The demand for products that last is innovating design, processes and materials.

As the technology in our pockets, homes and offices becomes increasingly critical to our daily missions as individuals, we all value the reliability of these complex electronic devices. We depend on smartphones, communication networks, home office equipment, automobiles, contactless payment terminals and more to be ready for action every time we call on them. To meet our expectations, these systems must deliver high reliability.

Product manufacturers and brand owners understand the market value gained from establishing a reputation for reliability. They also understand that product reviews and social media channels give consumers immense power to make or break that reputation.

In general, the reliability of consumer-grade and industrial products has improved remarkably as the electronics industry has matured. This is due to a number of important factors. Component and interconnect technologies have improved enormously. Digital electronics offer much greater repeatability and robustness to changing operating conditions than ancient, predominantly analog circuits. And opening the enclosure of almost any consumer device typically reveals a tidy and minimalist assembly as integrated components internalize many interconnections and functions. On top of this, standardization of specialized functions such as RF transceivers as plug-and-play modules has made complex systems much easier to design and build using hardware that’s already proven in existing designs. Moreover, the vendors continually refine and improve these modules from one generation to the next.

Read more: The Drive for Reliability

Will 2025 bring new solutions to familiar challenges?

The desire to solve problems is ingrained in human nature. But we know that our solutions often create new problems. It’s a cycle that will likely never end.

So if you want to know what’s coming in 2025, the short answer is nothing we didn’t already know. Important trends will include, of course, more AI spreading from cloud to edge, as well as developments in commercial space exploration and sustainable technologies. Each of these presents exciting opportunities while also being the subject of dire warnings if things were to go wrong.

Elon Musk recently suggested that the chances of AI turning out badly are about 10-20%. That sounds alarmingly high. Without delving more deeply into his comment, a logical, if slightly facetious, response is that the chances of AI working in our favor must then be 80-90%. That sounds more encouraging. In practice, however, we must be prepared for good and bad outcomes. Legislation is beginning to arrive as technology acts proposed in the US and Europe put forward restrictions on the use of the AI, including prohibiting undesirable practices like deception, social scoring, biometric categorization and untargeted facial recognition.

Read more: New Technologies, New Opportunities