Tech's Top 50 Stories of 2021

The crypto boom, rise of NFTs, and chip shortage made headlines this year.

Inside.com Part of   Network December 29, 2021

Presented by

Dear Insiders, From the cryptocurrency boom to the rise of NFTs and the ongoing chip shortage, 2021 was a wild ride in the tech world. As we count down to the New Year, Inside has compiled (what we believe are) the top tech stories of 2021. In tomorrow's issue, we'll give you our predictions for what could transpire in the year ahead. Thanks for reading, Beth

Tech's Top Stories of 2021: 1. The global chip shortage firmly took hold early this year and severely impacted the production of vehicles, smartphones, and other consumer electronics and industries. In a recent interview, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said he expects the situation to stretch into 2023, although others — like Nvidia CFO Colette Kress — believe GPU supplies will see improvements in the latter part of 2022. — ENGADGET 2. Frances Haugen, the Facebook whistleblower, was instrumental in the leak of several internal documents that laid the foundation for the series of Wall Street Journal stories known as the "Facebook Files." The documents exposed serious issues, like Facebook favoring profits over hate speech and Instagram's harmful effects on teenagers. Facebook also suspended plans for a children’s Instagram. The result has been repeated calls to make social media companies more transparent about their algorithms and impacts on users, which could gain traction into 2022. — YAHOO FINANCE TECH 3. In related news, Facebook changed its name to Meta Platforms, or simply Meta, as it seeks to rebrand and reflect its commitment toward the metaverse. The company faced pushback for the effort to rebrand amid all the controversy about its toxic impacts. At the same time, it appeared that the company is pivoting more toward its virtual reality ambitions, and consumers are jumping on board with record purchases of the Oculus (now Meta) Quest headset and other hardware. — LEXOLOGY 4. NFTs took the online world by storm as people turned to blockchain to claim ownership of their digital art and memes. The unique identifier records ownership of a person's digital assets using blockchain technology and was chosen by Collins Dictionary as its word of the year. Sales surpassed $23B in 2021, meaning NFTs are likely here to stay, though how they evolve in 2022 will be hard to say. While some argue the market is overinflated and note that NFTs are bad for the environment, supporters say they can democratize the work of creators and transform the digital world and metaverse. — DEZEEN 5. Jeff Bezos and others reached the edge of space aboard a capsule developed by Blue Origin, signaling the "non-official" start of space tourism. Shortly after the capsule landed in the desert in Texas, Bezos described the trip as the "best day ever," though others on Earth were not so amused. Even so, Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, and others have made commercial spaceflight viable, and anyone who can afford the $200,000 price tag for a short spaceflight may want to take advantage. It's worth noting that Virgin's Richard Branson reached the edge of space nine days before Bezos. — WIRED

A message from SEEDINVEST The next era of fundraising online is here SeedInvest is where high-growth startups go to fundraise online. From a Seed round to a $20M+ Series B, founders in SaaS, consumer, robotics, and more are harnessing the power of equity crowdfunding to take their company to the next level. Here’s what 250+ successfully funded companies know about SeedInvest: Equity crowdfunding is complementary to traditional VC - SeedInvest companies have received follow-on funding from Greycroft, Menlo Ventures, Tiger Global, and more. Your fundraise can be a major growth catalyst - We’ve seen measurable lifts in sales, signups, and press mentions from the moment some companies launch their fundraise. You can raise real capital from real people - No longer just for small deals, the average SeedInvest fundraise last year was $3M+. Ready to begin fundraising? 💸💻 Start your application

