 |
|
|
|||||
By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internets impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machines. Looking back, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugmans 1998 statement sounds like a failure of imagination. But at the time, his skepticism represented a familiar story: Bold, visionary ideas are met with resistance and fear from industries entrenched in conventional wisdom. Yet, time and again, we’ve seen how disruptors use technology and sheer conviction to rewrite the rules and yield transformative outcomes. In the last decade alone, this played out across industries like transportation, aerospace, and defensefrom electric vehicles challenging Detroit to reusable rockets shattering the assumption of expendable space travel. Are we lacking that same boldness in the pharmaceutical industry? Instead of a resounding call to action, we too often hear the careful footsteps of an industry tiptoeing through a minefield. Transformative science gives way to calculated discussions about payers and pharmacy benefit managers, sacrificing a compelling vision for cautious incrementalism. Capture the imagination The antidote to this paralysis isn’t less ambition, but morea renewed focus on the first-principles mindset that defines truly transformative companies and has the potential to reduce our industrys abysmal 90% failure rate. The reality is no other industry has more profound potential to radically improve lives. Today, the convergence of AI and automation with biology and chemistry is a multitrillion-dollar opportunity to fundamentally reinvent the way we make new medicines. The potential impact is extraordinary for everyone who eventually becomes a patient. Why, then, do todays leaders temper their remarks for the future? To me, this tone reflects a larger, more systemic issueone where the pressure to deliver short-term, incremental progress can come at the cost of world-changing ideas. This isn’t to say that incrementalism is without value. Many businesses with conventional, risk-averse strategies can be successful. The manufacturing industry, for example, relies on gradual improvements to drive small, consistent gains. Yet these incremental changes are built on the back of world-changing inventions like Fords moving assembly line, which reduced the Model Ts production time by nearly 90%. In my world of discovering new medicines, we see this parallel in hundreds of biotech companies that maintain a traditional, program-by-program strategy. This work is incredibly important for science and for patientswe need these companies. But this is a crucial distinction. The incremental approach is fundamentally different from the kind of moonshot thinking that changes an entire field. Of course, this call for boldness is not a call for recklessness. When human lives are at stake, there is a fine line between conviction and hubris. The cautionary tale of Theranos reminds us that boldness must be grounded in an unwavering commitment to science, ethics, and truth. But a fear of overpromising should not paralyze us into underdelivering. How game-changers are made Sometimes real change requires a deep belief in a seemingly impossible pathone that may be deemed too risky but, if successful, could create a step-function change for the better. This is the first-principles mindset that defines truly transformative companiesthe kind that don’t just innovate, but build or reinvent entire industries, like cloud computing and space travel. The creation of Amazon Web Services (AWS) required billions of dollars of investment in a new business line with no guarantee of success. The market saw it as an irrational capital expenditure, but it was a long-term bet on the idea that cloud computing would become the essential infrastructure for modern business. That high-risk bet is now the dominant force in its industry: AWS generated more than $100 billion in revenue in 2024 and controls the highest market share among cloud providers. Similarly, when SpaceX set out to make spaceflight more affordable and reliable, the goal wasn’t just to make a better rocket; it was to create reusable rockets. The company prioritized a first-principles mindsetasking what the most basic, fundamental truths are about rocket scienceand rebuilt the entire process from the ground up. This path had a higher chance of failure, but it significantly reduced the cost of space travel and led to a satellite network capable of providing internet to every corner of the globe. This high-risk, high-reward strategy is not for everyone. The pressure to abandon it is constant, especially in an environment where shareholders demand near-term milestones and predictable returns. But my conviction is born from the understanding that to solve the world’s most complex problems, we must be guided by a different playbook. This was our mindset when we founded Recursion. Our purpose is to decode biology to radically improve lives, and our commitment is to building a new kind of platform that can discover many medicines at scale, rather than just finding a single drug. The cost of playing it safe The most profound failures in history are not those that bet big and lost, but those that failed to bet at all. Incremental advances will never cure Alzheimer’s disease or reverse climate change. To achieve those kinds of step-function changes, we need to embrace the ambitious, the seemingly impossible, and the inevitably uncomfortable. We must not be afraid of a healthy dose of “hype.” We must defend it as the kind of conviction necessary for world-changing innovation. Very few companies are responsible for changing industries and the worldbut they are almost always the kind of companies that bet everything on the big idea. Chris Gibson is the cofounder and CEO of Recursion.
