The top growing industries post-Pandemic

Nobody can predict exactly how the end stages of the Pandemic will play out, but we have now coexisted with COVID-19 for long enough for it to have significantly altered our habits and systems. And with change comes opportunities for growth.

The circuitry linking together all the paradigm shifts of the last two years is digital transformation. The fastest growing industries are the ones tapping into this shift toward tech. Let’s zoom in on what industries are growing right now and what will be the growing industries post-Pandemic.

From a consumer perspective, the sheer force of habit, as well as heightened public awareness about infections, will continue to generate momentum in the sales of products like sanitisers, masks, and other personal hygiene items that saw a spike during the Pandemic.

But COVID-19 has also set healthcare delivery down a different path. The sector continues to be poised for growth as health hogs the spotlight and drives greater public investment in epidemiological response and preparedness, as well as momentum to bolster the health system as a whole.

Tech transformation has raged through the industry with almost as much fury as the virus itself: telehealth use is up 38-fold since before the Pandemic, and venture capitalists are investing three times more in 2020 than in 2017 in this area. Wearable devices and remote diagnostics are also a booming niche with major growth potential at the intersection or health and tech.

Again, driven by the Pandemic’s global shake-up of consumers’ habits, growth projections for online retail behemoths like Shopify and Amazon are still stratospheric.

A fast-expanding corner of this massive industry is grocery. The Pandemic accelerated an already growing trend of people buying food online and having it delivered to their homes (now around 10% of grocery purchases are made online, around double pre-pandemic levels).

This shift logically entails another post-Pandemic winner: delivery and transportation. The surge in e-commerce has brought and will continue to bring windfalls to order fulfilment apps and services. And e-commerce has spawned another tech darling poised for a major growth spurt: augmented and virtual reality. These technologies are used to allow consumers to get a more intimate feel for products without having to leave their homes.

The Pandemic supercharged a pre-existing shift toward digital classrooms, which in many cases are set to become permanent. This leads to two main industry winners. The first is remote learning tech. Players in this field range from giants like Google and Microsoft to smaller start-ups that were able to get their foot in the door during the Pandemic.

The second group is course content creators and providers. Online course companies are successfully landing ample funding as Pandemic-related economic uncertainty leads people to take shorter training as they gauge where the job market will go rather than committing to full graduate programs.

To the extent that digital shifts and online modes of working, learning, and shopping are here to stay, so too are the accompanying risks. Cyberattacks increased dramatically during the Pandemic, especially ransomware attacks. Companies and organisations are eager to hedge this risk by investing in cybersecurity. The amount of new funding for cybersecurity companies bears out this new focus, amounting to $11.4 billion dollars in 2020, or almost half again as much as in 2018.

One of the fastest growing industries in the UK and elsewhere is pets and pet products. As people endured lonely lockdowns and isolation, they turned to fluffy companions for comfort. These pets and their needs won’t vanish with the virus, so this market will doubtlessly continue the show strong momentum in the near future.

Though we have highlighted some of the main industries that stand to grow post-COVID, the Pandemic brought about such a titanic shift that investors can find winners and losers in all sectors of the market. Other areas experiencing drastic change driven by digital transformation include banking, with contactless payment and branchless banking going mainstream, and entertainment, with an explosion of virtual events and online social gaming. Also, certain sectors are still suffering from suppressed or irregular demand or disruptions due to the ongoing Pandemic, and investors may expect a shorter-term bounce-back in these areas before they level off. Examples include the airline industry, hospitality, and movie theatres.