2020 Predictions: Trends and Insights
By: Tribeca Venture Partners
Tags: Technology News, Entrepreneurship, Founders, Startup, Venture Capital

TVP Managing Partners, Chip Meakem (L) and Brian Hirsch (R)

We've been working on our 2020 Predictions and opportunities for next year. We don’t have a crystal ball but have thoughts to share based on what we see across our portfolio and in the market. We’d love to hear what your team has been thinking as well:

Prediction 1: The price of bitcoin will decline by over 50%. (Brian)

The price of bitcoin will decline by over 50%. Prediction 2: We will see early commercial applications of neural interfaces allowing people to think to computers. (Chip)

As reported in Inc: 25 Tech Predictions For 2020

“We will see early commercial applications of neural interfaces allowing people to think to computers. Today the I/O to our brain is speech and text. It’s like using a dial-up modem as the I/O to the AWS cloud. We need a higher bandwidth machine-human interface. No, this isn’t science fiction. Facebook bought CTRL-Labs and a team at UCSF has successfully created computer-generated speech for the disabled by processing brain and nervous system activity and converting it into instructions to a computer.” — Chip Meakem

Prediction 3: The IPO market will slow down considerably but will be replaced by a surge in M&A as strategics find pricing to be more reasonable. (Brian)

As reported in Forbes: What Venture Capitalists See For 2020

“The IPO market will slow down considerably but will be replaced by a surge in M&A as strategics find pricing to be more reasonable. As public equity investors have begun to shun startups without a clear path to profitability, those startups will turn to strategics for exits. When this occurs, price expectations will decline and come more in line with expectations of strategics that have struggled over the last few years to match public market tech multiples. The record amounts of cash sitting on corporate balance sheets will finally be put to work.” — Brian Hirsch

Prediction 4: An unnamed large search engine will face formal antitrust action claiming systematically using search data to build out content to retain a greater share of internet traffic is anticompetitive. (Chip)

As reported in Fast Company: Here are the top tech trends of 2020, according to top experts

“An unnamed large search engine will face formal antitrust action claiming systematically using search data to build out content to retain a greater share of internet traffic is anticompetitive. Also, the incredibly resilient third-party cookie will finally die.” — Chip Meakem

Prediction 5: The stock market will increase in volatility each quarter leading up to the Presidential election. (Brian)

The stock market will increase in volatility each quarter leading up to the Presidential election. Prediction 6: The unprecedented run of massive late-stage private financings will dramatically slow. This will ripple down through the system negatively impacting access to capital for private companies. (Chip)

As reported in Business Insider: 2020 Predictions

“The unprecedented run of massive late-stage private financings will dramatically slow. This will ripple down through the system, negatively impacting access to capital for private companies.” — Chip Meakem

Prediction 7: VCs will renew focus on tried and true tech sectors like software driven by a resurgent preference for high gross margin businesses. (Brian)

As reported in Business Insider: 2020 Predictions

“VCs will renew focus on tried and true tech sectors like software driven by a resurgent preference for high gross margin businesses,” Meakem’s cofounder Brian Hirsch said. “The IPO market will slow down considerably but will be replaced by a surge in M&A as strategics find pricing to be more reasonable.” — Brian Hirsch