Economic Complexity & Capability Breadth

790000 BC

Early humans built hearths, intensifying socialisation

Archaeological evidence of hearths has been dated to 790,000 years ago. Researchers believe controlled domestic fire intensified human socialisation and may have contributed to the emergence of language.

380000 BC

Paleolithic humans constructed temporary wood huts

Evidence of shelter dates back some 450,000 years, and by around 380,000 years ago humans were constructing temporary wooden huts. Dwellings grew steadily more sophisticated as the Paleolithic progressed.

2000000 BC

Hominids made the first stone tools by hammering flakes off pebbles

Around two million years ago hominids learned to strike flakes from a pebble to form a sharp hand axe, the earliest known technology. This established the basic pattern of tool-making by observation and trial and error on which all later technical capability rests.

1500000 BC

Early humans achieved continuous use of fire

Archaeological, dietary and social evidence points to continuous human fire-use from at least 1.5 million years ago. Cooking increased the digestibility and nutrient value of food and broadened the range of edible foods; the cooking hypothesis holds that this promoted an increase in hominid brain size.

120000–90000 BC

Paleolithic humans adopted clothing from fur and hides

Archaeological evidence of clothing dates to roughly 90,000 to 120,000 years ago. Clothing allowed humanity to expand into colder regions, supporting migration out of Africa around 200,000 years ago.

75000 BC

Early humans refined stone working into pressure flaking

About 75,000 years ago tool-makers adopted pressure flaking, which enabled much finer and more controlled work than percussion alone. It marked an early step in the progressive refinement of manufacturing technique.

10000 BC

Neolithic farmers invented the polished stone axe and began agriculture

The Neolithic Revolution accelerated technological innovation and increased social complexity. The polished stone axe allowed large-scale forest clearance and farming, while sedentism and larger populations produced labour specialisation, the precondition for advanced technical crafts.

10000 BC

Neolithic metalworkers used the furnace and bellows to smelt native metals

Improvements in furnaces and bellows gave humans for the first time the ability to smelt and forge gold, copper, silver and lead. Native copper was probably used from near the beginning of Neolithic times, and copper tools showed clear advantages over stone, bone and wood.

7000 BC

Egyptians sailed the earliest recorded ship under sail on the Nile

The earliest record of a ship under sail is a Nile boat dating to around 7,000 BCE, the first known use of wind power. Harnessing wind extended human energy sources beyond muscle and fire.

4000 BC

Ancient metalworkers discovered alloys such as bronze and brass

The working of metals eventually led to the discovery of alloys around 4,000 BCE. Alloying gave materials with properties unavailable in native metals and defined the Bronze Age technological base.

4000 BC

Mesopotamian, Caucasus and Central European cultures independently invented the wheel

Archaeologists estimate the wheel was invented independently and concurrently in Mesopotamia, the Northern Caucasus and Central Europe, with estimates ranging from 5,500 to 3,000 BCE and most experts favouring around 4,000 BCE. The wheel revolutionised trade and war and, as a transformer of energy in water wheels and windmills, transformed the application of non-human power.

4000 BC

Ur and Glastonbury builders laid the oldest known constructed roadways

The stone-paved streets of the city-state of Ur and timber roads through the swamps of Glastonbury, England, both date to about 4,000 BCE. These are the earliest known deliberately constructed transport surfaces.

3500 BC

Ancient road builders opened the first long-distance road, 2,400 km from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean

Around 3,500 BCE a road spanning 2,400 km linked the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea, though it was unpaved and only partially maintained. It was the first infrastructure to connect distant regions overland.

3429 BC

Sumerians used a stone potter's wheel at Ur

A stone pottery wheel found at Ur dates to around 3,429 BCE, with older wheel-thrown pottery fragments in the same area. Fast rotary potters' wheels enabled early mass production of pottery.

3000 BC

Mesopotamians and Iranians used the first two-wheeled carts

The first two-wheeled carts, derived from the travois, appeared in Mesopotamia and Iran around 3,000 BCE. Wheeled wagons made it possible to move heavy loads over land.

