30s Summary

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff envisions the future of AI being led by autonomous agents, rather than chatbots. These AI systems can perform tasks independently, such as sending marketing emails or handling customer service inquiries. While Benioff cautioned against overhyping AI’s capabilities, he affirmed the potential of autonomous agents in improving profits and customer relationships. Notably, major companies such as OpenAI and Nvidia are already moving toward this direction, with plans to introduce their respective AI bots in the coming years.

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Marc Benioff, the big boss at Salesforce, thinks the next big thing in AI will be autonomous agents and not AI chatbots. Speaking on The Wall Street Journal’s “Future of Everything” podcast, he hinted that we’ve kind of hit peak chatbot and suggested everyone’s gotten a bit too carried away with it.

But instead of chatbots getting smarter and taking over the world, Benioff believes autonomous agents will lead the way. And when we say autonomous agents, we mean AI systems that can carry out jobs on their own, like firing off marketing emails or handling customer service inquiries. These bots could help businesses run a lot smoother–and who wouldn’t want that?

Already, Salesforce is on board this train, using pre-made AI bots for customer service automation. “We have awesome tools to help us do our jobs better, boost profits and sales, and build better relationships with our customers,” Benioff said.

But hang on a minute, he also warned us about getting too excited about what AI can do right now. He took a swipe at “AI evangelists” who promise the world, like curing cancer or saving the environment.

Benioff thinks overhyping AI is a big fat slap in the face to customers who could potentially increase their profits and improve customer relationships with the use of autonomous agents.

OpenAI, another big name in the field, is set to release its own bot, named Operator, in 2025. This bot will reportedly be able to do stuff like writing codes or making travel plans for you. Nvidia, the world’s largest company by market capitalization, is also jumping on the bandwagon. Its CEO announced during the company’s Q3 earnings call that they are seeing agentic AI being widely adopted already.