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The artificial intelligence boom has companies racing to develop more advanced models, and Softbank’s chief executive reportedly thinks we’ll be seeing AI that is 10,000 times smarter than humans in just a decade.
Softbank chief executive Masayoshi Son said artificial super intelligence, or ASI, is “a totally different story,” and people “will see a big improvement,” during SoftBank’s annual general shareholders meeting on Friday, CNBC reported. In the future, Son said, ASI models will work together like neurons in a human brain. ASI, he said according to the Wall Street Journal, would be able to help with disease, wars, and even if a meteor crashes into the Earth.
“I seriously believe the reason why Masayoshi Son was born is to make ASI come true,” he said.
Meanwhile, Son said artificial general intelligence, or AGI — when AI systems reach human-level intelligence — will likely be one to 10 times smarter than humans, and that it will be reached within the next three to five years. However, he said if AGI ends up not being able to outsmart humans, “then we don’t need to change the way of living, we don’t need to change the structure of human lifestyle.”
Son also said it is “frustrating to remember the ones that I missed,” when talking about selling shares of Nvidia before it’s fast rise to becoming one of the most valuable companies in the world amid the AI boom. “The fish that got away was big,” he said, according to the Wall Street Journal.
In 2019, Softbank’s Vision Fund, which it makes investments through, sold its 4.9% stake in Nvidia, receiving $3.3 billion in returns. Today, its stake would be worth around $160 billion. Nvidia’s shares have risen 165% so far this year, and it quickly entered the $3 trillion market cap club with Apple and Microsoft earlier this month, after becoming the first semiconductor company to cross the $2 trillion threshold in February.