The Future of AI and Entrepreneurship, According Two Leading Innovators

Channel: Alex Kantrowitz

Published at: 2025-01-13

YouTube video id: MZ2z_MwLh7k

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZ2z_MwLh7k

what's up YouTube let's have a
conversation about voice Ai and AI
startups we're here at LG's inest and
this discussion is brought to you by LG
Nova I can't be more excited to
introduce the guests we have with us
here today we have first of all Norman
winarski the founder of Siri Norman
great to see you co-founder co-founder
see already humble and Saku is here he
is the head of innovation at LG also
familiar face on our Channel Saku great
to see you welcome back thanks for
inviting me all right so it's great
great to have you let's let's talk
immediately about the topic at hand
because uh Mark Zuckerberg recently said
something very interesting about voice
Ai and when I heard it I was like well
I'm speaking with the found co-founder
of Siri got to ask him he said I think
voice is going to be a way more natural
way of interacting with AI than text CH
PT gets all of the excitement all the
interest is voice the future of
artificial intelligence what do you
think well first of all I love voice
because I co-founded Siri I love how you
speak to Siri but I
disagree um wait wait you the co-founder
of Siri are disagreeing about voice I
this is a moment here I was co-founder
of Siri I disagree that voice is going
to be the primary way that we're going
to interact with ar why is that it's
first of all we're used to text text
also with AI has a lot more flexibility
in how we write what we think what we
want
to expand on what what our thoughts are
AI can help us in all of that voice is a
little more constrained first of all
you're usually just near each other or
near your iPhone or other Android phone
so basically why do you constrain things
to voice alone I I I don't see that as
as necessarily the dominant forms you're
saying the way we interact with
artificial intelligence is going to be a
combination voice multimo text exactly
exactly and in the future yeah as you
said audio uh
imagery um and we won't even we won't
even understand that AI isn't any
different than interacting with our
devices any other way so just a new
interaction layer it's a new layer of
interaction an intelligent layer of
interaction if you could go back again
buildy Siri doing with voice or text
oh I'd still the voice was a good
decision yeah he zaku let's go to you
what do you think about this statement
from Zuckerberg that voice is going to
be the most natural way that we interact
with artificial
intelligence the Norman because uh I
think there's these two modes of
communic Co exist but you really want to
come down to what you're going to use it
for for example if you're giving a
command a SP short command probably Bo
is going to work turn off for light turn
on the light right but if you really
need to stand up complex uh sort of an
article a complex uh writing is probably
much easier and faster text is going to
allow you to use multimedia you're
saying other articles news other voice
uh information video information and you
could say hey combine this all Give me a
summary whatever text is going to be a
dominant form and for a long time yeah I
was just speaking with some folks in the
industry today and they said something
like you can speak at 150 words per
minute but you can read it two to 300
words per minute so it's a very
effective way to deliver information
maybe we go to brain computer interfaces
eventually and we do a thousand words a
minute but we're not there yet well and
it's not just GNA in the future it's not
just text I mean your brain for example
has signals in it that could be just as
well be words it could be AI could be
interpreting those signals or AI could
be interpreting your health in terms of
your bi biomarker so there's many ways
that AI will be talking to you yes yeah
talking figuratively because it can be
intuiting what you're feeling exactly
okay so Norman you're investing in
startups these days help create them yes
and help create Saku you're also doing
the same through LG Nova but I want to
talk about ai's Focus for both of you
because there have been so many AI
startups that just haven't gone anywhere
and you think they're like a great idea
right right okay talk to any character
through history and it's very
interesting very sticky but they have
ended up ended up fizzling or doing this
new thing where like the founder goes to
a big tech company and the shell of the
company is sort of left and uh and
somehow that's like an aqua high or
whatever it is we won't get too deep
into that but I really want to know from
both of you what does it take to create
a successful AI startup today is there
something that's
working to you want me to yeah a
successful AI startup is always going or
any startup to tell the truth is always
going to start with uh a paino that's
crying out to be
solved a potential large and growing
Market a team that's superbly put
together to serve that particular
problem in technology and solution and a
value proposition where the value to the
customers
is
overwhelmingly positive okay yeah and
are you seeing that with artificial
intelligence today well where people
just are just giving a solution trying
to invest depends on the startups right
but we've already seen that there are
fundamental Ventures platform I would
call them Ventures that other Ventures
can be built upon that are already
having a profound impact as obviously
with open a on model Builders the model
Builders um there's going to
be startups I can't imagine an industry
that isn't going to be profoundly
affected by AI based on the platforms
the models that have been built every
single one re real estate
biotech um any Healthcare you name it uh
legal raw
everything agriculture something I'm
particularly excited by all of these are
going to be profoundly transformed guy
asking questions on YouTube
sure okay yeah well in the near term at
