Three and a half years after ChatGPT launched, it is tempting to assume the AI cycle is well advanced. We believe the opposite. In our view, 2026 looks less like the middle of the cycle than its beginning. This is the point at which AI moves from a productivity tool used by relatively few to a general-purpose technology that reshapes how work is organised, and where value is created, across every sector of the global economy.
The easiest way to underestimate AI is to mistake the interface for the capability. For most investors, ‘AI’ is still the chat window: a tool that drafts emails, summarises documents and writes code, or an enhanced version of search. Those productivity gains are real, but anchoring to the current interface systematically underestimates both the scale of the underlying capability and the duration of the cycle ahead.
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