Wright’s Law — Understanding Technology Cost Curves with Brett Winton

Our guest today is ARK’s very own Director of Research, Brett Winton. He is here on the podcast today to talk about the recent article he published titled Moore’s Law Isn’t Dead, It’s Wrong. Long Live Wright’s Law. In his piece and during this conversation, Brett unpacks the concepts in question and what sparked his desire to make this argument. He explains the popularity of Moore’s Law, used to forecast the growth of technologies, and goes on to show why he thinks it is not the best model for the task. Brett posits that Wright’s Law is better for this application and gives reasons and examples to back up his thesis. For instance, we will discuss electric vehicles, genome research, computing, and nuclear power. Be sure to join us on today’s episode!              Key Points From This Episode: Understanding the differences between Moore’s Law and Wright’s Law. Applying Wright’s Law to electric vehicles and other potential markets. Working elasticity of demand into the equation. Using Wright’s Law to forecast the future of genome sequencing. Looking forward to the possible futures of healthcare. Declining demand for computational power and the arc of transistors.   Tweetables: “We’ve applied Wright’s Law to electric vehicles, genome sequencing, robotics, and 3D printing. Anything where you’re manufacturing a physical thing, this law is very applicable.” — @wintonARK “Wright’s Law captures the fact that if there’s economic opportunity decision makers will throw more resources at it to win the market.” — @wintonARK