I was recently asked who I thought would win the AI race. My answer was, “NVIDIA. When there’s a gold rush, be the one selling shovels.”
The reasoning behind this is that selling the resources needed during a gold rush (shovels, hardware) will definitely generate revenue, while the participants in the gold rush will have to wait and see if they too become rich.
This LinkedIn post by Stephen Klein illustrates this nicely. Amazon is laying off 30,000 people because of AI. Not because it’s selling so well, but precisely because revenues are lagging far behind investments, forcing Amazon to cut back elsewhere. It is not a good thing if you get fired because your employer invested poorly…
This does not change my opinion that there are certainly useful applications of AI, but that expectations of amaaaaaazing returns are somewhat exaggerated.
