NEW YORK–The founder of a venture capital firm who is considered a top expert on technology in China is predicting that robots and artificial intelligence will combine to replace 50% of all jobs in the next decade—and he referenced lending as one example.
In addition, he suggested financial institutions are moving too slowly to realize the “treasure trove” of information they hold that other providers do not.
In an interview with CNBC, Kai-Fu Lee, founder of Sinovation Ventures, said that artificial intelligence (AI) is the wave of the future, calling it the "singular thing that will be larger than all of human tech revolutions added together, including electricity, [the] industrial revolution, Internet, mobile internet — because AI is pervasive."
"It is the decision engine that will replace people," Lee told CNBC, adding that AI capabilities far exceed those of humanity.
He noted, for instance, that companies in which his firm has invested can accomplish feats such as recognizing three-million faces at the same time, or dispersing loans in eight seconds.
"These are things that are superhuman, and we think this will be in every industry, will probably replace 50% of human jobs, create a huge amount of wealth for mankind and wipe out poverty," Lee said, later adding that he expected that displacement to occur in the next 10 years.
Lee previously headed Google China before founding his venture capital firm.
Lee further told CNBC that traditional companies like banks, insurance firms and hospitals, are moving to slow. And it's too bad, he added, because they "possess the biggest treasure" in the form of troves of data.
"Because AI is about taking data into insight and decision, so I anticipate [the] Internet sector, entrepreneurial sector, to continue to grow and in many cases, displace and even wipe out traditional companies in China," he told CNBC.