Necessity is the mother of invention and economic or business survival will no doubt throw up some wonderful changes over the next few years. But what things can we expect or predict for 2021?
The world nearly came to an economic stop and then stuttered through lockdown, through an engendered recessionary 2020 which is continuing into a lockdown and recessionary 2021. It might take the completion of the vaccine rollout to bring this recessionary period to an end, but end it will. Not all areas of the economy went into recession – because this isn’t an economic-led recession, there wasn’t a problem with the economy until we locked things down. It is a lockdown/pandemic-led recession and some businesses boomed in 2020, whilst others died. What does this K-shaped recession mean for a K-shaped recovery? That is the big question for 2021.
What else can we expect in 2021 and beyond?
• Cars are important and electric cars are likely to be cheaper than petrol cars by 2025.
• Digital retail boomed in 2020 – what next for retail?
• Remote working is here to stay, but not for all.
• Get ready for digital business competition – your competition is now global not local.
• Pay per view Film, TV and Music seems to be the way forward for the entertainment industry.
• Cities will change. The question is how much will people retreat from cities and how will cities change and react? Will the traditional Office Block and High Street die off?
• Colleges and Universities went virtual in 2020, how will they change now?
• Do you need to go to a restaurant when you can have a food truck deliver to your door?
• Fitness has gone virtual and personal.
• Manufacturing in far off countries and shipping stuff back to the UK is no longer the cheap and efficient answer it was. This is an area starting to change, starting with 3D printing, then smaller spare parts and moving on to bigger stuff.
• Green Hydrogen is the next big thing. Think cars, trucks, buses, ships and aircraft!
• The world needs more power generation, we use more year on year – is the answer more solar and wind generation?
• Germany is leading the way in developing safe and effective digital tools to support remote patient monitoring and care delivery in the healthcare sector. How long before your GP is an app on your phone?
• And a positive one to end on. As the vaccine rollout gathers pace and we emerge from lockdown, how will your business deal with the pent-up demand? There is likely to be an economic frenzy as customers look to spend money and companies try to make up for business lost to the pandemic.
Of course, I don’t have a crystal ball and these are just my ideas. I’m asking questions as much as I’m making statements. One of the important questions for business owners to answer is, where is the opportunity in this?
