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Big tech’s supersized ambitions

From metaverses to quantum computing

從玄武巖到量子計(jì)算

Is there any limit to the ambition and hubris of big tech firms? In October Mark Zuckerberg renamed Facebook Meta and described humankind’s new future in virtual worlds. On January 18th Microsoft, worth more than

69bn for Activision Blizzard, a video-games firm, in its biggest-ever deal. These decisions are part of a vast new investment surge at five of America’s biggest firms, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta and Microsoft—call them maama. Together, they have invested $280bn in the past year, equivalent to 9% of American business investment, up from 4% five years ago.

大科技公司的野心和狂妄有什么限制嗎？10 月，馬克扎克伯格將 Facebook 更名為 Meta，并描述了人類在虛擬世界的新未來。1 月 18 日，價(jià)值超過 20 萬億美元的微軟認(rèn)為自己還不夠大，以 690 億美元競(jìng)購視頻游戲公司動(dòng)視暴雪，這是有史以來最大的交易。這些決定是美國最大的五家公司 Alphabet、Amazon、Apple、Meta 和 Microsoft，稱其為 maama，新一輪大規(guī)模投資的一部分。在過去的一年里，他們總共投資了 2800 億美元，相當(dāng)于美國商業(yè)投資的 9%，而五年前是 4%。

Big tech wants to find the next big opportunity, and our analysis of deals, patents, recruitment and other yardsticks shows that cash is flowing into everything from driverless cars to quantum computing. The shift reflects a fear that the lucrative fiefs of the 2010s are losing relevance, and the fact that tech’s titans are increasingly moving onto each other’s patches (the share of sales that overlap has doubled since 2015 to 40%). So they are all looking to swoop into new territory.

大科技公司希望找到下一個(gè)大機(jī)會(huì)，而我們對(duì)交易、專利、招聘和其他標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的分析表明，現(xiàn)金正流入從無人駕駛汽車到量子計(jì)算的所有領(lǐng)域。這種轉(zhuǎn)變反映了人們對(duì) 2010 年代利潤豐厚的領(lǐng)地正在失去意義的擔(dān)憂，也反映了科技巨頭們正越來越多地進(jìn)入對(duì)方的地盤（自 2015 年以來，重疊的銷售份額已翻倍至 40%）。因此，他們都在尋求進(jìn)入新的領(lǐng)域。

They also have an eye on the history of technology, which is littered with once-dominant firms that were brought down not by regulators, but by missing the next big thing. Fairchild Semiconductor ruled in the 1950s but now exists only in books. In 1983 ibm was America’s most profitable firm but eight years later was loss-making after botching the move from mainframes to pcs. Nokia, once seemingly invincible in mobile devices, fumbled the shift to smartphones. The maamas spent the 2010s fortifying commanding positions, in business tools for Microsoft, e-commerce for Amazon, social media for Meta, and so on. The pandemic has boosted demand, from bored couch-surfers to startups in need of cloud computing. Apple and Alphabet are now larger than were us Steel and Standard Oil, the two mighty monopolies of the 1900s, measured by profits relative to domestic gdp. Yet past performance is not indicative of future results, and now all of them are limbering up for whatever comes next.

他們還關(guān)注科技史，科技史上充斥著曾經(jīng)占主導(dǎo)地位的公司，它們不是被監(jiān)管者打倒，而是因?yàn)殄e(cuò)過了下一個(gè)大事件。飛兆半導(dǎo)體公司在 20 世紀(jì) 50 年代曾是統(tǒng)治者，但現(xiàn)在只存在于書本中。1983 年，IBM 是美國最賺錢的公司，但 8 年后，在從大型機(jī)到個(gè)人電腦的轉(zhuǎn)變過程中出現(xiàn)失誤，導(dǎo)致虧損。諾基亞，曾經(jīng)在移動(dòng)設(shè)備領(lǐng)域似乎是無敵的，但在向智能手機(jī)的轉(zhuǎn)變中卻犯了難。2010 年代，馬馬虎虎地鞏固了自己的地位，微軟的商業(yè)工具、亞馬遜的電子商務(wù)、Meta 的社交媒體，等等。這種流行病促進(jìn)了需求，從無聊的沙發(fā)客到需要云計(jì)算的初創(chuàng)公司。蘋果和 Alphabet 現(xiàn)在比美國鋼鐵公司和標(biāo)準(zhǔn)石油公司還要大，這是 20 世紀(jì)的兩個(gè)強(qiáng)大的壟斷企業(yè)，以利潤相對(duì)于國內(nèi) gdp 來衡量。然而，過去的業(yè)績并不代表未來的結(jié)果，現(xiàn)在所有這些公司都在為接下來的事情做準(zhǔn)備

The problem is that nobody knows what it will be. But it will probably involve new physical devices that will supersede the smartphone as the dominant means of connecting people to information and services. Whoever makes such devices will therefore control access to users. This explains why Apple is planning a virtual-reality headset to compete with Meta’s Oculus range and Microsoft’s HoloLens. Alphabet, Apple and Amazon have also all placed expensive bets on autonomous cars. And vast sums are being spent on designing specialised chips, and pursuing new Approaches like quantum computing, to provide the processing power for whatever new devices emerge.

