These CEOs and CXOs are not 'impressed' by AI, here's the ‘big’ why

Not all CEOs and CXOs are impressed with the promise of AI at Davos. Cloudflare CEO, Matthew Prince, and other business leaders believe AI still has a lot to prove. Synthesia CEO, Victor Riparbelli, highlights concerns about false content and regulation. A survey shows 90% of executives are waiting for AI to go beyond the hype.

Seems not all CEOs and CXOs are impressed with all the noise around the promise of artificial intelligence (AI) at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. The arrival of OpenAI's ChatGPT triggered a frenzy investment and an abrupt change of course inside the world's biggest technology companies since late 2022.This year, several CEOs at the WEF meeting in Davos told news agency Reuters that the latest generative AI a lot to prove.

One not so 'AI enamoured' CEO is Matthew Prince, CEO of cloud and internet security company Cloudflare. He told the news agency that the months ahead may even feel like an "AI letdown". "Everyone's like, yeah, I can build these cool demos, but where's the real value?" he said. His views are echoed by some other business leaders attending the WEF meeting as well.

In the first two months since its launch in November 2022, ChatGPT reached an estimated 100 million users, making it one of the fastest growing apps in history. The success led to generative AI reaching fingertips of lay technology users. But as Victor Riparbelli, CEO of AI video generation startup Synthesia, said that ChatGPT proved a good collaborator for developing ideas in "low stakes, not business-critical use cases." But "the enterprise is definitely not really ready" for this chat-based AI, he said in an interview.

One problem Riparbelli cited, as per the report, is that there is no clear path to end so-called "hallucinations," or false content generated by AI. Other concerns, said IBM's Europe, Middle East & Africa Chair Ana Paula Assis, are stopping chatbot AI from reproducing human biases, and regulation. "Clients are still very worried about how they bring those solutions within the boundaries of regulations and compliance," she said.

Meanwhile, some 90% of 1,400 C-suite executives said they were waiting for generative AI to take a step beyond recent hype or were doing only limited experimentation and pilots, survey results published by consultancy BCG showed.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said at a company event in Davos Wednesday that AI is poised to grow productivity and potentially accelerate science itself. Yet businesses' revenue and profit from recent efforts remain unclear.

Tejpreet Chopra, CEO of BLP Group, a major wind and solar operator in India, told Reuters he is ready to incorporate AI chat technology "but only for internal use for writing good English, not for content."

Source: TOI‍