2000 BC

Minoans built a fully paved 50 km mountain road on Crete

Around 2,000 BCE the Minoans built a 50 km road from the palace of Gortyn through the mountains to Knossos. Unlike earlier long-distance routes it was completely paved, an advance in construction technique.

1800 BC

Ancient metalworkers produced the first iron alloys such as steel

The first use of iron alloys including steel dates to around 1,800 BCE. Iron and steel greatly extended the strength and availability of tools and weapons over bronze.

6th century BC

Romans began construction of the Cloaca Maxima sewer

Construction of Rome's primary sewer began in the sixth century BCE and the structure remains in use today. It anchored an extensive urban sewage system serving many public flush toilets.

312 BC

Romans built the first Roman aqueduct

The first Roman aqueduct was built in 312 BCE and the eleventh and last in 226 CE. Together the aqueducts extended over 450 km, with less than 70 km above ground on arches, demonstrating large-scale hydraulic engineering capability.

9th century · roughly 1,200 years ago

The House of Wisdom in Baghdad gathered and advanced scientific and mathematical knowledge under the Abbasid Caliphate

Scholars translated and extended Greek, Persian and Indian texts, developing algebra, refining astronomical instruments and advancing optics, work that later transmitted into Europe and underpinned much subsequent scientific and technical progress.

c. 1040 · nearly 1,000 years ago

Bi Sheng developed movable type printing in Song Dynasty China

Song China also advanced gunpowder weapons, the magnetic compass and mechanical clockwork, a cluster of innovations that made it, by most measures, the technologically most sophisticated economy in the world at the time.

18th century · 326 years ago

United Kingdom discovered steam power, setting off the Industrial Revolution

Steam power, discovered in Britain in the eighteenth century, triggered the Industrial Revolution with wide-ranging advances in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, metallurgy and transport. It also brought the widespread application of the factory system.

1776 · 250 years ago

James Watt brought an improved steam engine to market

Far more fuel-efficient than earlier designs, Watt's engine powered factories, mines and eventually railways, the central technology of the first industrial revolution and the starting point for sustained industrial productivity growth.

19th century · 226 years ago

Industrial economies entered the Second Industrial Revolution of mass production

A century after the first Industrial Revolution came rapid scientific discovery, standardisation and mass production. New technologies included sewage systems, electricity, light bulbs, electric motors, railroads, automobiles and airplanes, with telegraph, telephone, radio and television transforming communication.

1856 · 170 years ago

Henry Bessemer patented a process for mass-producing steel

Blowing air through molten iron to remove impurities cut the cost of steel dramatically, enabling railways, ships and structural steel construction and marking a defining advance of the second industrial revolution.

1940s–50s · 86 years ago

Jet engine developers invented jet engines by running devices to destruction

In the 1940s and 1950s, when knowledge of turbulent combustion and fluid dynamics was still crude, jet engines were developed by running devices to destruction, analysing what broke and repeating. The case illustrates that engineering capability can run ahead of the underlying science.

1947 · 79 years ago

Bell Labs invented the transistor

Bell Labs researchers invented the transistor in 1947, a solid-state alternative to the vacuum tube made possible by innovations in quantum physics. Smaller, more reliable and far cheaper as a switching component, it replaced bulky vacuum tube machines such as ENIAC, dramatically compacted computers and drove the digital transition, making it the single invention most directly responsible for the modern semiconductor industry.

1950s · 76 years ago

Japanese manufacturers rebuilt around quality-focused electronics production

Firms including Sony and Toyota adopted statistical quality control methods and miniaturised electronics, turning Japan within two decades from a producer of cheap goods into a byword for precision manufacturing and consumer technology.

20th century · 126 years ago

The term 'technology' acquired the meaning of the systemic use of knowledge to practical ends

Following scientific progress and the Second Industrial Revolution, technology ceased to be treated as a distinct academic discipline and took on its modern meaning. Earlier, from the 19th century, continental Europeans used Technik or technique for a 'way of doing' covering all technical arts.

20th century · 126 years ago

Physicists discovered nuclear fission, opening the Atomic Age

The discovery of nuclear fission in the twentieth century led to both nuclear weapons and nuclear power. It made atomic capability a defining marker of national technological standing.

