Jeff Bezos calls AI boom ‘industrial bubble’ with ‘immense’ societal benefit

Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder, warned on Friday that the massive investment surge into artificial intelligence (AI) is creating a “industrial bubble,” but he stressed that the underlying technology is real and will bring “immense” benefits to society.

Speaking at Italian Tech Week in Turin, Bezos compared the current excitement and speculative funding environment to previous tech booms, like the dot-com era and the bitcoin surge of the 1990s.

Bezos noted that the current AI market shows classic signs of a bubble, where valuations seem “disconnected from the fundamentals” of many businesses. He pointed to the huge sums of capital being given to very young companies, even those without a proven product.

This excitement, he explained, leads to a period where investors struggle to separate the good ideas from the bad.

However, Bezos made a key distinction between this “industrial bubble” and a purely financial one, such as the 2008 banking crisis, which he said society should avoid.

He argued that industrial bubbles can actually be beneficial because they lead to massive investment in infrastructure and innovation that benefits everyone in the long run. He cited the biotech bubble, which, despite many company failures, resulted in life-saving drugs.

The Amazon executive remains overwhelmingly optimistic about AI’s long-term impact, assuring attendees that even if a market correction happens, it would not take away from technology’s inherent values.

He firmly believes AI will transform virtually every industry and company in the world.