Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai has addressed fears that AI could render half of the company’s 180,000 employees redundant. In a Bloomberg interview, he labeled AI an “accelerator” for productivity rather than a threat.
Pichai stated,
“I expect we will grow from our current engineering phase even into next year, because it allows us to do more.”
He emphasized that AI is enhancing engineers’ efficiency by automating mundane tasks, paving the way for new product development that could necessitate hiring more workers.
Despite past layoffs, which included 12,000 job cuts in 2023, recent reductions have been more targeted. Alphabet laid off less than 100 people in Google’s cloud division and hundreds more in its platforms and devices unit.
Looking ahead, Pichai pointed to growth in ventures like Waymo autonomous vehicles, quantum computing, and the success of YouTube, which boasts 100 million channels. He highlighted YouTube’s rapid expansion in India, where 15,000 channels have over one million subscribers.
When discussing the future of AI, Pichai acknowledged concerns about job displacement, especially regarding comments from Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei that AI might threaten half of entry-level white-collar jobs. He responded,
“I respect that . . .I think it’s important to voice those concerns and debate them.”
As the interview concluded, Pichai commented on the limits of AI and the possibility of never achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI), saying,
“There’s a lot of forward progress ahead with the paths we are on… So are we currently on an absolute path to AGI? I don’t think anyone can say for sure.”
Pichai remains optimistic about innovation despite potential temporary plateaus in technology development.
