Editor’s Note: This article is a reprint. It was initially revealed January 5, 2019.
Kai-Fu Lee, Ph.D., a number one professional on synthetic intelligence (AI), a enterprise capitalist and writer of “AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order,” has spent many years working for tech giants reminiscent of Apple, Microsoft and Google, each in China and Silicon Valley. He acquired his Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University, one of the prestigious AI establishments within the U.S., if not the world.
His skilled achievements got here at a worth, nonetheless. In 2013, Lee got here down with Stage 4 lymphoma. While the main focus of this interview is the influence of AI, his well being journey is an fascinating testimony to what can occur in the event you work too arduous.
“I’ve been a workaholic mainly my entire life, till my sickness,” Lee says. “Workaholic to such an extent that after I was the president of Google China, I’d work 100-hour weeks. Not solely that, I’d mechanically get up twice an evening to reply my emails, as I needed to speak to the individuals at headquarters with the time zone distinction.
But, I feel, inside me, I additionally wished to set an instance in order that my workforce thinks that [since] I work actually arduous, they’d too. Once, I acquired a surgical procedure and I had a particular pc made so I may work whereas mendacity in mattress, recovering from my surgical procedure …
Obviously, we do not actually know what the explanations are, however I used to be recognized with Stage 4 lymphoma. When I came upon, it actually modified my entire life. First, there’s the traditional stage of denial, ‘Why me?’ And then lastly, acceptance.
Once I accepted, I began trying again on my life and realized, first, that my life-style most likely led to this sickness … Lack of sleep, an excessive amount of stress, not consuming healthily … But extra importantly, I noticed that … I used to be singularly centered on my work and accomplishments, and actually missed all the opposite issues that have been extra essential.
When I noticed I’ll solely have just a few hundred days to reside, working arduous didn’t imply something to me. What was essential was giving love again to the individuals I like, spending time with them and, in fact, regretting that I haven’t lived that method.”
Regrets of the Dying
During his sickness, he learn Bronnie Ware’s e-book, “The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing.” As a nurse, she was current over the past days of some 2,000 individuals. Before they died, she would ask them about their regrets. One of the highest regrets was working too arduous.
The No. 1 remorse was not spending extra time with the individuals they beloved. Another essential remorse was not doing issues they felt actually enthusiastic about, listening to and following as an alternative the expectations of others. “That modified my outlook,” Lee says, who’s now in remission and has modified his priorities in life.
When requested what drives this unbelievable work ethic in China — particularly within the startup surroundings — Lee explains:
“Many younger Chinese entrepreneurs, their households have been poor for 10 or 20 generations. They’re an solely youngster. Their two mother and father and their grandparents have solely this one youngster or grandchild to look ahead to, to bettering the lives of the whole household. The strain is on and the expectations are excessive.
Usually, they acquired into good faculties, so even larger expectations. They gave up high-salary jobs to do that dangerous startup … To provide you with an instance, there’s one startup that advertises an excellent work-life steadiness.
‘Join us and also you don’t should work as arduous as your present startup, as a result of we solely work 9-9-6.’ What meaning is 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days per week. In many startups, it’s extra like 10-12-7. That is 10 a.m. to midnight, seven days per week …
There’s not even a lunch or a dinner break. You see individuals consuming in entrance of their computer systems. This is 14 hours a day, seven days per week. It’s about 100 hours. It is actually crazed like that.”
Sinovation Ventures
Lee’s e-book, “AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order,” helps us perceive the potential implications of AI, which is clearly one of many hottest matters within the tech world. Most main companies are investing closely on this expertise.
His personal enterprise capital agency, Sinovation Ventures, which began about 10 years in the past, has since funded 15 so-called “unicorns” — corporations which have grown in worth to over $1 billion.
“Our funds are among the many best-performing. One of the explanations there are such a lot of unicorns is our information about expertise and AI. My personal AI Ph.D. and my companions’ technical backgrounds allowed us to essentially select the most effective technical entrepreneurs after which assist them with the enterprise aspect.
I imply we invested in these corporations after they have been $10 million to $30 million in valuation. Now, they’re $1 billion to $15 billion. Our investments made anyplace between 50 to 100 occasions for these 15 corporations. Obviously, there are different corporations that failed.
But even contemplating that, simply these corporations have made us very, very well-performing. Five of those corporations are core AI corporations. The different 10 are non-AI corporations, however they used AI, so we have been in a position to observe the facility of AI and the way it was reworking all types of usages and purposes,” Lee says.
Lee’s Professional History
Prior to Sinovation Ventures, Lee was one of many main AI researchers on the earth, and was liable for establishing Google China. His Ph.D. thesis was one of many earliest on speech recognition and machine studying.
After his Ph.D., he led the AI, graphics and multimedia teams at Apple earlier than shifting on to Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI), adopted by Microsoft, the place he was put answerable for beginning Microsoft’s analysis lab in China, the place about 5,000 individuals have obtained AI coaching.