6. The cryptocurrency market had a banner year, with bitcoin and ether reaching all-time highs and meme-inspired tokens like dogecoin gaining in popularity. Bitcoin reached $1 trillion in market value in February. As well, PayPal began allowing purchases using bitcoin from its wallet, following after Tesla, Visa, Square, and others that now allow transactions using cryptocurrencies. Talks of regulation also took hold, with China once again confirming its ban on crypto and U.S. lawmakers pushing for some sort of regulatory framework. — CNBC 7. Some Activision Blizzard employees held a walkout and demanded that CEO Bobby Kotick resign following a report in The Wall Street Journal that he has been aware for years of sexual misconduct allegations at the company. The report says Kotick failed to tell the company's board of directors about "everything he knew" regarding certain incidents, including a 2018 settlement involving a former employee who was allegedly raped by a supervisor. The harassment scandal has prompted a lawsuit and caused the heads of PlayStation and Xbox to both express concerns about their respective relationships with the video game giant. — CNET 8. Big Tech reported record-breaking sales and profits, and also saw their market caps grow. With more people staying at home, more online shopping, and more gaming, it was no surprise that people gravitated toward electronics and the digital world, boosting the profits of tech companies. Also in 2021, Apple and Microsoft neared $3 trillion market caps and Tesla and Meta surpassed $1 trillion. As of late December, "Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Tesla, and Facebook had added a combined $2.9 trillion to their collective market caps" this year. — STATISTA 9. Google released its new Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro smartphones, the first Pixel to use Google's Tensor processor, in late October. The phone was met with rave reviews, and is often considered the best Android phone. Google designed the Tensor chip specifically for the Pixel series, bringing advanced machine learning to mobile without needing to transmit data to the cloud. — ANDROID POLICE 10. Apple's in-house M1 chip also impressed users with its top-notch performance and efficiency. The M1X successor is reportedly 3x faster at machine learning and 2x as fast at GPU tasks. The first M1 launched in 2020 in the MacBook Air and fueled a 70% growth in Apple Mac revenue in Q2 2021. The 14-inch MacBook Pro, which runs on the latest M1 Pro and M1 Max chips, launched in October, and the chips can also be found in Apple's desktops and even the iPad Pro. — CNBC

A message from COIN CLOUD Welcome to Easy Buckets...where bitcoin meets basketball for a slam dunk opportunity. You could win your share of $100,000 in Bitcoin while watching some of today’s top basketball talent explore digital currency. Here’s why people are excited about the opportunity to Watch & Win with Easy Buckets: This informational video series features Atlanta Hawks star Trae Young, New Orleans Pelicans guard Josh Hart, Las Vegas Aces forward A’ja Wilson, and Stanford Cardinal guard Haley Jones as they navigate the new and often confusing world of digital currency.  Guiding them on their journey as series host is podcaster, publisher and recognized crypto expert Joe Pompliano. New episodes launch every Sunday starting December 26, 2021, with additional prizes and entry opportunities available each week (no purchase necessary to win). You could take home between $500 and $5,000 in Bitcoin as one of our weekly giveaway winners! Ready to score? Enter now for a chance to win your share of $100,000 in Bitcoin. Enter Now

Honorable mentions: 11. A record number of tech companies went public this year including Rivian, Roblox, and Coinbase. 12. The FTC sued in an attempt to block Nvidia’s takeover of U.K. chip designer Arm — a deal that is also facing an investigation in the U.K. 13. A court ruling established that Apple will not have to change its App Store business model, which has an up to 30% sales cut, for now. 14. The $1T bipartisan infrastructure bill set aside $7.5B for a national network of electric-vehicle charging stations over the next five years.  15. Jack Dorsey stepped down as Twitter CEO, replaced by CTO Parag Agrawal. Dorsey is still CEO of the digital payments company Square, which just changed its name to Block. 16. Samsung announced that it will build its $17B chip plant in Taylor, Texas. The facility is expected to manufacture advanced logic chips for mobile devices and autonomous vehicles starting in 2024. 17. The U.K.'s main competition regulator is expected to block Meta's ongoing acquisition of Giphy, a rare reversal of a Big Tech acquisition. 18. TikTok surpassed 1 billion monthly users and Instagram surpassed 2 billion monthly users. 19. Amazon announced new hardware and software products including an Alexa-enabled rolling robot for home monitoring and a drone security camera. 20. Facebook launched its $299 Ray-Ban Stories smart glasses, allowing users to capture photos and video, answer phone calls, and listen to music.  21. More reports emerged about Apple's AR/VR Headset, which will require a connection to another device like an iPhone. It's expected to cost around $1,000 and will be released in late 2022. 22. Tesla announced plans for a humanoid robot that can perform tasks for people. The company also began hiring robot experts for its new Mobile Robotics team. 23. Alphabet's Deepmind created the most accurate and complete database of the 3D structures of nearly every protein in the human body, which could supercharge the discovery of new drugs and more. 24. The CEOs of Facebook, Google, and Twitter testified before the Senate regarding their platforms' role in the Capitol Hill attack. Facebook and Twitter also barred former President Trump from their platforms. 25. The European Commission released its proposed rules for artificial intelligence, considered the broadest and most ambitious effort yet by any large government worldwide to regulate riskier forms of AI.

