Hello AI agents

This will be the year of artificial intelligence agents. We will need to manage two streams of resources — members of a team and AI tools. An AI agent is a programme that can autonomously perform certain tasks on behalf of a user or another system by designing its workflow and utilising available tools, be it approving expenses or responding to customer-service requests with minimal human supervision. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman calls agents “the next giant breakthrough” while companies are signing deals to install AI agents. For example, Salesforce has already signed deals to install AI agents at more than 200 companies. Agents can be activated with natural-language instructions and are meant to be conversant with their human users.

Starlink will make waves

It remains to be seen if Starlink can obtain a satellite Internet licence in India but Elon Musk’s company is going places and since it uses a constellation of satellites to deliver Internet to even the most remote corners of the planet, connectivity appears to be good. Whatever the future of Starlink in India, many airlines across the world have started offering in-flight connectivity by partnering with the company. For example, Air France has announced plans to offer free high-speed Wi-Fi from summer 2025. Customers would enjoy an "ultra-high-speed connectivity service" designed to deliver a "ground-like" Internet experience.

Cybersecurity threats

Nothing new you may say, but cybersecurity threats will become more sophisticated. Cybersecurity Forecast 2025 says that bad actors will increasingly “use AI for sophisticated phishing, vishing, and social engineering attacks. They will also leverage deepfakes for identity theft, fraud, and bypassing security measures.” Combine this with espionage operations: The report says that Russia, China, Iran and North Korea will “remain active” as far as information operations aligned with their geopolitical interests go.

Trump to take on EU

Be it USB-C or opening up app stores, the European Commission has played a major role in the past few years when it comes to bringing about several user-focussed changes. As long as Joe Biden has been in the White House, the EU could discuss technology with the US but Trump’s win has put the future of US-EU Trade and Technology Council (a biannual transatlantic political gathering founded in 2021 as a place for the US and the EU to discuss tech policy and coordinate on topics such as semiconductors and artificial intelligence standards) under a cloud. With Elon Musk becoming a close aide of Trump, the EU will be on weak ground if it comes to issues like applying fines on X for breaches of the bloc’s content-moderation rulebook if the EU tries to “take US Big Tech companies down”. Besides Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook too has a cordial relationship with Trump. Apple, which the EU has hit with fines, tax decisions and costly orders, may have a favourable time in the next few years. “I found him (Cook) to be a very good businessman,” Trump told Bloomberg in July.

Back to office

In recent months, there has been a drastic shift in how business leaders perceive remote work. According to the KPMG 2024 CEO Outlook report, which surveyed more than 1,300 CEOs globally, work from home has fallen out of favour for just about everyone. The survey states that 34 per cent of CEOs favoured an in-office model earlier this year but by the time the year drew to a close, 79 per cent wanted employees to return. Many companies are promising favourable assignments as well as tying promotions to the idea of returning to office full-time. Most companies believe that in-person collaboration results in more and better ideas.

Tim Cook of Apple, Elon Musk of X and Mark Zuckerberg of Meta are expected to be in the news throughout 2025

‘Healthspan’ tracking

We mostly hear people talk about increasing lifespan but now we are in the era of increasing ‘healthspan’, that is, how long do we want to remain healthy. At age 60 we want to physiologically resemble a 45-year-old. A company like Apple will deliver more health feature-rich offerings through Apple Watch, which outsells all Swiss watches by a big margin. Companies are trying to make monitoring glucose easier and also to identify blood-sugar spikes. For example, the app January AI will showcase at the upcoming CES tech show how it uses AI to analyse photos of what you eat to predict your blood sugar… all this with no hardware required. DexCom’s Stelo is using AI to connect blood-sugar spikes with sleep, diet and other lifestyle habits.

AI gadgets

Think of AI-supercharged gadgets. Bloomberg reports that Apple is set to release a six-inch smart-home display: It will be more of an iPad with speaker and focus will be on Siri. AI will also accompany you everywhere. “Next year is a big year for Meta glasses,” Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in 2024. It will come in the form of Ray-Ban smart glasses with a small display. Any surprises? Former Apple design icon Jony Ive and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman are reportedly collaborating on an AI device, though we think it may come in 2026.

Cleaner AI… power

A boom in AI and Cloud computing means more data centres that require power and can drive up local electricity rates and pollute the air by using fossil fuels. Some tech giants are trying to play it clean. Amazon, Google and Microsoft are investing billions in nuclear power. For example, Microsoft recently signed a deal with Constellation Energy for power from the undamaged reactor at Three Mile Island, according to The Wall Street Journal.

‘Healthspan’ involves how long we want to remain healthy

A second coming for crypto

Bitcoin went through the $100,000 barrier in early December and it may go higher this year before finding itself on shaky grounds. The market will be powered by a crypto-friendly incoming US administration.

Weather is right

It will be the year of weather apps. Take the case of GenCast, a new model from Google’s DeepMind artificial-intelligence lab. It can offer accurate forecasts up to 15 days in advance. Usually, a typical 10-day forecast is accurate only about half of the time, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Google says its machine-learning-based weather model produced forecasts that were 97.2 per cent better than a widely used European model.