問題是，沒有人知道它將是什么。但它可能會(huì)涉及新的物理設(shè)備，這些設(shè)備將取代智能手機(jī)，成為連接人們與信息和服務(wù)的主要手段。因此，無論誰制造這種設(shè)備，都將控制對(duì)用戶的訪問。這就解釋了為什么蘋果正在計(jì)劃推出虛擬現(xiàn)實(shí)頭盔，與 Meta 的 Oculus 系列和微軟的 HoloLens 競(jìng)爭(zhēng)。Alphabet、蘋果和亞馬遜也都在自動(dòng)駕駛汽車上下了昂貴的賭注。大量資金正被用于設(shè)計(jì)專門的芯片，并追求量子計(jì)算等新方法，以便為任何新設(shè)備的出現(xiàn)提供處理能力。

The maamas’ other priority is creating software platforms that will allow them to extract rents, by drawing in users, and then relying on network effects to draw in even more. Hence Facebook’s renaming and its $10bn annual spending on immersive online worlds, known as the metaverse. Apple has been expanding the walled garden of services, it provides to users of its devices, moving into areas such as fitness classes and television shows. Buying Activision may help Microsoft provide a richer experience for its gaming customers, while Mesh, a platform for virtual 3d workplaces, is aimed at corporate users. The cloud-computing platforms operated by Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft literally charge rent to host computing environments for other companies.

MAAMAS的另一個(gè)優(yōu)先事項(xiàng)是創(chuàng)建軟件平臺(tái)，使他們能夠通過吸引用戶來獲取租金，然后依靠網(wǎng)絡(luò)效應(yīng)來吸引更多用戶。因此，F(xiàn)acebook 重新命名，并在沉浸式網(wǎng)絡(luò)世界上每年花費(fèi) 100 億美元，即所謂的 metaverse。蘋果公司一直在擴(kuò)大它為其設(shè)備用戶提供的服務(wù)的圍墻花園，進(jìn)入健身課程和電視節(jié)目等領(lǐng)域。收購動(dòng)視可能有助于微軟為其游戲客戶提供更豐富的體驗(yàn)，而 Mesh 是一個(gè)虛擬 3D 工作場(chǎng)所的平臺(tái)，主要針對(duì)企業(yè)用戶。Alphabet、亞馬遜和微軟運(yùn)營的云計(jì)算平臺(tái)實(shí)際上是收取租金，為其他公司托管計(jì)算環(huán)境。

Governments, rivals and billions of customers, who already fear these firms are too powerful, may be alarmed by all this. One view is that the companies’ large customer bases, and control of pools of data with which to train artificial intelligence (ai), give them an insurmountable advantage. Won’t the giants use that to squash rivals? Yet all these new areas look competitive for the time being. Many other firms are in the metaverse race, for example. “Fortnite”, made by Epic Games, has more than 300m players worldwide, while Roblox has 47m gamers who spend 3bn hours a month on its platform. Nvidia, a chip firm, is moving into the space, too. Even Microsoft’s Activision deal would raise its market share in gaming to only 10-15%—hardly a monopoly. In autonomous cars, big tech must contend with the likes of Tesla, gm and Volkswagen. Global startups raised $621bn of venture funding in 2021, far more than big tech invested. And new rivals have emerged with unexpected speed in some areas, such as TikTok in social media.

