NEWS FROM THE FUTURE: Saying goodbye to silicon

Dateline: July 9 2029 

For decades we’ve used silicon semiconductors to build processors and microchips for data, signal and information processing. Graphics too. With increasing power and speed and decreasing cost as integrated circuits approached the sub-nanoscale. 

But silicon chips have their limitations; they operate electronically, using electrical signals. Transmitting data is faster using light — optical signals — and we’ve used fibre optics to send information around the world, at lightspeed, for many years. 

To avoid the bottleneck of converting from optical signals to electrical and back again, Chinese researchers created all-optical photonics platforms that integrate logic and signal processing. 

Not to be outdone, a pan-European effort succeeded in making photonic chips out of glass, paving the way for computers that are far faster and more powerful than anything made of silicon, and opening the door to quantum photonic machines. 

Now chip giants such as Intel and Samsung are facing their own “Kodak moment”. Do they continue to bet the farm on advancing silicon beyond what might be its ultimate physical limits, or pivot to entirely new materials like semi-metals and glass? The stakes are enormous, and the cost of reinventing chip fabrication and design are monumental. 

As quantum computing begins to become technically feasible and commercially viable, the market for efficient computing is set for a major shake-up. The enormous power demands from AI datacentres, the need for ultra-fast networks and edge computing, and photonic innovations will spawn entirely new industry leaders. 

Glass can do it at the speed of light. And we’ll say goodbye to silicon. 

First published on Mindbullets July 10 2025.

Goodbye silicon, hello carbon 

Dateline: March 27 2027 

Once, the centre of hi-tech development was called Silicon Valley. But silicon is rapidly becoming a thing of the past as carbon emerges as the new super-material, with derivatives such as carbon nano-tubes and graphene moving centre stage. 

Graphene, made of single-atom-thick sheets of carbon, has some amazing properties: it is strong, highly conductive, flexible and transparent. 

Now graphene is making its appearance — and slashing costs — in a range of industries, from flexible computer displays to unbreakable solar cells; in the exploding science of robotics and, most impressively, in manufacturing and construction, where its super-strong properties come to the fore. And that’s just the start. 

The graphene sheets are bonded into mats to make a bulk material, now being deployed in aircraft, in new lightweight electric vehicles and even in construction. “It’s like a science fiction material that can be manufactured inexpensively and used almost everywhere to replace existing expensive or heavy materials,” says New Scientist journalist Ivan Kantey. “This really is the start of a new age of manufacturing.” 

The success of graphene has certainly changed the world for Houston’s Rice University, where the material was refined for commercialisation. It has brought hundreds of millions of dollars to the institution through patents and partnerships, as well as making multimillionaires of the key researchers behind the process. 

Graphene’s rise will spell yet more trouble for the already-embattled steel industry, under pressure because of its polluting processes. “There’s little doubt that graphene, and a host of other new materials in development, will steadily replace steel in virtually every manufacturing process you can imagine,” said Angelo Bartolli, professor of industrial chemistry at MIT. 

First published on Mindbullets June 17 2010 

• Despite appearances to the contrary, Futureworld cannot and does not predict the future. The Mindbullets scenarios are fictitious and designed purely to explore possible futures, and challenge and stimulate strategic thinking.