The Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) recently released its vision for the future, predicting flying air taxis, supersonic business travel between countries, and an emerging market for space-based research and manufacturing in 2050.
Working with McKinsey & Company, the AIA reviewed the aerospace industry and its proposed innovations, interviewing more than 70 industry leaders in the process. Those leaders believe urban air mobility, drone delivery, increased supersonic speeds and the potential of space-based resource extraction and manufacturing will not only be game changers in the decades to come, they will actively change the world. Riding as an undercurrent beneath them all, greater use of and improvements to artificial intelligence and updated cybersecurity defenses will likewise leave their marks on the world.
Convenience and rapid evolution seem to be the key factors of the predictions.
“For the last 100 years, the American aerospace and defense industry has shaped the world around us, and AIA has worked alongside our members to enable those remarkable achievements,” AIA President and CEO Eric Fanning said. “Developing Vision 2050 to mark our Centennial is the next logical step in that progression. This report doesn’t just look at the next thirty years, it sets the stage for the next hundred years of American leadership.”
The study, delivered at South by Southwest (SXSW), presents an admittedly optimistic vision of the future. AIA said that it begins the process of identifying what leaders in private industry and the U.S. government need to do to turn such visions into reality.