“Basically, the chief expertise officers (CTOs) of all the highest Chinese corporations, possibly 70% have been skilled by us in Microsoft Research,” he says. After that, he labored with Bill Gates in headquarters for 5 years earlier than being employed to ascertain Google China.
“I discovered that lots of my smartest individuals have been leaving Google China to begin their very own corporations. I felt the entrepreneurial spirit was going to be phenomenal, and I wished to affix that,” Lee says.
“So, I left in 2009, after which, sadly, Google additionally determined to tug out. That was my profession historical past. For the previous 9 to 10 years, I’ve been doing investments in China, primarily in AI and applied sciences.”
China’s Technological Advantage
In some ways — notably on the subject of implementation — the Chinese are head and neck forward of Silicon Valley. For instance, WeChat has the performance of Facebook, iMessage, Uber, Expedia, Evite, Instagram, Skype, PayPal, Grubhub, Amazon, LimeBike and WebMD, multi functional smartphone app. About 75% of Lee’s personal cellphone utilization is completed by means of WeChat.
“I’m on every thing. I’m on Facebook. I’m on Twitter. I take advantage of Google. I take advantage of YouTube and different Chinese apps. This is 75% for me. That means a few issues. First, that the Chinese corporations, specifically Tencent, which construct WeChat, constructed an unbelievable platform that … accumulates an amazing quantity of consumer knowledge.
If you assume Facebook has lots of your knowledge, WeChat has much more. But it is not all their knowledge. They associate with individuals. They associate with the meals supply, the bike rental, the Uber of China and different corporations. And additionally, individuals in China use the cell phone to pay. There’s nearly no money in China anymore.
People simply pay with WeChat or Alipay. Those are the 2 selections. If you go to a farmers market, a comfort retailer and even the seller on the street, they’d be holding up an indication that claims, “Scan me,” not, “Give me cash.” Scan is the best way wherein you employ your cellular app, WeChat, to pay.”
AI is an extremely highly effective algorithm that thrives on knowledge. Data is to AI what gasoline is to vehicles. As defined by Lee, the AI works in a different way from the human mind. It merely seems to be at large quantities of knowledge, for instance, buy patterns on Amazon, which permits it to be taught your preferences, after which offer you extra issues that match your buy patterns.
The identical factor goes for patterns of what you learn on-line or like on Facebook. AI additionally works with knowledge streams from audio and video, and makes use of facial and speech recognition. All this knowledge will finally result in the creation of autonomous robots and autos, Lee says.
“All this stuff apply to web, enterprise, together with banking, insurance coverage, schooling, retail, manufacturing and well being care drugs, in addition to robotics and autonomous autos.
All these AI purposes will come out within the subsequent 5 to fifteen years. The web ones are already out, however the different ones are coming quickly. China’s benefit is having that ocean of knowledge. In the age of AI, knowledge is the brand new oil, and China is the brand new Saudi Arabia. That is China’s benefit.
Now, by way of analysis, core analysis competence, U.S. continues to be a lot stronger. Maybe 10 occasions stronger. But the lecturers typically publish papers and transfer on. Entrepreneurs in China, the U.S. and anyplace can use that. Usually, it is open-sourced, with out web protocol (IP) safety or patents, as a result of college professors simply wish to write papers …
[But] China is best at taking all this knowledge and dealing 100 hours per week to monetize the information to create purposes … that leverage the AI to construct the purposes that change the banking, insurance coverage and finally the medical trade.”
China Leads Mobile Payments Trend
The cellular cost knowledge is extremely essential, Lee says. Few Chinese carry money and even bank cards anymore. Most transactions, each on-line and offline, are made by cell phone. The whole transaction quantity for 2017 was $17 trillion, which is larger than China’s complete gross home product.
There are about 800 million Chinese on the web, and of these, about 600 million use cellular cost by means of WeChat Pay or Alipay. In WeChat pay, you may pay anybody, not simply retailers, and there are not any surcharges or commissions of any form. Lee explains the implications of this monetary knowledge:
“This is the highest-quality knowledge ever. If you consider, to illustrate, a health care provider’s prognosis of a affected person; effectively, the physician may have made a mistake. If you consider a mortgage officer’s resolution to make a mortgage, the mortgage officer might have made a mistake.
You take into consideration you’re searching a web page on Amazon, possibly you don’t have any actual curiosity within the product, it was just-for-fun searching. But in the event you pay for one thing, that may be a particular transaction, and that carries lots of worth. Of this kind of knowledge, Chinese corporations have 50 occasions greater than the U.S.
Technologies [are] constructed on prime of this knowledge, reminiscent of focused loans that you would be able to borrow cash immediately, reminiscent of insurance coverage coverage design primarily based in your utilization, reminiscent of suggestions on how you must make investments your cash, and so forth and so forth.
