The opportunity behind the dark side of AI
#54 Angelinvesting.it - From idea to Series A - Weekly Newsletter
Dear reader,
I have recently stopped searching for information on Google. I have an application on my phone called Perplexity. You ask it a question and a chatbot powered by generative AI produces the perfect answer. It saves you the hassle of navigating links, it cites the sources. It puts everything in perfect English right before your eyes, it's magical.
Yet, every innovation comes with its set of challenges. Alex de Vries, a data scientist at the central bank of the Netherlands and a Ph.D. candidate specializing in the energy implications of emerging technologies, presents a thought-provoking scenario
"What would happen if you were to fully turn Google’s search engine into something like ChatGPT, and everyone used it that way—so you would have nine billion chatbot interactions instead of nine billion regular searches per day The energy use of Google would spike. Google would need as much power as Ireland just to run its search engine”
Through Perplexity I’ve also discovered that by 2027, worldwide AI-related electricity consumption could increase by 85 to 134 TWh annually, which would be comparable to the annual electricity needs of countries like the Netherlands
If you zoom out, AI in 2024 has 3 parameters to improve:
Energy consumption (human brain efficiency is the benchmark)
Accuracy of the answers (hallucinations for example)
Latency, how quickly the response is given.
Startups that are focusing on improving one of these 3 parameters are great opportunity for us angel investors right now.
Funding two founders with an idea of a technology that even marginally improves one of these aspects can turn out to be a home run investment. (or a write-off)
** To go deeper: Understand the AI wave
Have a great weekend,
Simone
—
Want to read more: click here
Want to invest with me: click here
Want to share a deck: click here