2025-12-29
The Quiet Shift in the AI Conversation
Compute & inference are powered by energy. Around minute ~35 of 20VC conversation, the AI discussion quietly shifts to clean energy. That shift matters.
Compute & inference are powered by energy. Around minute ~35 of 20VC conversation, the AI discussion quietly shifts to clean energy. That shift matters.
1️⃣ Who would win the AI race? Ultra-efficient chips under tight energy constraints, or less-efficient chips paired with abundant power? Translation: An interesting and solvable dilemma. Humans are unlikely to accept energy as a permanent binding constraint—and increasingly, we don’t have to. Clean energy is ready and deployable.
2️⃣ How could AI create labor shortage instead of gloom and doom? · Goods & services get cheaper · Some people work less by choice · New industries and jobs show up Translation: Labor would go through a transition, not a complete collapse. But with billions of people in the labor force around the world, the labor transition won’t be smooth or evenly distributed.
3️⃣ Vertically integration...Why keep trying? It's brutally hard to fully integrate: chips, software, infrastructure, power. But let's keep watching - companies will keep trying. Translation: Integration reduces counterparty risk and supply chain shocks. But it increases execution risk and financial risk. Clean energy is a good reminder of how capital-intensive and execution-heavy “fully integrated” really is.
When energy becomes the binding constraint, clarity in what we build - and why - matters more than ever.
Link to the full conversation between Jonathan Ross (Founder & CEO of Groq, and today Chief Software Architect at Nvidia) and Harry Stebbings (20VC): https://lnkd.in/gPTSnjvp
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