The Churchill Club recently held their 11th Annual Top Ten Tech Trends event. This event brings together a group of industry panelists who attempt to predict the next big trends in the industry. This year was a bit different from previous years as each of the five panelists outlined one trend of their own choosing and the rest were “crowd-sourced,” whereby the moderators picked them based on criteria like which areas are getting venture funding and the number of press mentions.

After each trend was presented, the panelists voted (a green paddle held up if they agreed, a red one if they disagreed). They then debated the pros/cons, before the audience voted. Here’s a rundown of the 10 trends that were identified:

1. The Millennials are here. Everything is changing. Rapidly! - Joe Schoendorf, Partner, Accel Partners

The Millenial generation is about to graduate from college and enter the workforce. Schoendorf’s observation was that this generation doesn’t remember what it was like not to be online. He feels this generation will advance innovation farther than ever because they grew up with technology and the web. From a workforce perspective it will be very interesting to see how this generation pushes the evolving world of work.

The audience mostly agreed on this trend.

2. Advanced batteries will be the most popular alternative energy investment in ‘09 and’10. But the medium term will provide the best returns - Crowd-sourced Idea

The panel noted that while the press seems to love talking about this trend, it never seems to happen. Battery technology has been very slow to develop, and there isn’t much to suggest that this will change anytime soon. Having said that, if a company can bring an advanced battery to maket, it will be huge.

The crowd was evenly mixed on this trend.

3. The unstructured data deluge will create the next great information leaders - Ann Winblad, Partner, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners

Enterprise data will continue to grow at a huge rate. In five years, 80 percent of that will be unstructured, says Winblad. Some argued that this idea isn’t particularly new - but most agreed think the time is indeed right for addressing this issue.

The crowd mostly agreed with this trend.

4. Wireless broadband will be one of the only IT sectors to see increased funding this year - Crowdsourced Idea

Everyone agreed that this is an old idea. Even with more investment, bandwidth demand will continue to grow.

The crowd almost entirely disagreed with this trend.

5. “Maintech” not “Cleantech” - Increasing carbon efficiency of global GDP - Vinod Khosla, Founder, Khosla Ventures

Khosla thinks that it’s not necessarily the hot “greentech” trend that will thrive in this economy, because it’s still too small a part of the market. Instead, he looks for innovation in more traditional energy technology. A lot of the smartest students in this country are getting into the energy tech field, he noted.

Most agreed with this trend.

6. Power and efficiency management services will see a growing level of investment and innovation - Crowd-sourced Idea

The idea that energy in the future isn’t just going to be about building new power plants, but instead will be about figuring out how better to distribute the power we’re already creating. The smart grid will be increasingly important and a number of companies are working on this.

The crowd mostly agreed with this trend.

7. The triumph of the distributed web - Steve Jurvetson, Managing Director, Draper Fisher Jurvetson

The distributed web is “the aggregate power of all of you,” according to Jurvetson. The theory is that crowds will control most of the interesting things people look for on the web. People are already spending more time in social networks than on email.

The audience was about half and half on trend.

8. Healthcare administration will see the best growth in B2B software in ‘09 and ‘10 - Crowd-sourced Idea

Because they were running short on time, the group skipped this one, which everyone dubbed as old news.

9. Consumption of digital goods on mobile devices is the biggest growth story of the coming decade - Ram Shriram, Managing Partner, Sherpalo Ventures, LLC

Shriram believes the ad-supported model cannot continue to fuel growth in the mobile space. He thinks application building may be the model that succeeds, noting that we’re already seeing it across a variety of platforms in both the mobile and social networking space. He also believes that there’s a trend towards paid applications - especially cheap ones - and that will be enough to grow the industry.

The audience mostly agreed with this trend.

10. Electronic displays will prove the hottest investment in hardware this year and the next - Crowd-sourced Idea

Again, running short on time, the panel barely talked about this one, but suggested there’s no real money to be made here even though the trend is hot.

The audience almost completely disagreed with this trend.

Two More Ideas

The two moderators, Tony Perkins, and Jason Pontin, also put up two trends:

1) DC will prove to be a poor VC

Washington DC trying to get involved in funding new ventures in technology will fail. Entrepreneurs need to be allowed to do what they do best, without government meddling.

The audience completely agreed with this trend.

