Four trends that will shape the business landscape in 2026
Every year, experts from Jester Strategy research the key forces and disruptions that will shape business and society. An overview of the four trends they predict will define the year ahead.
AI: From experimentation to operating reality
Last year, artificial intelligence captured nearly half of all global startup funding, cementing its role as the centrepiece of a broad technological “supercycle.” Whether this momentum continues through 2026 or is moderated by a market correction remains a topic of debate among industry analysts and investors.
What is far less contested, however, is AI’s continued prominence and its accelerating integration into business and society. Large-scale investments in AI will persist, adoption across sectors will deepen, and the tangible impact of AI on jobs, organisational structures, and everyday life will become increasingly visible.
2026 marks a pivotal phase in AI’s evolution: the shift from experimentation to industrialisation. This transition is characterised not just by advances in technology, but by the strategic choices organisations make – decisions about where to deploy AI, how to embed it into operations, and how to govern and scale its use responsibly.
Companies that navigate this phase thoughtfully will transform AI from a source of competitive promise into a driver of measurable industrial impact.
How leaders can prepare
Here is how leaders across Europe can prepare:
Anchor AI in business strategy, not IT. Decide where AI fundamentally changes your value proposition versus where it primarily reduces cost. Make explicit choices: automate, augment, or deliberately remain human.
Redesign core processes end-to-end. Re-engineer workflows with AI as a starting point, not as an add-on. Measure impact on cycle time, error reduction, and scalability – not on tool adoption.
Build AI-ready governance. Translate EU AI Act requirements into operational playbooks (risk classification, human-in-the-loop, documentation). Treat AI governance like financial control: routine, disciplined, and embedded.
Invest in people, not just tools. Upskill the organisation in AI literacy and critical thinking, not prompt tricks. Redesign junior roles toward judgement, exception handling, and learning.
Reduce dependency and lock-in risk. Avoid reliance on a single hyperscaler or model provider. Build optionality through modular architectures, multiple vendors, and clear exit paths.
Prepare for scrutiny and accountability. Assume AI use will be audited by regulators, customers, and partners. Be ready to explain why AI is used, how it works, and which data it relies on.
Remilitarisation
In response to heightened geopolitical risks, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and shifting US security commitments, European economies are undergoing a significant remilitarisation. Decades of post-Cold War “peace dividend” defence retrenchment are reversed as governments bolster conventional forces and invest in advanced (cyber) capabilities.
This is guided by NATO’s investment benchmark: 5% of GDP by 2035, split between 3.5% core military investments and 1.5% investments into broader resilience. The EU has invested an estimated €381 billion in 2025: ~2.1 % of EU GDP (up from 1.6 % in 2023).
The flipside of this trend is that among structurally increasing fiscal pressures, concerns regarding government debts across the eurozone grow.
How leaders can prepare
Here is how leaders across Europe can prepare:
Reframe strategy around “security relevance”
Assess whether your products, data, infrastructure, or talent are security-critical or dual-use. This is becoming a decisive factor in access to public funding, permits, and partnerships. Even non-defence firms (e.g. logistics, agri/food, energy, materials) should stress-test their business models against a more statedirected, security- first policy environment.
Engage early with governments and ecosystems
Firms investing early in public-private partnerships, NATO/EU programmes, and national innovation clusters gain agenda-setting power.
Build regulatory and ESG resilience
Expect tighter controls on exports, data sovereignty, supply chains, and foreign ownership. Strengthen geopolitical risk, compliance, and scenario planning functions. In ESG terms, defence and security activities are increasingly seen as “socially enabling.”
Secure talent and critical inputs
Competition for engineers, cyber specialists, and advanced manufacturing skills will intensify. Forward-looking organisations invest in long-term talent pipelines, retraining, and automation, while diversifying suppliers for energy and (vital) materials.
Treat defence as a technology accelerator
Regard defence as an R&D and scale platform for dual-use tech. Spillovers into civilian markets can be substantial if IP and commercialisationpathways are designed upfront.
Strategic flexibility
Avoid overdependence on a single government or programme. Maintain portfolio balance and optionality as defence strategies evolve.
Weaker dollar and ‘de-dollarisation’
In one year’s time, the dollar went from near parity to the euro (1.03 early January 2025), to being worth 14% less (1.17 in January 2026). Over a longer term, its role as a reserve currency has diminished from 70% in the early 2000s to 56% last year. The Trump administration has been ambivalent on the value of the dollar.
On the one hand, (given inflation) they favour a strong dollar, as it gives the US economic leverage in foreign and trade policy and attracts investment. On the other hand, even the president spoke of how a lower dollar could rectify trade imbalances, as it would make US-made products more price-competitive and make reshoring of manufacturing to the US more appealing.
