After crossing the $15 billion cumulative investment milestone in late 2025, the fusion industry entered 2026 with a fundamentally different capital structure. No longer a collection of isolated lab experiments, fusion investment is now forming a full industrial stack. Here are the five key investment trends defining the fusion industry in 2026.

Beyond engineers and physicists, the fusion era demands talent from manufacturing, digital technology, policy, and education—creating one of the most multidisciplinary job ecosystems in modern history. Yet, a growing skills gap threatens to slow progress.

California is turning fusion into industry. Backed by billions in investment and home to the world’s leading fusion companies, the state is no longer treating fusion as science, but as strategy. Can California turn this momentum into economic reality?

As fusion energy races toward commercialization, the spotlight often shines on breakthroughs inside the reactor. But the real challenge may lie outside the core, in the infrastructure, workforce, supply chains, and financing systems that will turn scientific success into global impact. Here's why the future of clean energy depends on more than science.