Jeffrey Altman notes that modern infrastructure transitions — from telecoms to Europe's energy shift to AI build-outs — follow remarkably similar investment patterns. They begin with capacity constraints, attract extraordinary capital and cheap debt, spur innovation, and ultimately reshape the economics of the very assets investors thought would yield exceptional returns. Every generation believes its transition is unique; history suggests otherwise.

The telecoms boom of the mid-1990s to early-2000s illustrates these dynamics clearly. Rapid fibre, broadband, and mobile expansion was financed on assumptions of near-unlimited demand. Yet each technological advance — optical transmission, network efficiency, mobile generations — increased capacity faster than anticipated. Capital attracted by scarcity removed it, competition intensified, and several high-profile telecoms firms entered bankruptcy even as global communications capacity expanded beyond imagination. The highest returns eventually migrated from infrastructure assets to software, platforms, and digital services.

Europe's energy transition followed a similar arc, driven by government decarbonisation targets and renewable support mechanisms. Private capital financed unprecedented wind and solar deployment. China's manufacturing scale slashed solar module costs; turbine technology and supply chains improved. Success then created new infrastructure challenges as grids designed for dispatchable generation struggled with variable renewable input.