26. Chinese tech giants began facing increased scrutiny from regulators, set off by ride-hailing giant Didi Global's controversial listing. Didi also announced plans to delist from the New York Stock Exchange. 27. Cerner announced that it could be potentially acquired by Oracle in a deal worth $30B. 28. More Chinese technology companies were added to the U.S. government's investment blacklist over links to alleged human-rights abuses in China's Xinjiang region. 29. Amazon welcomed new leadership with CEO Andy Jassy, who replaced Jeff Bezos. 30. Zillow announced it was shutting down its home buying/selling business. 31. More tech companies pushed back their return-to-office plans into 2022. 32. Despite his many controversies (or because of them), Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk was named Person of the Year by Time Magazine. 33. 5G had its biggest rollout ever and more people began using 5G smartphones. 34. AI and other tech fueled new advancements in the biotech and drug discovery markets. 35. Startups like Mosa Meat and Upside Foods made strides in advancing plant-based substitutes for meat. 36. Author and tech philanthropist MacKenzie Scott donated close to $6B to charities, social programs, and schools in 2021. 37. Russian group Darkside led a ransomware attack against Colonial Pipeline, which operates a major pipeline that transports petroleum products in the U.S. The company paid a ransom of more than $4M in bitcoin. 38. PayPal announced it's not exploring an acquisition of social media site Pinterest, a reversal from a report that said the payments company was exploring a deal equivalent to $45B. 39. Amazon Web Services had a series of outages that impacted everything from streaming services to apps, games, and products like Alexa and Ring. 40. TikTok became extremely popular, surpassing 1 billion monthly active users in September, up from 788 million earlier this year. 41. Netflix began rolling out new mobile games to its users globally through its app. 42. OnlyFans faced a backlash after announcing a ban on sexually explicit material, reversing the ban only days later. 43. Researchers imaged the shadow of a black hole for the second time ever. 44. Microsoft announced plans to acquire AI speech technology company Nuance for $19.7B, its second-largest purchase after it bought LinkedIn for $26B in 2016. 45. OpenAI’s natural language processing model GPT-3 soared in popularity, generating more than 4.5 billion words per day of humanlike text. OpenAI also dropped the model's API waiting list, opening up its features to more developers. 46. MotorTrend named the all-electric Rivian R1T its 2022 truck of the year. 47. The CEOs of Boeing and Airbus Americas asked to delay the January 2022 rollout of 5G services for phones, citing interference that could impact planes' ability to fly safely. 48. Reddit's anger over Wall Street led to the AMC and GameStop surge from earlier this year. 49. Icon furthered its efforts to build 3D printed homes, helping to address the global housing crisis. 50. Tesla’s market value eclipsed $1 trillion after Hertz announced it had ordered 100,000 vehicles. The EV maker reported record earnings in Q3.

Upcoming Events: December 29 - Need to Know NoCoder - David Siegel (CEO - Glide) (Register Here) January 04 - Venturing in VC with Landon Campbell (Episode #1) (Register Here) January 05 - DAOs and the intersection of tech & media with Kinjal Shah (Blockchain Capital) (Register Here) January 06 - Augmented and Virtual Reality with Timoni West (VP of AR/VR at Unity) (Register Here) January 11 - The Business of Interactive Gambling with Jon Kaplowitz (Penn) (Register Here) January 13 - Education within the Metaverse with Steve Grubbs (VictoryXR) (Register Here) January 25 - Need To Know NoCoder - Leon Young (Cogniss) (Register Here) January 27 - Understanding the Metaverse (Register Here) February 03 - Blockchain Gaming & Play-to-Earn Economies (Register Here) February 10 - The Business of Wellness (Register Here) February 17 - Customer Acquisition in a post iOS 14 world (Register Here) February 23 - Need to Know NoCoder: Derya Sousa (Kianda Technologies) (Register Here) February 24 - Alternative Investments (Register Here) March 03 - The $12B Appetite for Amazon Aggregators (Register Here)

Beth is an Inside Analyst and a former public policy/investigative reporter. She has covered AI, VR, technology, and e-commerce for Inside. When she's not busy writing, she's hiking in Arizona's desert, playing pickleball, or trying out new Mexican food recipes.   Editor Eduardo Garcia is a writer and editor based in New York. He is writing an illustrated book about climate change that will be published by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Bylines in The New York Times, The Guardian, Slate, Scientific American, and others. In one of his previous lives, Eduardo worked as a Reuters correspondent in Latin America for nearly a decade.

SeedInvest is the online fundraising platform designed for growth-obsessed startups. Raise from our network of 575,000+ investors.

Enter now for a chance to win your share of $100,000 in Bitcoin with “Easy Buckets” from Coin Cloud.

Click to Share ➞

767 Bryant St. #203, San Francisco, CA 94107 Copyright © 2021 Inside.com

Did someone forward this email to you? Head over to inside.com to get your very own free subscription! You received this email because you subscribed to Inside Tech. Click here to unsubscribe from Inside Tech list or manage your subscriptions.