Installation and Deployment Phases

Carlota Perez's framework, developed in her 2002 Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital, distinguishes two phases in the life cycle of each major technological revolution. The installation phase is the early period during which the technology develops, early adopters experiment with it, and financial capital drives speculation that produces both infrastructure and bubbles. The deployment phase is the subsequent period during which the technology becomes broadly adopted, its benefits are widely distributed, and institutional capital governs its integration into the economy. The transition between phases is typically crisis-driven and requires what Perez calls institutional innovation — new rules, new norms, new arrangements that channel the technology's power toward broad benefit. The Andreessen — On AI volume deploys this framework to position the current AI moment as the transition between installation and deployment, and to identify the institutional innovation the moment requires.