Early 2026 · 6 months ago

TSMC began volume production on its 2-nanometre process

The new node, manufactured in Taiwan, offered meaningful gains in transistor density and power efficiency over 3-nanometre chips and was contracted by Apple, Nvidia and other major fabless customers for their next generation of designs.

• Apple secured early allocation of the new node

2025 · last year

The UAE expanded sovereign artificial intelligence computing capacity

Abu Dhabi-based G42 deepened partnerships with US technology firms to build large AI data centre capacity in the emirate, part of a wider effort across the Gulf to convert energy wealth into advanced computing infrastructure.

2025 · last year

Chinese robotics firms pushed humanoid robots toward commercial deployment

Companies including Unitree and UBTech expanded production of humanoid and industrial robots, building on China's position installing more industrial robots each year than the rest of the world combined, with state programmes backing so-called embodied intelligence.

2025 · last year

Rapidus advanced its state-backed 2-nanometre pilot line in Hokkaido

The Japanese government-industry consortium, working with IBM technology, pushed toward domestic leading-edge chip production, aiming to restore Japan's presence at the frontier of semiconductor manufacturing after decades of decline.

2025 · last year

SK Hynix and Samsung raced to supply high-bandwidth memory for AI accelerators

Both South Korean firms expanded output of stacked HBM chips used in Nvidia and other AI processors, with SK Hynix holding an early qualification lead that made the memory segment a central battleground in advanced chipmaking.

2025 · last year

SMIC continued to advance sub-10-nanometre chip production for Huawei

Using multiple-patterning deep ultraviolet lithography rather than the extreme ultraviolet tools it is barred from buying, China's leading foundry kept extending domestic chipmaking despite export controls, though yields and costs remained less favourable than for market leaders.

2024–2025 · last year

The United States brought new CHIPS Act-backed fabs into production

TSMC's Arizona plant and Samsung's Texas facility moved toward volume manufacturing of advanced logic chips, though both ran behind original schedules, underlining the difficulty of relocating leading-edge production outside East Asia.

2024–2025 · last year

The Netherlands tightened licensing controls on advanced lithography exports to China

Coordinated restrictions with the United States and Japan limited ASML's ability to service and upgrade extreme ultraviolet and advanced deep ultraviolet machines already installed in China, extending the reach of export controls beyond initial sales.

• ASML reported a falling China revenue share

2024–2025 · last year

Singapore grew as a hub for advanced chip packaging and testing

Investment from global semiconductor and equipment firms expanded packaging, testing and specialised fabrication capacity on the island, building on its established base in wafer fabrication and design to move further into advanced-node work.

2024–2025 · last year

Tata Electronics advanced construction of India's first advanced chip fabrication plant

The Dholera facility, alongside a separate assembly and test plant built with Micron in Gujarat, formed the core of a government-backed push to establish domestic semiconductor manufacturing rather than design and assembly alone.

• Micron opened an assembly and test plant in Gujarat

March 2022 · 4 years ago

North Korea used the Blender.io mixer to launder $20.5 million in stolen cryptocurrency

In March 2022 North Korea used the Blender.io mixer to conceal cryptocurrency exchanges, laundering over $20.5 million taken from Axie Infinity and stealing over $600 million from the game's owner. It demonstrated state-level exploitation of digital financial technology.

2021 · 5 years ago

Researchers found science-based patents are 26% more valuable

A 2021 analysis showed that patents based on scientific discoveries are on average 26% more valuable than equivalent non-science-based patents. The finding quantifies the economic premium attached to science-linked innovation.

2020 · 6 years ago

World Economic Forum forecast AI would displace 85 million jobs by 2025

The Future of Jobs Report 2020 predicted artificial intelligence would replace 85 million jobs worldwide while creating 97 million new ones by 2025. It became a widely cited benchmark for automation's projected labour impact.

2019 · 7 years ago

Nick Bostrom introduced the notion of a vulnerable world

In 2019 the philosopher described a vulnerable world as one in which some level of technological development almost certainly devastates civilisation by default. He cited bioterrorist pandemics and arms races from novel armaments that undermine mutual assured destruction.

