Now that 2017 has come and gone, what new developments can we expect in 2018?

My crystal ball doesn’t always get it right. But I like dusting it off at the beginning of the year and having a little fun with it.

There’s no dearth of issues on people’s minds…

Is a crash imminent? What will the new hot technologies be? What industries have lost their luster?

And, of course, what inside tips do I have about getting the most out of your startup investment dollars in 2018?

Here are my five intrepid predictions for 2018…

The Crash Will Continue

It’s not coming. Actually, it’s here already.

What? You hadn’t noticed? With the stock market still going up and cryptocurrency hogging everybody’s attention, this has been about the quietest implosion I’ve ever witnessed. But, believe me, it’s real.

Our friends at PitchBook have been tracking the numbers. Since 2014, the number of early- and seed-stage rounds worldwide has nearly halved, from just over 13,000 to more than 5,000 today. That’s a stunning 56% drop.

What’s going on?

The shift to mobile, cloud and software attracted billions of dollars these past few years, but these aren’t new trends or business models anymore. Suddenly, new ideas aren’t as plentiful or as fresh.

Case in point: The prospect of funding consumer apps no longer excites investors.

The Next Hot Technologies Will Finally Meet Expectations

These include medical and healthcare, smart home, automotive, factory and voice-recognition-related applications.

These technologies were expected to make an impact earlier. But tech problems took longer to resolve than expected. Those are finally getting ironed out.

I personally think medtech is going to explode. The medtech market should be getting a boost from a host of advancing technologies whose time has come. I’m keeping an especially close eye on robotics, wearables and digital health, genomics, and artificial intelligence.