政府、競(jìng)爭(zhēng)對(duì)手和數(shù)十億客戶已經(jīng)擔(dān)心這些公司過于強(qiáng)大，可能會(huì)對(duì)這一切感到震驚。一種觀點(diǎn)認(rèn)為，這些公司的龐大客戶群，以及對(duì)用于訓(xùn)練人工智能（AI）的數(shù)據(jù)池的控制，使它們具有不可逾越的優(yōu)勢(shì)。難道巨頭們不會(huì)利用這一點(diǎn)來壓制對(duì)手嗎？然而，所有這些新領(lǐng)域目前看起來都很有競(jìng)爭(zhēng)力。例如，許多其他公司也在參與元?dú)獾母?jìng)賽。Epic Games 制作的 "堡壘之夜 "在全球擁有超過 3 億玩家，而 Roblox 擁有 4700 萬玩家，每月在其平臺(tái)上花費(fèi) 30 億小時(shí)。芯片公司 Nvidia 也在向這個(gè)領(lǐng)域進(jìn)軍。即使是微軟的動(dòng)視交易，也會(huì)將其在游戲領(lǐng)域的市場(chǎng)份額提高到只有 10-15%，很難說是壟斷。在自動(dòng)駕駛汽車領(lǐng)域，大型科技公司必須與特斯拉、通用汽車和大眾汽車等公司抗衡。2021 年，全球初創(chuàng)企業(yè)籌集了 6210 億美元的風(fēng)險(xiǎn)資金，遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)超過了大科技公司的投資。在某些領(lǐng)域，新的競(jìng)爭(zhēng)對(duì)手以意想不到的速度出現(xiàn)，比如社交媒體的 TikTok。

Moreover, there is an outside chance that the new terrain will prove less prone to domination by centralised platforms. Deep-learning technology, the dominant form of ai today, relies on large amounts of data, but future forms of ai may not. Then there are the decentralised blockchain services owned and operated by users, loosely known as Web3. At the moment these have clunky interfaces, use up lots of energy and are not always as decentralised as they seem. But in one area—decentralised finance, or DeFi—rapid improvements are already under way.

此外，事實(shí)證明，新的地形不太容易被中心化的平臺(tái)所支配，這也是一種外部機(jī)會(huì)。深度學(xué)習(xí)技術(shù)是當(dāng)今人工智能的主要形式，它依賴于大量的數(shù)據(jù)，但未來的人工智能形式可能不會(huì)。然后是由用戶擁有和運(yùn)營的去中心化區(qū)塊鏈服務(wù)，松散地稱為 Web3。目前，這些服務(wù)有笨重的界面，耗費(fèi)大量能源，并不總是像它們看起來那樣去中心化。但在一個(gè)領(lǐng)域——去中心化的金融，或 DeFi——已經(jīng)在快速改進(jìn)。

Nonetheless, the temptation is for regulators to clamp down pre-emptively. In 2020 Lina Khan, who is now America’s top antitrust official, recommended that big tech firms be banned from expanding into adjacent areas. Some big antitrust cases may reach America’s courts by 2023. And Europe may soon pass a sweeping Digital Markets Act, aimed at regulating big technology companies “ex ante”—that is, constraining such firms’ behaviour upfront, rather than punishing them later with antitrust cases (Margrethe Vestager, the eu’s competition tsar, explains all on our Money Talks.

盡管如此，監(jiān)管機(jī)構(gòu)的誘惑是先發(fā)制人地進(jìn)行打擊。2020 年，現(xiàn)為美國最高反壟斷官員的莉娜-汗建議禁止大型科技公司向鄰近地區(qū)擴(kuò)張。到 2023 年，一些大的反壟斷案件可能會(huì)到達(dá)美國的法院。歐洲可能很快就會(huì)通過一項(xiàng)全面的《數(shù)字市場(chǎng)法》，旨在對(duì)大型科技公司進(jìn)行 "事前 "監(jiān)管--即預(yù)先限制這些公司的行為，而不是事后用反壟斷案件來懲罰它們（歐盟的競(jìng)爭(zhēng)事務(wù)主管 Margrethe Vestager 在我們的 "Money Talks "播客中解釋了一切）。

Yet a lighter touch is the best policy. Investment in tech is linked to rising productivity, and the share of cashflows the tech giants are reinvesting has almost doubled since a decade ago. Trustbusters will struggle to predict the technologies of tomorrow. What they can do is block firms from doing deals that give them a monopoly position in new markets today. That is not yet a danger. Indeed, history suggests that tech giants are most often brought down by failing to master emerging technologies. If today’s giants want to spend billions trying to move into new areas to avoid that fate, so far there is no reason to stop them.

然而，輕裝上陣是最好的政策。對(duì)科技的投資與生產(chǎn)力的提高有關(guān)，而科技巨頭們?cè)偻顿Y的現(xiàn)金流份額自十年前以來幾乎翻了一番。信任者將很難預(yù)測(cè)明天的技術(shù)。他們能做的是阻止企業(yè)進(jìn)行交易，使其在今天的新市場(chǎng)中獲得壟斷地位。這還不是一種危險(xiǎn)。事實(shí)上，歷史表明，科技巨頭最常因未能掌握新興技術(shù)而被打倒。如果今天的巨頭想要花費(fèi)數(shù)十億美元試圖進(jìn)入新領(lǐng)域以避免這種命運(yùn)，到目前為止，沒有理由阻止他們。