【英文】2020年亿万富豪洞察报告（45页）

Other billionaires, on the wrong side of economic,  technological, societal and environmental trends  are becoming less wealthy. Contrast this polarization with most of  the past decade, when steady growth and  buoyant asset prices lifted billionaire wealth in  all sectors. Most of the decade was a time  of exceptional prosperity for billionaires  regardless of sector, but in the last two years  those using technology to change their  business models, products and services have  pulled ahead. The COVID-19 crisis just  accentuated this divergence. While business innovators and disruptors  are deploying technology for competitive  advantage across all sectors, naturally the heartland of this activity is the technology, healthcare  and industrial sectors, which clearly signal  the polarization taking place (see page 17, What’s  a billionaire “innovator” or “disruptor”?). During 2018, 2019 and the first seven months  of 2020,4  technology billionaires’ total wealth rose  by 42.5% to USD 1.8 trillion, supported by  the surge in tech shares. Meanwhile, healthcare  billionaires’ total wealth increased by 50.3%  to USD 658.6 billion, boosted by a new age of  drug discovery and innovations in diagnostics  and medical technology, as well as latterly  COVID-19 treatments and equipment. (Note our  standard analysis period has been extended  to take into account the effects of COVID-19.) Compare this to the smaller increase for  the billionaire class as a whole. It rose by  19.1% to USD 10.2 trillion over 2018, 2019 and  the first seven months of 2020.

Increasingly, business innovators are taking  advantage of new technologies to gain  a competitive edge and create new business  models. Think of technologies like the Internet of  Things, 3D printing, drones and artificial  intelligence that are already being applied in  businesses. Further into the future, imagine how  quantum computing, neural interfaces,  solid-state batteries and fuel cells might  transform the global economy. Many of the innovators applying technology at scale in this way are already billionaires,  while others are becoming wealthier as they  drive change. Naturally, billionaire innovators are  most common in sectors such as technology,  healthcare and even industrials/manufacturing –  where technology has powerful applications  such as introducing robots to assembly lines –  but it’s increasingly being applied in other  sectors to varying degrees. A small number of these innovators  are “disruptors”. Think of the people pioneering  the production of electric cars for the mass  market, or extending online retailing into new  areas such as groceries. We have taken a multilayered  approach to identifying “innovator and disruptor”  billionaire-controlled companies that can  be applied from the outside in or vice versa.  Judged as the factors having the biggest  impact on business disruption and innovation,  the components we have analyzed are: disruptive  business models, essential technologies and  proven emerging technologies (see methodology  page 41).