What's Possible: 20th August, 2021

We hope you enjoy this week's hand-picked selection of important and interesting stories from the frontiers of tech.

This lab-fermented no-cocoa ‘chocolate’ solves the industry’s climate and child-labor problems

“QOA plans to launch its own brand to help make more people aware of issues like child slavery in cocoa production. ‘I think only a few know about the child labor, and even less know about the climate impact’.”

Market Update 2021: True Wireless Earbuds Evolving Toward Hearables

By showing that True Wireless Earbuds (TWS) products can evolve in features, Apple gave the starting shot to a race that will pave the way to real hearing augmentation and hearables.

Divvy Homes hits $2 billion valuation after latest funding round

“The Divvy Homes business model is aimed at boosting homeownership; Divvy purchases the home, then rents it back to the interested party for up to three years while they build their equity, credit and savings.”

Plant-based Foods Market to Hit $162 Billion in Next Decade

“The plant-based foods market could make up to 7.7% of the global protein market by 2030, with a value of over $162 billion … as global animal and dairy protein demand is poised to reach $1.2 trillion by then.”

The robotic fry cook Flippy is getting a new look

“The ultimate goal is to offer the robot for free and charge restaurants a fee for the use of the robot. The robotics-as-a-service model is already popular in the logistics industry, where warehouses are improving margins through increased automation, but robots have yet to make significant enough inroads into the restaurant business to make the business model work… so far.”

Brain-computer interfaces are making big progress this year

“It’s possible that the current approach of reducing brain activity to electrical signals is the wrong one and that we might experience a BCI winter if the likes of Kernel and NextMind don’t produce promising commercial applications.”

Connected Cars: A Multibillion-Dollar Opportunity

“New cars shipped with Internet connectivity is growing rapidly. It is expected to rise from 13% in 2015 to 75% in 2020. This is driven not only by car manufacturers (aka OEMs) but also by regulation. McKinsey estimates that the overall revenue pool from car data monetization can add up to $450-$750 billion by 2030.”

NFT marketplace OpenSea's trade volumes have jumped since the start of the month

“The exchange has seen nearly $800 million in volume since the beginning of the month. In July, the marketplace saw $284.2 million in July volumes and $125.2 million during June.”

With explosive new result, laser-powered fusion effort nears ‘ignition’

“The National Ignition Facility (NIF) has taken a major leap last week, a single laser shot sparked a fusion explosion from a peppercorn-size fuel capsule that produced eight times more energy than the facility had ever achieved: 1.35 megajoules (MJ)—roughly the kinetic energy of a car traveling at 160 kilometers per hour. That was also 70% of the energy of the laser pulse that triggered it, making it tantalizingly close to “ignition”: a fusion shot producing an excess of energy.”

A crop of electric startups are hitting the $292 billion heavy machinery market just in time for harvest.

“Tractors and other vehicles in the $292 billion global market for machinery equipment are playing an outsized part in climate change. In the U.S. alone, tractors burn 5.3 billion gallons of fuel a year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, and agriculture accounts for 10% of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions — about one-third as much as the country’s planes, trains and automobiles.”

IP-NFTs for Researchers: A New Biomedical Funding Paradigm

“This week, the first university biomedical intellectual property (IP) and research project was funded as an NFT (non-fungible token), enabled by a pioneering innovation at Molecule. The IP-NFT enables new fundraising and collaboration strategies for researchers by combining legal and technical frameworks with NFT technology. Early-stage research can be financed without endless grant applications, creating a startup and raising VC or needing to file a patent.”

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