jason Mikula | Fintech consultant, publisher of Fintech Business Weekly
OK, OK, I’m not nearly that optimistic. Particularly because answers to that question will (indeed, already do) vary significantly by jurisdiction; in the United States, some of the toughest answers to the question will require new legislation, which seems unlikely to pass in 2022.
So, those caveats notwithstanding, I think 2022 will significantly improve clarity around some key crypto regulatory questions, including stablecoin regulation and disclosure, crypto “interest” accounts, such as those offered by BlockFi and Celsius, tax reporting, use of leverage, and how traditional financial institutions can engage in well-defined crypto activities like trading and custody. Increasing institutional interest in the sector — and VC funding flowing to players like Anchorage and NYDIG — signal the maturation (some might say takeover) of the crypto sector by those who see the value in engaging productively with regulators to establish a clearer framework.
Thornier crypto questions that 2022 likely won’t answer? How regulators can prevent rampant market manipulation aka pump and dump schemes, protect users from hacks and theft, and how regulations apply to “decentralized finance” protocols, where there isn’t an entity to regulate.
4. When will full-service business model (ie consolidation) be the next evolution of Fintechs?
Monisha Chakrapani — Product strategy, Co-host of Fintech Cafe
There is no physical clock that starts and stops at the calendar on trends but for the line drawn in the sand, we’ve already seen the evolution of Fintechs business models towards a full-service model in 2021 through consolidation ( Opportun and Digit) and product expansion (HMBradley).
Forces driving the change include customer growth and retention, low barriers of entry with incumbents already in the game(Chase and Chime). It will be interesting to see where the model will diverge from incumbents (customer experience) and where it will converge (Alex Johnson’s gentrification of deposits and jobs to be done).
Eyes on 2022!
Product Management, Leadership, and Questions about Experience
1. Will Product Management practices become embedded across an entire organization?
Adrienne Tan, Board Member at Association of Product Professionals
Interest in Product Management from C-Suite executives in medium to large enterprises has hit critical mass.
More and more case studies and examples of good Product Management practices delivering results (catalyst for growth) and organizations are wanting the same results.
Organizations are recognizing that in order to get the most out of their Product Management discipline, they must transform and adopt the same mindset and apply the same techniques.
2. When will we see the “tangibilization” of product strategy?
KP Frahm — Building @field_so — to help teams navigate the complexity of product development and collaborate on strategy \\ Co-author @productfield
I see 3 key enablers accelerating the “tangibilization” of product strategy. They are…
1 — the rise of remote and distributed teams and the need this has created in part a better way of recording and distributing information, needs that were not as pressing before the pandemic
2 — the spread of APIs that allow product dev apps (Jira, Slack, Figma, Teams, Github, etc.) to interconnect, makes it possible to throw operational convos at strategy statements to check their consistency
3 — the state of AI to help process, analyze, and make sense of complex information
I consider this a new frontier of product development, something that could not have been done before and is now possible — being able to see the invisible, making it addressable (via URLs), share it, evaluate it, validate it, connect it. This will lead to not only much faster delivery and discovery, but also to a better fit with social and environmental requirements (context!) …
3. Will the UX of crypto improve enough to be actually adopted by mainstream consumers?
Peter Ramsey, Helping people build better products. Founder @BuiltforMars , EIR @Creandum , writer @TechCrunch .✌️
Crypto has been ‘mainstream’ for years, but its adoption lacks behind. Personally, I think that much of this is because the UX of crypto is shockingly bad.
In 2022, we should see crypto projects like Block / Paypal / Twitter launch. Will they be a catalyst to show the rest of the world how it’s done?
Is there enough money in crypto now, that companies will invest heavily in UX? I saw this personally in 2021, but it’s certainly been rising as crypto leaves behind its ‘early-adopter’ sentiment.
Specifically in NFTs, 12 months is enough time for a player like OpenSea to actually develop a good experience. Will they? Or is it just too complicated?
4. When will content on the internet make a paradigm shift from 2D to 3D?
Amogh Vaishampayan, Principal Product Manager at Avataar.me
Hardware devices are powerful enough and web browsers have become sufficiently advanced to render complex 3D models and environments. Interactive 3D content can be accessed on our phone browsers which also support Augmented Reality experiences.
The e-commerce industry will be the biggest beneficiary of this in 2022. For example, replacing 2D product images with Avataar’s interactive 3D and AR product experiences delivers a 3x increase in conversion rates. For a consumer, the experience is easy to use because the browser-based 3D and AR seamlessly integrate within existing shopping apps.
In 2022 we will also start seeing more 3D and AR digital-only goods as NFTs. The 3D models created to sell physical products through e-commerce can be reused to mint NFTs as the digital versions of the same products. This is part of the broader market movement towards creating content that will populate immersive 3D metaverses.