Category:
E-Commerce
Consumers with higher incomes are more likely to return purchases than lower- or middle-income shoppers, according to a new report by the Bank of America Institute. Higher-income households had the most retail refunds (5.3% of their 2025 purchases), while lower-income households had the least (3.7%). The report said that while shoppers nationwide love the flexibility of returning what they’ve bought76% consider “free returns” an important factor in where they shopthe practice is wreaking havoc on retailers, who lost $890 billion from returns alone last year, according to the National Retail Federation. In fact, return rates have more than doubled since 2019 among large retailers. These return costs come at a time when retailers are already struggling due to inflation, higher prices, changing consumer habits, tariffs, and overall economic uncertaintyall of which have many Americans buying less. Why are the wealthiest shoppers more likely to send things back? One reason may be that higher-income households are less cash-constrained and so are more likely to buy items speculatively when they are searching for a particular purchase, in the knowledge they can return it later if they decide its not right for them, according to the BoA report. Returns to department stores were particularly high, with wealthier shoppers returning a whopping 20% of purchases, compared with lower-income shoppers who only returned 11%. What generation makes the most returns? Boomers (the wealthiest generation), Gen Xers, and millennials all currently send items back at around 16%, whereas those born before 1945, called traditionalists or the Silent Generation, are at 15% and Gen Zers at 10%. Gen Z returns goods at lower rates than other generations, except when it comes to electronics. Gen Zers typically have a lower net worth than previous generations do at the same age, due to inflation, student-loan debt, and the fact that they are buying homes later in life.
Category:
E-Commerce
Bad news for morning routines everywhere: The New York Times has put its Mini Crossword behind a paywall. On Tuesday, instead of their usual puzzle, players were met with a paywall. The internet is not taking it well. “I’m actually in such a rage over this,” said TikTok user @ssophieice. “Screw New York Times. Screw capitalism. I’m done.” @ssophieice This was my final straw #nyt #nytminicrossword #minicrossword original sound – sophie ice Meanwhile, alongside a video overlayed with text that reads, “mourning the mini crossword right rn. NYT when I catch you,” user @gdiggityyyy wrote: “I’m actually distraught over this.” @gdiggityyyy im actually distraught over this. my daily nyt routine is now disheveled. #nytgames #minicrossword original sound – stevies_angelsx On X, many also shared their frustrations. One user wrote: My morning routine is ruined now. Im giving up my Wordle streak for this protest, so you know its serious. Another added: I hope whoever decided to put the NYT Mini Crossword behind a paywall has warm pillows for the rest of their life. I am boycotting the nyt games app bc they paywalled the mini crossword. I feel hurt and betrayed. My morning routine is ruined now. Im giving up my wordle streak for this protest so you know its serious. pic.twitter.com/65gosYlG3R— reallyboringtbh (@reallyboringtbh) August 28, 2025 Redditors piled on as well. Now have a 40-60s gap in my day that I have no idea how to fill,” one user complained. The Times has leaned heavily into puzzles and games in recent years, acquiring Wordle in January 2022 for a low seven-figure sum. With the launch of Pips earlier this month, we now offer 10 distinct puzzles, a rich and diverse portfolio that reflects both the breadth of gameplay and the depth of experiences our team of puzzle editors and constructors has built, a Times spokesperson tells Fast Company. Other gamesincluding Wordle, Connections, Strands, and Sudokuremain free. For now, at least.
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||