least it seems like a lot of the biggest
Solutions uh that AI is being applied
for are big Enterprise Solutions right
it's just one of those things with
technology it seems like there's always
businesses are less demanding than
consumers at least when it comes to like
how the sofware looks how it works but
generally more forgiving because they're
shipping and trying to run ahead pretty
fast and we use technology sometimes to
paper over the problems um and also
there's a pretty good Roi for a business
if you can solve something so generally
that's where new technology tends to see
the return on investment first so Saku
I'm curious to hear from your
perspective the Enterprise opportunity
in AI is a bigger than consumer now and
how big is it so I would say is a bigger
or smaller but I completely agreed to
what NOA said uh AI is essentially a
enabler That's What I Call enabling
Noels usually enabling andr you does not
make a lot of money I mean there so if
you go back to uh uh sort of like a uh
early days of Internet so there's a lot
of investment into the fiber optics so I
kind of see this current to build of
infrastructure in AIS so like at the
days of fiber optic they invested tons
of
and they eventually end up ended up with
over capacity it took multiple decades
that's 10 years or more they get to the
point they find the right application
like video
strip so as eventually there will be a
lot of the application Focus setups or
vertical Focus startups that leverages a
I think that's what the really real
Market is but I also understand without
infrastructure we cannot get there so I
think we are in that kind of Journey of
right and are you through LG Nova seeing
AI startups that are helping Enterprises
and actually in in the world right now
solving problems yes most of the
startups that we deal with they're
trying to uh solve the issues the B2B or
Enterprise it right so it's simply
because probably that's more perceivable
those problems are easier to uh not uh
notice and easier to pinpoint at this
point consumer are like you turn on the
light and turn up the light is it a
problem is oral convenience yeah uh
businesses are like if you do it that
it's going to cut cost for 20% or not
and the model Builders it seems like the
revenue that they're making is largely
through API right now and not chatbots
not as much through chatbots although
jgpt has some crazy numbers uh in
premium but it's the apis that are
leading this at the moment I that's
absolutely truth so normally let's talk
about these model Builders so they're
all trying to race towards artificial
general intelligence this sort of
Godlike Ai and this whole first half of
our conversation we're talking about
startups and how they're going to handle
this stuff okay so if I'm startup
building on a foundational model that's
being built by an open AI or anthropic
and I know their goal is to create
effectively I'm Mission artificial
intelligence what am I doing because
eventually isn't the
sort of God models from open AI from
anthropic just going to subsume and do
what I'm trying to do anyway why would I
be building I mean what do you think
about this is there a is there some
conflict there do you think that these
model Builders will eventually just
subsume all AR all AI
startups there's certainly a
risk that the model
Builders can uh dominate the industries
particular industries that that their
models are most effective if that's
their goal there's a great risk and also
those model Builders are spending tens
of or hundreds of millions of dollars
per training and exercise and and in
order to get to the point where these
models are effective in solving these
problems so you can imagine a world
where the five or so companies in the
world can kind of dominate everything
that's one dystopian world then there's
another world more like SIU was talking
about where
there's there's an infrastructure that's
been created and from that
infrastructure many companies will
dominate vertical areas why will they
dominate verticals in in in particular
Industries because they're going to have
the data and the expertise and the focus
on specific consumer segments ments that
are going to be most effective at
reaching those consumer segments so from
my point of view I
believe that these big companies will
never try to focus sufficiently on the
market verticals that will really make a
huge difference to that particular
market and so the industry will flourish
in each of these individual markets Sak
do you agree it's the application of the
technology point is this if you look at
internet how internet goal there were
companies like freom and Cisco there
Cisco still great company but they filed
infrastructure and then after that there
are new compan like Google meta and all
these cops came out of that built their
application H it so I think I mean if
you look at it AI is on that Trend that
had ear right now so I think eventually
they're going to both survive but
they're going to play different Ro so AI
become an operating system when we first
created Siri our
vision was very specific it was say a do
engine for instead of a search engine
and what we meant by a do engine
was understand a person's intent a
request to do something it always had to
be a request to do something buy me a
ticket get me a hotel
reservation um you know make
uh get me to the nearest train uh
information on the nearest uh train
station or whatever and then guide me to
it or buy me or whatever so the the
whole point again was Siri was a do
engine and in that sense would do
everything for you okay instead of
search for something it would do it for
you Apple purchased Siri uh Steve Jobs
and they
in 2010 they took Siri as it was and
reinvented it for the Apple purposes so
that would access Apple calendar Apple
Mail all of those things so we're now
beginning to see new functionality that
we'll start doing that do engine again
it's come full circle your vision AI is
that's it it's only just beginning it's
