Google CEO Sundar Pichai Urges Embracing AI at Paris Summit, Highlighting Its Transformative Potential

'It was Uncomfortable to Watch My Kids Learn Math on Smartphones, but They Turned Out Fine,' says Google CEO

Sundar Pichai urged people to embrace AI and move beyond the scepticism. At the AI Action Summit 2025 hosted in Paris, France, Google CEO Sundar Pichai spoke about how AI can influence various sectors such as education, healthcare, science, etc. and why the company invests as much in the industry. While Google has taken multiple opportunities to showcase how the company plans to use AI to benefit humanity, Pichai's recent talk included several personal anecdotes as he urged the world to embrace AI and address issues related to public policy. He took the stage to help ease the scepticism associated with AI and spoke about how policies must be framed with a balanced approach. "I grew up doing math using logarithmic tables, and I was uncomfortable watching my kids learn math with smartphones. They've turned out just fine," he added. Pichai began his talk by sharing his experiences while growing up in Chennai. He shared how he had to wait five years before his family acquired a rotary phone, which changed their lives. Moreover, he revealed once he had to take a "four-hour round trip" to get blood test results for his mother, but, now, all he needed to do was just pick up the phone. Citing similar examples, Pichai highlighted the power of transformative technologies. "We're still in the early days, yet I already believe AI will be the most profound shift of our lifetimes," he said. Pichai added that to unlock the full potential of AI, an ecosystem of innovators must be enabled, and a powerful infrastructure must be built. "We're excited for the path [US] President [Donald] Trump, [French] President [Emmanuel] Macron and other countries are forging here," he said. Pichai highlighted the need for industries to invest in people and prepare them for the workforce ahead. He believes people will have to act boldly to advance the applications of AI responsibly. Along these lines, Pichai outlined a framework for a successful AI public policy. This policy must address the risks associated with the technology without affecting progress. He also suggested that policies must fill gaps and draw on existing laws instead of creating new ones. However, the AI race is not limited to the United States. China made a bold entry recently, France is showing promise with Mistral, and India is actively working on a foundational model. Hence, Pichai suggested that policies must be aligned across countries. "AI can't flourish if there is a fragmented regulatory environment, with different rules across different countries and regions," he said. According to him, AI is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to improve lives. "We must not let our own bias for the present get in the way of the future." Taking the stage at the summit, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said that AI is writing the code for humanity. PM Modi said AI is developing at an unprecedented scale and speed, and being adapted and deployed even faster. He stressed the need for collective global efforts to establish governance and standards. "Governance is not just about managing risk and rivalries, it is also about promoting innovation and deploying it for the global good. So we must think deeply and discuss openly about innovation and governance," he said, echoing Pichai's sentiment. Aligning with Pichai's expectations, Macron said that Europe is planning to reduce AI regulations. As per Reuters, European Union's digital chief Henna Virkkunen promised to simplify rules and implement them in a business-friendly way. With regards to AI infrastructure in France, Macron announced plans for €109 billion of private AI investment, analogous to The Stargate Project in the US. The recent few events have been a ray of hope for Europe and its relatively restricted tech ecosystem. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, announced that the company is opening a new office in Munich, Germany. This is in addition to their previous offices in Dublin, London, Paris and Brussels. Furthermore, Mistral announced plans to invest "several billion euros" in building its first data centre in France. The AI startup also recently announced a new application called Le Chat, which it claimed is the fastest AI assistant capable of producing over 1,000 tokens per second. The chatbot is powered by Cerebras Inference, which is also touted as the world's fastest AI inference engine.

Google's Sundar Pichai at France AI Summit: 'AI rewiring technology, accelerating human ingenuity'

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told attendees of the AI Action Summit in Paris on Monday that the technology heralded a "golden age of innovation" and that "the biggest risk was missing out." At an event where countries and industry have focused more on deploying AI than on reining it in, Pichai called for ecosystems of AI innovation and adoption like one he said was growing in France.