2) The rumors of the demise of the reporter have been greatly exaggerated

While newspapers and magazines will continue to struggle, there must be a place for real journalism in the world - even if it is online. Bloggers cannot replace trained journalists - it’s a collaborative process between professionals. Some of the panel took exception to the notion that bloggers can’t also do journalism, but all agreed that there needs to be objective reporting on things like the Iraq war.

The audience mostly agreed with this trend.

Summary

Overall, energy, data and the web were the main themes discussed this year. It is worth noting that predictions like these must always be taken with a large grain of salt. While forward-looking views do no always come to fruition they are often directionally correct, and as such provide clues for how companies should strategize and react.

One thing is clear to me from this discussion; the U.S. technology sector addresses a wide range of business challenges and opportunities. As our M Squared Consulting teams are out in the marketplace having conversations with clients and prospects they are finding the need to innovate is still a priority. Companies will continue to need seasoned professionals, like the talent we have in the M Squared Talent Network, who can quickly execute and deliver results.

The inspiration for today’s headline came from the 1992 Presidential election. George H.W. Bush was running for re-election against the upstart Governor from Arkansas, William Jefferson Clinton. The economy was in turmoil, we had just suffered through the dot-com meltdown, and the savings and loan scandals. Yet Bush was considered unbeatable because of the end of the cold war and his decisive “victory” in the Persian Gulf war. Clinton was having a tough time focusing on the major issues so his political strategist, James Carville hung a sign in their Little Rock campaign headquarters with the following three points:

• Change vs. more of the same
• The economy, stupid!
• Don’t forget health care

The parallels to today are ironic.

I wrote a few weeks ago about the positive business outlook for the cleantech industry in California. While the long-term business opportunity is significant the results of a recent public survey make it abundantly clear that the ever-fickle gaze of public attention is fading from the problem of global warming, in favor of pretty much everything else.

A recent Pew Center report suggests that there are few things people care about less than whether or not the oceans will crash over their doorstep in a few decades. Here is a list of issues sorted by the percentage of respondents who rated the item as a “top priority”:

• Economy (85%)
• Jobs (82%)
• Terrorism (76%)
• Social security (63%)
• Education (61%)
• Energy (60%)
• Medicare (60%)
• Healthcare (59%)
• Deficit reduction (53%)
• Health insurance (52%)
• Helping the poor (50%)
• Crime (46%)
• Moral decline (45%)
• Military (44%)
• Tax cuts (43%)
• Environment (41%)
• Immigration (41%)
• Lobbyists (36%)
• Trade policy (31%)
• Global warming (30%)

The results are not an anomaly, either. Despite plenty of media attention, a growing number of data points are suggesting that the global warming issue just isn’t connecting with the average American. Take the vehicle sales numbers this past Christmas, which showed gas-guzzling pickups and SUVs outpacing car sales as gas prices have dramatically fallen over the past 12 months.

Pew’s numbers show that the number of people who consider global warming a “top priority” has declined 8 percent since just two years ago, when they started tracking it. Protecting the environment has fallen 15 percent since last year; it was 22 percent higher in 2001. Energy has risen in large part because of terrorism (the previous chart topper) and the oil price peak last year.

Does this public opinion matter? In the short term, perhaps not, at least for renewable energy like solar and wind. The recession has already taken a significant bite out of the sector, and now President Obama is giving cleantech perhaps the strongest boost it has ever had in the United States. But long term, the downward trend of public opinion could begin to spell trouble.

That trouble would come from the cost and effort of switching over to cleantech. Few renewables are on par with coal, gas or oil in terms of cost, and those that are tend to have their own challenges in terms of location and operation. Public opinion similarly torpedoed nuclear power decades ago because of (largely incorrect) safety fears. The fear is that people may be unwilling to take the hit for more expensive renewables like solar on their monthly electricity bill.

This discussion proves that electorates are willing to overlook long-term concerns (like the environment) in favor of short-term worries (like their jobs). Once the economy enters a recovery mode it is very likely that environmental concerns will again bubble to the top. With that growing interest (and the inevitable increase in fossil fuel costs) the cleantech industry will grow. The great news for knowledge workers is that the growing cleantech industry will generate many new full-time and flexible career opportunities. This is certainly a trend we will be monitoring at M Squared Consulting.