Hi everyone — today I wanted to share five topics I found worth discussing this week. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.
We’re not living through a loud revolution.
There isn’t a single announcement that changes everything.
What’s happening in 2026 is quieter — but more important: power is shifting.
It’s not only artificial intelligence. It’s not only telecommunications. It’s not only regulation.
It’s a convergence of forces moving together.
In the last few weeks, five connected signals help explain where real control is moving:
- AI wants to become the dominant layer of digital work.
- Telecommunications are prioritizing smarter networks over building more hardware.
- Regulation stops being a brake and becomes a strategic barrier.
- Generic SaaS is losing ground to specialized vertical products.
- Fixed product roadmaps break under the pace of change.
Quick summary (what’s changing in 2026):
- Power shifts to whoever controls where work starts — and what happens next.
- Efficiency, compliance, and real domain context become the advantage.
- Product execution moves from a fixed roadmap to fast learning cycles.
None of this requires a “big bang” announcement. It happens quietly, inside operations: in how work starts, how decisions are made, and how fast teams can adapt.
1️⃣ The quiet war for control of the desktop
During the 90s, power was in the operating system. In the 2000s, in the browser. In the following decade, in the cloud.
Today, the new strategic layer is AI sitting between the user and the rest of the software.
We’re no longer talking about assistants that answer questions. We’re talking about systems that:
- Interpret graphical interfaces
- Execute multi-step workflows
- Automate tasks without formal APIs
- Decide which tool to use and how to use it
The change isn’t functional. It’s structural.
Core insight: Whoever controls the “start of work” controls the workflow that follows.
In plain terms: the starting point of work moves from “open an app” to “ask the AI.”
A simple example: instead of opening Excel first, you ask an AI to prepare last quarter’s analysis — it finds the file, runs the steps, and returns a draft.
That shift is structural: orchestration becomes the new product surface.
What this means in real life:
- The AI needs permissions to act (and those permissions must be explicit).
- You need a trail of what it did (so teams can trust it).
- Reliability matters more than flashy demos.
If you’re building or adopting these tools, the question is simple: can this system execute work safely, not just generate text?
If you lead a team, a light checklist:
- Decide what the AI is allowed to do (and what it’s not allowed to do).
- Make sure humans can review, approve, and undo critical actions.
2️⃣ Telecommunications: less physical expansion, more operational intelligence
Global mobile traffic continues to grow at rates close to 20–30% per year.
Average revenue per user does not grow at the same pace.
That gap compresses margins.
Core insight: When traffic growth outpaces ARPU, the battleground shifts from coverage expansion to operational efficiency.
What changes: Networks evolve from static infrastructure to adaptive systems (detect → decide → act), with energy and automation as first-order levers.
For years, the answer was CAPEX:
- More towers
- More fiber
- More spectrum
- More 5G
Today, the model is shifting.
Operators are investing in:
- Dynamic network optimization
- AI-based failure prediction
- Automatic power tuning based on traffic
- Energy consumption reduction
In advanced 5G environments, AI can dynamically power down equipment in low-demand hours and rebalance load before congestion.
In mature markets, the edge is less “more coverage” and more “lower OPEX per GB.”
So the playbook changes:
- Fewer manual interventions (less “truck roll” work)
- More automation in operations (detect problems earlier, fix faster)
- Strong focus on energy efficiency
This is also why the biggest wins often don’t look “sexy.” They look like fewer incidents, lower energy bills, and smoother performance — week after week.
If you’re in telecom (or selling into telecom), the simple question is: can you prove savings in operations, not just “innovation” slides?
3️⃣ Regulation: from obstacle to competitive advantage
In 2023 the dominant narrative was: “Regulation will slow innovation.”
In 2026 the landscape is different. Frameworks like the EU AI Act are turning governance into a real competitive edge.
At a high level, it pushes:
- Risk-based rules (not everything is treated the same)
- Stronger documentation and traceability
- More transparency for high-impact systems (with meaningful penalties)
If you sell into regulated industries (finance, health, telecom), being “audit-ready” is no longer optional — it’s part of the product.
