Blain’s Morning Porridge April 21st, 2026 – Robots, Competition and Total Addressable Markets.“When Henry Ford made cheap, reliable cars, people said, ‘Nah, what’s wrong with a horse?”Past performance is not a guide to the future. Tesla trades on a massive PE because folk believe Elon Musk will repeat his success in EVs across AI, Capacitance, Robotaxis, Autonomous Driving and Robotics. But hype, showmanship, undelivered promises and increasing competition are leaving his ventures in the literal rear-view mirror. I am indebted to my chum Mark Blyth, Professor of International Economics (and fellow Scot) at Brown University in the US for yet another pithy quote of the moment. We were discussing the current state of global play, supply chain risks, and Robotics yesterday and he made the following astute observation: “The US is doubling down on Coal. China has robots that run on batteries the US can’t make.” What more is there to say? OUCH….Did you see the videos of Chinese Robots doing the Beijing half-marathon last weekend? (Here is a link.) Interesting. Run Robot, Run! They beat the humans hands and feet-pads down. The winning robot could have run a 1 hour 41 min Marathon. When it comes to Robotics, or other demonstrable tech like drone swarms, China is right out there, leading from the front. The signals that should be sending to the US and the West about tech development, and concerns about access to critical rare earths for the server motors, is pivotal – but we’re all too busy watching the absolute FUBAR/clusterf*ck that is the on/off/on again War against Iran.You can read the Morning Porridge by subscribing on ⁠www.morningporridge.com⁠, and have it delivered fresh to your inbox every morning!

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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