And additionally, completely on-line banking and monetary transactions. Once you pay on-line, you may as effectively save on-line. You may as effectively make investments on-line. You may as effectively purchase insurance coverage on-line.
It’s making a complete disruption over a time frame for all issues monetary, as a result of as soon as it is cashless and merely digital transactions, then every thing goes digital. Then everyone has knowledge, after which everyone has AI. This is what propels China ahead with the AI purposes. U.S. leads in analysis, however China actually leads in software.”
The Future of Autonomous Vehicles
One space the place the U.S. is within the lead is in autonomous autos. However, the query is whether or not America will keep forward on the subject of implementation. The Chinese authorities is already constructing infrastructure that may enable Chinese corporations to launch autonomous autos quicker.
“For instance, highways that can speak to the vehicles, cities which have new roads paved, two ranges of downtown, one stage for people to stroll, one stage for vehicles to keep away from hitting individuals,” Lee says.
“China is watching [reports of autonomous vehicle] incidents and saying, ‘Well, our companies are behind. Why don’t we construct roads that can facilitate corporations to get their product going, regardless that they’re not so good as the American counterparts? But we make it safer by shifting away the pedestrians.’
Now, it should value tens or a whole bunch of billions of {dollars} to redo a two-layered downtown for nonetheless many cities that strive it, however that is the form of effort the Chinese authorities is doing … The authorities is giving encouragement and constructing infrastructure and subsidies to assist China turn out to be a pacesetter on the earth of AI.”
Setting Priorities
While Lee nonetheless admits to working about 60 hours per week, he’s reprioritized plenty of areas of his life, inserting emphasis on household time, stress reduction, sleep and a nutritious diet.
“It does not imply I do not work arduous. But it is a matter of placing issues first. It’s not a matter of lowering my work hours and giving it to my household. Family do not simply need hours. They wish to see that you just genuinely care. When my daughters have their trip, I take my trip to match theirs, not the opposite method round.
My spouse travels with me wherever we go. When she travels with me and doesn’t have one thing to do, I come again at 2 or 3 within the afternoon and take her someplace.
This is among the good issues about being a enterprise capitalist and having my very own firm — I have to put in some hours, however I can put it in each time I need. It’s not a 9-to-5 job. I can mainly put my household’s wants first, after which the work later …”
After his lymphoma prognosis, Lee hung out with an excellent Buddhist monk who warned him about being hooked on fame and riches.
“He stated, ‘You don’t be concerned about AI turning into people, however I fear about people turning into machines.’ He stated, ‘What you actually ought to do is consider what issues to the world. Give love again. Give information again. Give knowledge again. You’re at an age the place you do not have to show something anymore,'” Lee says.
The Implications of AI for Education and Career Choices
The motive he provides for writing his e-book is to tell individuals about coming adjustments to allow them to make wiser selections by way of schooling and profession constructing, as jobs will inevitably be misplaced as AI begins beating human efficiency.
While AI can improve and work symbiotically with plenty of professions, reminiscent of attorneys, medical doctors, authorities officers, CEOs and scientists, jobs reminiscent of telemarketing, mortgage officers, customer support, fruit and berry pickers, dishwashers, drivers and meeting line inspectors will all finally turn out to be a factor of the previous.
“I feel it is essential for individuals to know, to begin shifting out of their routine jobs and for companies to comprehend that they’ve a accountability to handle their individuals, even when they plan to make use of AI to displace them,” Lee says. “For schooling, mother and father should know that you do not educate your youngsters to go after routine jobs.
What is a routine job? I feel most physician jobs are clearly nonroutine, however some massive elements of some physician jobs are routine [such as] radiology and pathology. Not right this moment, however in 15 years, AI would do the prognosis and studying a part of their job, which is a considerable portion.
I feel mother and father want to know. People going to medical college ought to take into consideration, ‘What is essentially the most sustainable medical job?’ Probably in analysis, and ‘What are the least sustainable?’ Probably radiology and pathology. These are essential messages for individuals …
The content material I actually wish to get throughout is we, as employers, mother and father, individuals who run corporations, staff, actually should plan for ourselves in gentle of AI coming over to take over anyplace between 30 to 50% of the roles within the subsequent 15 to 25 years.”
More Information
To be taught extra about AI and what its software means for the longer term, be sure you decide up a duplicate of Lee’s e-book, “AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order.” It’s an interesting learn.
“I feel the details actually are that China and U.S. are the 2 large AI engines that can create this expertise revolution that’s corresponding to the economic revolution, however most likely even quicker as a result of it would not require {an electrical} grid to be constructed,” Lee says.
“AI is working right this moment. It, runs as software program. That AI can create large quantities of wealth for humanity, and scale back poverty and starvation. But on the identical time, AI additionally has lots of points, together with privateness, safety, wealth, inequality and job displacements. My e-book is a abstract of all the above.”