2018 · 8 years ago

Machine learning experts forecast AI would outperform humans at every task by 2063

In a 2018 survey, half of machine learning experts believed artificial intelligence would accomplish every task better and more cheaply than humans by 2063, and automate all human jobs by 2140. Estimates on artificial general intelligence remain widely dispersed.

2017 · 9 years ago

Economists reached no consensus on AI and long-term unemployment

A 2017 survey found no clear consensus among economists on whether artificial intelligence would raise long-term unemployment. The result underlined the uncertainty surrounding automation's labour effects.

2005 · 21 years ago

Ray Kurzweil predicted the next revolution would rest on genetics, nanotechnology and robotics

In 2005 the futurist argued that the next technological revolution would come from advances in genetics, nanotechnology and robotics, with robotics the most impactful. The claim shaped emerging-technology agendas.

1990–2007 · 36 years ago

Daron Acemoglu measured that each robot per 1,000 workers cut US employment and wages

An MIT study covering 1990 to 2007 found that adding one robot per 1,000 workers reduced the employment-to-population ratio by 0.2%, about 3.3 workers, and lowered wages by 0.42%. It supplied empirical grounding for debates on technological unemployment.

1987 · 39 years ago

Morris Chang founded Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company

TSMC pioneered the pure-play foundry model, manufacturing chips designed by other companies rather than its own, a structure that let fabless firms worldwide compete without owning factories and made Taiwan central to the global chip supply chain.

1978 · 48 years ago

Deng Xiaoping launched China's reform and opening policy

Market reforms and special economic zones opened China to foreign investment and technology transfer, beginning a decades-long absorption and eventual mastery of manufacturing techniques that made the country the world's leading producer of manufactured goods.

1975–89 · 51 years ago

US patent record showed science citations in patents rising to one per patent

In 1975 there was an average of one citation of scientific literature in every three US patents granted; by 1989 this had risen to one citation per patent. The shift measures the deepening dependence of invention on formal science.

1970s–90s · 56 years ago

Ted Kaczynski conducted a bombing campaign and published the Unabomber Manifesto

Between the 1970s and 1990s the American terrorist carried out a series of bombings across the United States. His manifesto denounced technology's negative impacts on nature and human freedom, becoming the best-known violent expression of anti-technology politics.

1970s · 56 years ago

Philosophy of technology grew considerably as a distinct discipline

Philosophy of technology emerged as a discipline over the past two centuries and expanded considerably from the 1970s. It studies the practice of designing and creating artifacts and the nature of what is created.

1970s · 56 years ago

Critics of technology drove a surge in investment in solar, wind and clean energy

From the 1970s, technology's impact on the environment came under sustained criticism. The resulting pressure led to increased investment in solar, wind and other clean energy technologies.

1969 · 57 years ago

Samsung Electronics was founded as South Korea pursued chaebol-led industrialisation

State-directed credit and export targets built conglomerates that moved within a generation from assembling simple electronics to leading global production of memory chips, displays and consumer electronics.

• South Korea's memory chip industry grew to dominate global DRAM production

1964 · 62 years ago

US president Lyndon Johnson signed the National Commission on Technology, Automation, and Economic Progress bill

Johnson signed the bill in 1964, saying technology created both new opportunities for productivity and new obligations to ensure no worker paid an unjust price for progress. It marked formal state engagement with automation's social consequences.

1960s · 66 years ago

Governments and analysts lost faith that basic research funding yields marketable technologies

Since the 1960s the assumption that government funding of basic research would automatically lead to the discovery of marketable technologies has lost credibility. The change reframed how states justify science budgets.

1960s · 66 years ago

Hippie counterculture developed the idea of appropriate technology

Segments of the 1960s counterculture disliked urban living and favoured locally autonomous, sustainable and decentralised technology. This preference was termed appropriate technology and shaped later debates on technological scale.

1958–1959 · 67 years ago

Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce separately invented the integrated circuit

Combining multiple transistors on a single chip of semiconductor material made increasingly complex circuits practical to manufacture, the foundational advance behind every subsequent generation of computing and consumer electronics hardware.

1957 · 69 years ago

Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, beginning the Space Age

The launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957 opened the Space Age, followed by crewed missions to the Moon in the 1960s. Spaceflight became a headline demonstration of national technological sophistication.