Puts More Time In Our Hands, How Can It Be Bad: Shiprocket CEO Says AI Not Hype Or Doomsday

 Artificial Intelligence is not a hype but a business-transforming reality, Shiprocket co-founder and CEO Saahil Goel has said, adding that any skepticism over AI ignores the technology’s long-term value and how it has the potential to change every industry.

"It is net positive, because it is putting more time back in our hands. So how can it be bad...think of it this way. And technology has always done that," Goel told PTI in an interview.

It is pertinent to mention that a global debate over a possible bubble in artificial intelligence (AI) has been brewing amid heady market valuations and big tech committing billions of dollars in AI investments - infrastructure, chips and data centres.

Shares of global firms dabbling in AI have spiked in recent months, though, at the same time sharp market pullbacks and news of debt bankrolling AI investments have raised skepticism in Western markets.

In the US, playground for global AI bets, the Buffett indicator - which measures the ratio of American stock-market capitalisation to US GDP - has signalled overvaluation, surpassing levels seen at the height of the dot-com overheating.

Shiprocket's Goel argues that AI valuations are a market outcome, and must be viewed separately from broader discussions on the technology’s intrinsic value or its effect on jobs.

AI powered tools "will work in our favour in the long run, and I don't think it's like a doomsday," said the top executive of the logistics tech company that is heading for an IPO.

Goel urged people to embrace AI, to start learning and using it.

"One hundred per cent this is not a hype. It is going to change everything," he said.

AI today enables scenarios where 'agents' can make calls and or make bookings at a restaurant, he said.

"It has become that simple, is what I mean. So 100%, it is going to change pretty much every industry. And then with AI, you are seeing a parallel revolution in robotics," he said, predicting that robotics will be 10 times bigger than soft applications of AI.

Drawing parallel to a similar debate in tech circles in early 2000s about the internet being a 'fad', Goel said despite such views and all the skepticism then, internet and online today drives every business and economy.

"I don't think this is different than that. I think this time it is mobile and internet together. So 100% please adopt it and start to use it and learn it....There will be some jobs lost, say, a pure call center job, which can be fully automated with AI. Yes, that process is going to go away. But there will be something else that will come around...there might be 10 more processes that get born...And this is true for any technology. Right back from the industrial revolution, it was the same thing," he said.

Goel refused to weigh-in on stock valuations in India, emphasising that companies should focus on performance and value creation, and added that he hopes the logistics tech firm’s own IPO will be "rightly priced" so everyone makes returns.

"I am no one to comment on valuations. I think it's very much a matter of the forces of buyers and sellers and it's a market-driven thing, to be very honest. As operators, it's our job to deliver revenue, deliver performance, deliver margins, kind of create value on the business front. And then there's obviously macro things happening all around the world that drive all kinds of things," Goel said.

Goel was responding to a question on how he sees valuations in India, particularly given that several companies are trading below their listing price post their stock market debut this year.

"From a perspective of IPOs not having made money, again, it is hard for me to comment on that because I really don't have any role in that. When it comes to us, hopefully we will be rightly priced by the market where it is a price where everybody should make money is the way we think about it," Goel said.