A simple mini-case:
- Team A ships fast, but can’t explain how the system makes key decisions.
- Team B ships fast and can show documentation, controls, and logs.
In regulated markets, Team B wins more deals — because buyers don’t just buy features, they buy risk reduction.
If you ship AI products, keep it simple:
- Write down what the system does, where the data comes from, and how it’s monitored.
- Treat this as part of the product — not an afterthought.
The kinds of questions buyers ask are practical, not philosophical:
- Can you show how the model was tested?
- Can you explain failures and how you detect them?
- Can you provide logs when something goes wrong?
4️⃣ The collapse of generic SaaS and vertical consolidation
Horizontal SaaS is getting crowded — and AI makes it easier to copy generic features fast.
That’s why vertical products keep winning: they understand a specific workflow, language, and set of constraints.
In practice:
- Horizontal tools “almost fit” many industries
- Vertical tools fit one industry deeply (templates, data, compliance, KPIs)
The differentiator isn’t UI. It’s context.
Quick example:
Horizontal CRM:
- Works “okay” for many industries
- Feels generic in day-to-day work
- Needs lots of customization
Vertical CRM (e.g., agriculture):
- Matches the real workflow (seasons, batches, traceability)
- Comes with the right metrics out of the box
- Fits compliance requirements naturally
Vertical software wins because it speaks the language of the job.
If you build SaaS, the takeaway is straightforward: pick a domain where you can go deep (workflow + data), not wide.
AI accelerates this trend because it makes “good enough” generic features cheaper to build. Depth becomes the differentiator.
5️⃣ The end of the traditional roadmap
The classic yearly roadmap is losing relevance because the environment changes faster than planning.
In practice, teams are moving from “big launches” to shorter loops:
- Test a small hypothesis
- Ship quickly
- Measure adoption
- Keep what works, drop what doesn’t
The advantage isn’t planning more. It’s learning faster.
A practical contrast:
Traditional product teams:
- Lock a roadmap for months
- Release in big batches
- Learn too late what users actually needed
Modern product teams:
- Ship smaller updates
- Measure adoption quickly
- Keep what works, drop what doesn’t
This doesn’t mean “no strategy.” It means strategy stays stable while the plan stays flexible.
If you manage product, you don’t need chaos — you need shorter feedback loops.
The roadmap still exists, but it becomes more like a compass than a calendar.
The structural pattern
If we connect the five movements:
- AI wants to control the operational layer.
- Telecom seeks algorithmic efficiency.
- Regulation redefines competitive barriers.
- Generic SaaS loses defensibility.
- Product becomes an adaptive system.
Technological power is less about expanding faster and more about building structural advantages:
- Control the layer where work starts
- Optimize operations (especially cost and energy)
- Make governance a capability, not paperwork
- Win on deep sector context
- Learn faster than competitors
We’re entering a less noisy phase, but a more strategic one.
Less spectacle. More architecture.
And as often happens in technology, whoever recognizes the pattern earlier will hold structural advantage for years.
Final Reflection
What looks like five separate stories is one pattern: power migrates to the layers that orchestrate work, optimize efficiency, prove governance, and own domain context.
This phase is quieter than past platform shifts, but more strategic. The advantage is not louder innovation — it’s structural capability.
If you remember one thing from these five trends, let it be this: the winners won’t necessarily be the teams with the best “ideas.” They’ll be the teams with the best execution under real-world constraints.
That means:
- Clear permissions and accountability (especially with AI doing work)
- A real focus on cost and reliability (not only growth)
- The ability to operate in regulated environments without slowing to a crawl
- Products that feel native to a specific job, not generic to everyone
It’s a calmer kind of power shift — but it lasts longer.
Takeaways:
- Control is shifting to whoever orchestrates work.
- Efficiency + governance + domain context are the real moats.
- Winning teams learn fast — without losing discipline.
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