only just beginning because it it can do
things far far in in this conference
today I
saw people one person starting a company
that relating to a blind person and
helping that individual
navigate well with this kind of engine
and a Siri like dual engine you could
say with Vision by the way not just
speech and also text get me from here
over to
the uh meeting two blocks away and with
that kind of device it could lead a
blind person over so so that's a du
engine it's a vertical it's not an
operating system but it's a very strong
capability for a diverse set
of applications absolutely yeah how
about as an enabling technology Sak I'm
curious to hear your perspective you're
talking to startups all the time you
know Sam Alman has this thing that he
says that he wants AI to enable us to
have a oneperson unicorn onep person
billion dollar startup we're not there
yet uh but but it is helping companies
build better and and build faster so
what have you seen uh when it comes to
AI as an enabling technology I'm
actually seeing it the companies that
new sty coming in previously maybe took
10 people to start a company decent uh
you know ramp up now they can do it you
know one person or TR basically that's
because it makes easier for setups to do
what they did using
enterprise software now with they
enabled by AI so HR function or all
these things could be done much even
coding in so I think that's definitely
Happ what do you think that that about
that type of power I think
AI
absolutely helps enable the creation of
new startups that's what you mean and I
also think that it makes humans more of
a superpower themselves so rather than
replace it helps more capable cap uh
human capability to do what humans
possibly couldn't have done before so
you're not in the this is going to lead
to mass unemployment
Camp so in terms of mass unemployment I
think every great technology has always
been that fear going to displace people
I think it's becoming pretty clear now
that there will be a loss of
current jobs and capabilities and an
enormous increase in new jobs relating
to the deployment of new AI technology
yeah it's so interesting because it
changes like we we I remember a couple
years ago there's an app for that right
everyone was building apps yeah now I
wonder do we even need apps if
everything is going to go through let's
say an air operating system or even uh
on phone intelligence right like a on
device intelligence that can pull let's
say a review of like how a restaurant is
like do you necessarily need the apps
that were just built for the restaurants
or do they just become something else
they become an API that feeds into the
AI what do you think sakur actually I
don't agree that apps disappear and
here's why if you have a four let's say
you have 30 different apps in theory you
don't need 30 apps you need maybe if all
these vendors and Cass work together for
one single app that can do everything
like that can do Uber that can do
Netflix then you just use one app it's
same deal so basically even if you have
ai in play it doesn't mean all these
hundred, companies going to actually
unify under one umbrella at one I don't
think I don't think it's going to happen
what do you think Norman I think
that it's going to be a major new
capability to to deploy solutions that
we used to think of as individual apps
and instead just ask that it be done
right so um you'll still wonder whether
you're going to use you know Google Maps
or Apple Maps or whatever so you can't
just say get me from here to there but
there'll be uh a knowledge of you the AI
is gonna know you okay at least in my
opinion people may not like it because
it's too intrusive but if it knows you
it'll know what you prefer what what to
what your heating system is what your
home is where you are and so you won't
need to say call upon Google Map or
whatever it is you'll just ask for what
you want and get it so I do think that
everybody will have their
own application business but I don't
think we'll see it the same way as we do
today with with your iPhone or Android
phone so this is a fascinating point so
you have a Siri but all these other apps
like we talk about Netflix and all this
things going to probably going to work
in the background they'll work in the
background say you tell Siri what you
want but individual as you may not have
this own interface that's right he's
going to operate in the back they'll
operate that is a scenario that is
possible those are all businesses those
businesses aren't going to go away but
your access to those businesses are
transparent you know Alex you want to
take this video record it share it
somewhere and and then get lots of
people uh feedback about what they think
you think you have to tell every app to
do that you'll just ask the AI your AI
system by the way to do that you know
what I'm also finding is that we can
start of make our own personalized apps
with this new technology not necessarily
in like a graphic musical interface form
but I'll tell you one thing I did so we
had a show recently with Yan Hari who
wrote about OIC and basically his big
thing is that if you eat processed food
you're going to be hungry a lot if you
eat Whole Foods you won't and OIC mimics
the Whole Foods diet because it will
just make sure that you feel sa satiated
I'm going something more with this I
promise I took Claude and said which is
anthrop spot and said I'm going to share
every meal that I'm meeting with you and
I want you to give me some feedback on
whether it fits a Whole Food's diet and
then just rate it at a whole food score
one of 10 now what I just did is made a
personalized you know Diet app
effectively in in Claud but it's it's
just for me and I don't think this is
something that like I would
commercialize or mass-produce but that's
I think one of the powers that these
these models and Bots give us is we can
start to program them with natural
language and then have them do our
bidding and with multimodal it's amazing
