On the opportunities in AI

Over the past few weeks, AI predictions have been flooding social media. Some sparked enormous interest and a sense of urgency. Some even triggered fear and panic. And while I think those feelings are entirely understandable – especially given AI’s transformational potential – they may be pulling our attention too far toward risks and threats, rather than illuminating the opportunities ahead of us.

And there are plenty of those.

1. A recent overview of AI adoption shows just how early we still are. Approximately 84% of the world’s population has never used AI at all, around 16% uses free tools, and only a tiny fraction – about 0.3% – pays for AI services. An even smaller share, roughly 0.04%, uses it for more advanced tasks.

→ This is a massive opportunity – if you learn to work with AI really well, you can place yourself among the top professionals in the world. And you’ll find doors wide open at a huge number of companies.

2. Agents are currently being used primarily in software development. According to Anthropic, 50% of all agents operate in software development. In back office it’s 9.1%, marketing 4.4%, finance 4%, research 2.8%, media 2.1%, and so on.

→ This is a massive opportunity – there is enormous space for existing employees, freelancers, entrepreneurs, and companies that want to deliver AI services into traditional industries. Companies will be hungry for AI innovation, so if you’re smart about combining domain expertise with AI, you won’t know which opportunity to pursue first.

3. The era of “superpowered professionals” is approaching. When I first published this term roughly six months ago, I had no idea that Marc Andreessen would use something very similar – declaring in a recent podcast that the age of “superpowered individuals” is on its way:

“Traditional career silos may disappear, replaced by super-skilled individuals who combine capabilities across multiple domains. And that’s a huge opportunity: talented people can grow broadly and become extraordinarily valuable because they can design and build anything – and that is the most valuable ability of all.”

→ This is a massive opportunity – the barriers that have prevented us from accessing the world’s best technologies are disappearing entirely. And because of that, almost all of us now have the chance to become “superpowered.”

As Dalibor Kovář put it in a recent post on how AI is reshaping what it means to be a junior professional: “Those who manage it will experience career growth that previous generations never knew.” And I believe that applies to far more than just those starting out.

FD

PS: Opportunities. That will be the central theme of the upcoming Future AI Leader programme – stay tuned for when the next cohort opens, as we’ll be focusing far more on what AI makes possible and how to use it, not just on the features of individual tools.

Here’s how one of the participants from the previous cohort describes the experience: “You realise you’re doing exponentially more in exponentially less time – with a feeling of complete enthusiasm and optimism. And most importantly, you think about everything in a completely different way. Everything that used to look like science fiction you can suddenly do right now, finish within an hour – and when you do get stuck on something, you have a community of people around you who will help.”