Gautam Adani, Chairman, Adani Group
Photo: PTI
“Going into WEF ’23, I was surprised to read about massive layoffs by the “infallible” tech industry and economists’ warnings about the global recession in the third quarter of 2023. These days, the quality of the economists’ predictions is as good as my skiing skills. Both are on slippery slopes,” the Adani Group chairman wrote.
The year 2022 and 2023 were marked by mass layoffs by tech companies that started handing pink slips to employees after going on a pandemic-induced hiring binge in 2020 and 2021. According to Layoffs.fyi, a platform that tracks job cuts in the tech sector , 214,814 tech workers have been laid off in 2022 and 2023. Out of this number, 55,863 were fired in the first month of 2023 itself.
Adani—a
ChatGPT has a new fan in Asia’s richest, who is back from Davos 2023 and raving about the potential of the Artificial Intelligence-powered tool.
Adani, besides expanding his empire to include airports, data centers, and defense, has been “addicted” to the AI tool, he explained in a recent blog post on his experiences from the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos.
“Third is all the discussions at the WEF around advancements in AI or, to be more precise, we should call it generative AI. It was the buzzword at this year’s event. The recent release of ChatGPT (I must admit to some addiction since I started using it) is a transformational moment in the democratization of AI given its astounding capabilities as well as comical failures,” wrote Adani.
ChatGPT uses advanced machine learning algorithms to analyze vast amounts of data and generate natural-sounding text on virtually any topic. The program has a wide range of applications, from crafting jokes and writing ad copy to debugging computer code and even creating poetry and essays.
“But there can be no doubt that generative AI will have massive ramifications. Nearly five decades ago, the pioneering of chip design and large-scale chip production put the US ahead of the rest of the world and led to the rise of many partner countries and tech behemoths like Intel, Qualcomm, TSMC, etc. It also paved the way for precision and guided weapons used in modern warfare with more chips mounted than ever before,” he added.
Adani in his post also wrote about the compounding effect of the onslaught and confluence of multidimensional risks—best encapsulated by the term ‘polycrisis’, which the WEF defines as “a cluster of related global risks with compounding effects, such that the overall impact exceeds the sum of each part”.
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