The AI Gold Rush: Who strikes gold and who gets left behind?

Invariably, the guaranteed winners of the AI gold rush are the big players, that is, the “shovel sellers” who are at the forefront of building the models and infrastructure, and supplying semiconductors, cloud, hardware and related data, whereas the startups are at extremely high risk of losing out, as are entities, especially IT services providers, who are merely trying to jump on the AI bandwagon without converting their business to AI first and providing value anchored on AI as the core differentiator.

Hence, in the AI gold rush, the first wave sells the shovels, and the second wave is expected to use the shovels to provide value addition, generate productivity gains and significant transformation.

The AI gold rush is a race at both the state and corporate levels, with governments investing in AI infrastructure, talent and innovation to strengthen national competitiveness, while businesses are also racing to adopt and invest in AI to drive productivity, innovation and market advantage.