because I'm literally sending it photos
of labels it ingests the labels it reads
the ingredients and spits out text right
based on how I did that stuff is Amazing
by the way not with voice not with voice
that's right because everything imagery
text video audio Yeah I could imagine
though like um taking a look at
something let's say I have like The Meta
Ray bands on which have the camera and
just being like well should I eat this
for lunch and then based off of whatever
I've programmed it it says yeah that
that that that slice of pizza is pretty
processed you know maybe maybe cook some
rice what's important though you better
make sure that privacy is part of that
because oh you just ate this I'm going
to send you an ad for that oh yeah so
more and more this your vision what you
just said is not only possible but
likely unless people have access to your
information and start sending you ads
Every Which one yeah I mean especially
could you imagine it's the processed
food companies and they're like hey have
a slice of pizza or cheeseburger and I'm
like buy eat something in a package I
haven't trying so hard with my bot
anyway I'm way off to schedul it so um a
couple time for a couple more questions
so we've talked a lot about AI let's go
a little broader uh what are some areas
for promising uh startups today like if
I was going to start a startup where
might I look Saku what do you think yeah
I mean uh El NOA focuses on AI and
healthare at Quint and it's not po
incidence we are po Healthcare at Quint
we believe that that industry is gonna
only grow and Norman when you're
thinking of investing or building where
do you look
well I'm thinking of AI as it exists
today as the very first
wave and in that first wave we're going
to see transformation of virtually every
industry healthc care uh um by
biotech uh real estate you name it law
every industry is going to have either
knowledge that's provided people or
co-pilots that function with those
people to perform those Services the
next wave of of innovation in AI is
going to say hey folks what and for
these large language models in the
generative AI what's special about
words okay well words aren't all that
special you could have a series of
motions or actions and all of a sudden
robotics could be a next great
Revolution what's special about and if
you look at your brain waves I'm working
with a spin out out of uh Google on this
go next sense what are we learning by
reading brain wavs from an airpod likee
device that says whether or not you're
going to have a seizure or even more
generally whether you're depressed or
whatever so those aren't words they're
brain waves so you we're going to start
seeing Generations Beyond text and
language going into other new
breakthroughs and we're going to see the
same impact in those waves pretty cool
so that sets up my final question so
perfectly I want to hear from both of
you what you think the world looks like
in five 10 and 15 years I start with
your s that's a great question so in
short term five years I think I think we
going to just see more of a a uh
incremental Improvement of our lifestyle
so whatever we are doing today whether
we overlay AI or cble that it's going to
get better easier more conv be 10 15
years I think you will have a very
different uh world uh because as Mor
said maybe at that point robotics the
physical world now it be very different
because AI right now is just software
right but now as soon as it is applied
to physical movement World which by the
way takes a lot longer and just changing
it in the Cod uh but 10 years 15 years I
think will happen so then all the Sci-Fi
movies if you're seeing uh hopefully
maybe robots helping us at home
obious wow okay so I agree and right now
we're we're uh harvesting the
consequences of a remarkable
breakthrough in AI you know so y that
really was and I'm usually skeptical of
these things but this breakthrough with
generative AI large language well
Transformers is real what's wrong with
it of course is that it's also
um knowledge in the in The Ether rather
than fact or truth it can hallucinate it
can provide incorrect information so
we're seeing the breaks we just talked
about in every industry but really
co-piloting or helping humans five years
from now we will first of all see major
industries that have formed in each of
these Market verticals that are
dominating those verticals
and we'll also have seen some incredible
new science come out biotech with cancer
treatments and uh discovery of how to
treat these cancers in ways that humans
couldn't even
perceive after five years if was right
there's going to be robotics using this
new AI capability that uses instead of
words it uses the Motions of devices and
things like that to be able to do that
so we're going to see and then we're
going to see the Collision of all these
new
technologies together one impacting the
other okay
so everything's going to change in BIO
in health and
biotech hospitals Insurance compan you
name it the whole world of of providers
and and payers in in health are going to
change the whole world of Robotics is
going to be open the devices that can
help people and I know you say keep this
short so I'll say five years from now
we'll start seeing the rewards of what
we just saw 10 years we're going to see
breakthroughs in robotics in biotech all
those areas 15 years I don't know we're
going to be in a in a world that is
either remarkably successful in all we
do or we'll be in the Stone Age one or
the
other it is amazing how like the power
of this technology it's either Bust or
just unbelievable abundance everywhere
it's it's crazy yeah yeah yeah we're
trying to make it a undo success he said
yes yes Baku Norman so great to see you
thank you again for making the time s
with us here and uh great event been
enjoying LG's Nest LG Nova's Nest Sak
was putting it on and uh thanks
everybody for watching thank you LG Nova
for sponsoring this video and we'll see
you back on the feed soon all right
until next time