I think that it's now at a point where, depending on your individual needs and the size of your wallet, a "functional cure" for Androgenetic Alopecia with ostensibly guaranteed results is pretty damn close.
We're actually already kinda there in the sense that with advancements in transplants, and if you can find yourself a really skilled surgeon, some people (lower NWs) get results so good that even though it's a half-*** solution, the improvement more than makes up for it. There have also been some incredibly-lucky responders to finasteride, minodixil, or barebones dermarolling that have amounted to functional cures.
But these people are the minority, and there are risks; sometimes, substantial risks.
However, by my looking into the subject, there has never been so many companies (big and small) that are actively seeking to eliminate these risks and dismal results, and there has never been so many to make it this far through clinical trials.
IMO, the big three right now are Follica, Shiseido, and RIKEN (Tsuji). They all have positive trial results that have warranted pushing into the next phase, they are all backed by successful and wealthy cosmetics/research/biotech companies, and they have shown human results. We know that wounding neogenesis is a viable method of growing hair, but getting the most out of those results has eluded other studies; RCH-01 showed positive results among everyone who was treated to protocol, and Shiseido is expanding their operations for distribution of the product in Asia ahead of any public unveiling of their Phase II (their last trial before a conditional market release); Tsuji's tech has repeatedly grown human hair successfully, they found a solution to the multiplication problem (as did Terskikh), and it has grown hair with human cells in animals with no illl effects quite a number of times, and they're actually still on schedule for a release in Japan in 2020 which is amazing.
There's no smoking gun regarding some negative variable on these things that suggests their failure is terribly likely at this point, so there is no point dwelling on some unknown "what if" that there is no real evidence for; that's what most of the people around here who are always freakin' out and being all cynical fail to realize.
Will we all be fullheads in the next five years? No, especially when you consider the inevitable cost. However, I think it's obvious at this point that superior options, some which could amount to a functional cure in certain scenarios, is pretty damn close.