Actions by the Trump administration have so far worked towards a lower dollar value. ‘Liberation Day’s’ tariffs and various trade deals, but also worries about US institutional stability and independence, have made investors fret and contributed to eroding the dollar’s value.
Experts don’t necessarily expect Trump to pursue a weaker dollar directly, but his administration’s actions have the potential to (further) erode confidence in the dollar’s value and its central role in the global economy. Most trend reports expect a lower US dollar for 2026, but its global reserve role will not evaporate overnight.
How leaders can prepare
Here is how leaders across Europe can prepare:
Map your exposure to a lower dollar. Not just transactionally in the short term, but also economically for longer-term (demand and supply) effects.
Financial hedging: Source inputs in the same currency as sales, pay suppliers and staff in local currency where possible, price in local currency in large markets, use currency baskets in volatile regions, and/or incorporate fixed adjustment clauses into long-term contracts. Additionally, reprice more frequently to reduce the need for financial hedging.
Explore supply chain potential. Localise production or assembly in key markets.
Stock up. Strategically stock up on dollar-denominated inputs/resources before producers price in a lower dollar. Try to win share from competitors locked into US-dollar pricing.
Margin protection. For exporters to the US, margin protection is important as consumers become more price-sensitive, relative input costs rise (if not US-denominated), and the relative value of US revenues diminishes. This often means reducing costs, but also pushing volume growth to offset lower margins. Also consider locking in customers for longer terms.
Switch strategy if competing on price and volume in the US is no longer feasible. This could mean changing your value proposition (to more value-added) if you want to remain in the US market, or pulling out of the US altogether if the business case no longer makes sense (in the short and long term; for the latter, potentially consider weathering it out longer than competitors if you can).
M&A. Consider M&A to gain US market share: a lower dollar means US M&A targets are cheaper. Don’t just defend margins – go on the offensive to gain market share.
A PLUTO World
Researchers of the University of Navarra’s IESE Business School came up with the successor to VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) and BANI (Brittle, Anxious, Nonlinear, Incomprehensible). One that sums up quite well the world for 2026 and beyond: PLUTO – which stands for Polarised, Liquid, Unilateral, Tense and Omni-relational.
Polarised
The global environment is increasingly divided along political, ideological, and values-based lines. Issues once seen as settled (e.g., ESG, diversity, globalization) are now contested, creating pressure on companies from opposing sides.
How businesses can prepare
- Anchor decisions in a clear, long-term corporate purpose, not short-term political swings.
- Align strategy with enduring values rather than reacting to polarised debates.
- Adapt communication carefully by market (e.g., “green hushing” where sustainability is pursued but less publicly emphasised).
- Develop leadership that balances financial performance with commitment to purpose.
Liquid
Policies, alliances, and regulations shift rapidly, making the environment unstable and unpredictable. Reacting case by case is no longer sufficient.
How businesses can prepare
- Use scenario-based planning across short- and medium to long-term horizons.
- Prepare for best- and worst-case outcomes and other scenarios with built-in contingencies.
- Implement agile management processes to regularly assess learning, performance, and needed adjustments.
- Institutionalise continuous monitoring rather than crisis-driven reactions.
Unilateral
The era of stable multilateralism is fading. Major powers increasingly act in their own national interest, even at the expense of allies, reshaping trade and economic cooperation.
How businesses can prepare
- Build strong geopolitical (scenario) literacy at leadership level.
- Anticipate fragmented trade rules and transactional policymaking.
- Look for strategic opportunities where power shifts create openings (e.g., Europe addressing innovation gaps).
- Avoid overreliance on assumptions of global cooperation.
Tense
Geopolitical conflict, trade wars, tariffs, and regional instability increase systemic risk, especially for global supply chains.
How businesses can prepare
- Prioritise resilience over pure efficiency.
- Diversify supply chains to reduce single points of failure.
- Assess risk at both country and sector levels.
- Invest in alternative markets and production hubs.
- Adopt nearshoring and friendshoring strategies.
- Strengthen financial buffers to absorb sudden shocks.
- Ensure (frequent) board-level oversight of geopolitical risk.
Omni-relational
Power and innovation are increasingly multipolar. Value creation no longer flows only from traditional Western centres but from many regions simultaneously.
How businesses can prepare
- Broaden innovation scanning beyond the U.S. and Europe to China, India, Latin America, Africa, and beyond.
- Build capabilities to sense ideas from unexpected places.
- Form alliances with likeminded partners across regions and ecosystems.
- View global competition (e.g., AI) as a complex, multi-actor landscape, not a simple bilateral race.
