This is a sad statement on the complete utter lack of awareness of how the system of tech development works in the United States.
The simple reason Silicon Valley doesn't fund Hyperloops is because they cost BILLIONS to develop over DECADES, with highly uncertain outcomes. This scale of large-scale, long-term, technology investment risk is borne by..... drumroll.....
TAXPAYERS. The guv'ment. Uncle Sam.
The Internet. Computers. NASA (hello SpaceX). Airplanes. Even frickin Siri was funded by the public.
The way it works is it's done under the banner of military applications. DARPA is a key agency in core development, but a very large part is government procurement. Then whatever works out given away pretty much for free to private hands.
Silicon Valley specializes in investing in the "last mile" of commercial development. It's still risky, but orders of magnitude less than something like developing Hyperloop from scratch.
The simple reason Silicon Valley doesn't fund Hyperloops is because they cost BILLIONS to develop over DECADES, with highly uncertain outcomes. This scale of large-scale, long-term, technology investment risk is borne by..... drumroll.....
TAXPAYERS. The guv'ment. Uncle Sam.
The Internet. Computers. NASA (hello SpaceX). Airplanes. Even frickin Siri was funded by the public.
The way it works is it's done under the banner of military applications. DARPA is a key agency in core development, but a very large part is government procurement. Then whatever works out given away pretty much for free to private hands.
Silicon Valley specializes in investing in the "last mile" of commercial development. It's still risky, but orders of magnitude less than something like developing Hyperloop from scratch.