The AI Action Summit: A golden age of innovation

Editor's note: Today, Google CEO Sundar Pichai spoke in Paris, France at the AI Action Summit. What follows is a transcript of the remarks, as prepared for delivery. Distinguished leaders, everyone: I'm excited to be here with you all today. President Macron, thank you for the invitation and for gathering such an esteemed group here. AI is a once in a lifetime technology. And conversations like these, ones focused on collaboration and concrete action, will move this work forward. As today's sessions come to a close, I want to share some examples of why I'm so optimistic about AI and its applications -- and the opportunity we have to benefit everyone, everywhere. Improving lives through technology is personal for me. I grew up in Chennai, India. Each new technology took a while to arrive at our doorstep. That included the rotary phone. We were on a five-year wait list. And when it finally came, the phone changed our lives. Before I would need to take a four hour round trip to get blood test results for my mother. And sometimes I would go all the way to the hospital and they would say, "No, it's not ready. Come back tomorrow." Now, we only had to pick up the phone. I saw the positive impact technology could have to make things better. It set me on a course that would bring me to the U.S., and eventually to a growing start-up called Google. I couldn't have imagined then that one day I would toast three Google colleagues their Nobel Prizes, or take my parents for a ride in a driverless car, all within a couple of weeks. And all because of another technology: AI. We're still in the early days, yet I already believe AI will be the most profound shift of our lifetimes. Bigger than the shift to personal computing, or to mobile. And it will do more to democratize access to information than the internet. In 18 months, the cost to process one token -- or the building blocks used for processing information -- has come down 97% for developers. So what used to cost four dollars per million tokens now costs just 13 cents, and I expect this trend to continue. The result: intelligence is more available and accessible than ever before. So, this moment has the characteristics of a platform shift. But what makes it so profound? A couple of things: As AI interactions come to feel more intuitive and human -- they put us at the center of the experience. Technology begins to feel like a natural extension, augmenting human capability, bridging gaps in expertise and experience, and breaking down barriers like language and accessibility. As a truly general purpose technology, AI is applicable across many different human endeavors and all parts of the economy -- every company, every sector will use this technology in their own ways, including the public sector. As it continues to improve, it will spur innovation, opportunity and growth in economies around the world, and drive an explosion in knowledge, learning, creativity, and productivity that will shape the future in exciting ways. The opportunity with AI is as big as it gets. And it will be up to the people in this room to make sure that as many people as possible benefit.

Biggest Risk in A.I. Is 'Missing Out,' Says Google CEO Sundar Pichai

Existential fears shouldn't get in the way of unlocking the A.I.'s full potential, the Google CEO said. The rise of A.I. brings existential challenges, from job losses to misinformation and misuse. But for Google (GOOGL) CEO Sundar Pichai, the greatest risk is letting fear block its potential. "The biggest risk could be missing out," he said at the AI Action Summit in Paris yesterday (Feb. 10). Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter Sign Up Thank you for signing up! By clicking submit, you agree to our <a href="http://observermedia.com/terms">terms of service</a> and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime. See all of our newsletters Pichai acknowledged that it isn't unusual to be wary about emerging technologies. "Every generation worries that the new technology will change the lives of the next generation for the worse -- and yet it's almost always the opposite," the CEO said, recalling how he was initially uncomfortable when his children began using smartphones instead of logarithmic tables to learn math. "We must not let our own bias for the present get in the way of the future," he added. Google has long been a leader in A.I. Its DeepMind unit, for example, is the team behind AlphaGo, the A.I. system that shocked the world in 2016 by beating Go champion Lee Seedol in a five-game match. And two years later, it was a group of Google researchers that made revolutionized A.I. with "Attention is All You Need," a paper introducing transformer-based models. Pichai noted that Google's A.I. papers have been cited three times more than any other company or educational institution. Pichai first joined Google in 2004, six years after its initial founding. "I couldn't have imagined then that one day I would toast three Google colleagues their Nobel Prizes, or take my parents for a ride in a driverless car, all within a couple of weeks and all because of another technology," he said. In October, Google DeepMind's Demis Hassabis and John Jumper received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, while former Google researcher Geoffrey Hinton was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics -- all thanks to their achievements in A.I. The Alphabet (GOOGL)-owned Waymo, meanwhile, made more than four million autonomous passenger drives last year. What's next for Google? The company's future A.I. endeavors include delving further into "deep research," a feature Google began releasing at the end of 2024 that autonomously searches the web and compiles information for users. "You could ask a deep research agent, 'Where in Europe should I vacation for two weeks in August?' Five minutes later, you have a full analysis considering factors like affordability, weather, visa requirements and more -- all with sources cited," said Pichai. Earlier this month, Google unveiled plans to spend an estimated $75 billion on A.I. investments this year. Combined with commitments from other major tech companies, A.I. leaders in Silicon Valley are expected to earmark $300 billion in capital expenditures for 2025. Pichai also called for action to ensure that the world's digital divide doesn't cause A.I.'s capabilities to only benefit those with access to technology. He pointed to his childhood in Chennai, India, where new technologies like the rotary phone took years to arrive -- but had major, life-changing impacts when they eventually did. "I think about how fortunate I was to have access to technology, even if it came slowly. Not everyone had that chance," he said. "With A.I., we have the chance to democratize access from the start."