Vantage Point: Portfolio Construction  

How generative AI will define this era of investment

Xuesong Zhao

Xuesong Zhao

Investing in the AI opportunity

The Polar Capital Artificial Intelligence strategy invests in all sectors and companies where we see an

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opportunity to benefit from AI. This includes the enablers, those that reside within the technology sector and contribute to the advancement and infrastructure of this technology as well as, importantly, beneficiaries of the technology that reside in the wider AI ecosystem. Such companies might own proprietary data that is now of higher value with the improved analytical capabilities AI brings.

We also look for companies deploying AI tools to generate incremental revenue or profit that is not captured in current expectations, which also brings the potential to see their multiples rerate higher. Finally, we are also excited about companies that will use generative AI to create those entirely new markets and applications that could completely upend existing profit pools.

During the initial stages of an innovation wave, we would expect, and are seeing, capital spending on infrastructure. However, we believe the longer-term opportunity will be much larger in the applications and beneficiaries, within and beyond the technology sector. We are hugely excited about AI adoption and potential in the industrial, robotics, healthcare and information services industries, all of which are already experimenting with and deploying AI tools. It is our firm belief that investing in the face of such rapid disruption requires a technology-minded framework to identify and avoid threats to incumbency, and that domain expertise will be required to capture what we believe will prove a huge opportunity for investors.

Xuesong Zhao is the lead manager of the Polar Capital Artificial Intelligence Strategy