By Krish Ramineni, CEO and Co-founder, Fireflies.ai
AI is changing the world faster than we ever imagined.
Like the internet in the ’90s, AI is now part of everything—military, defence, healthcare, education, and commerce. A major driver behind this is the 99% drop in the cost of deploying AI over the past year. Tasks that used to be way too complex and expensive to automate are now fair game.
We’re standing on the edge of one of the most transformative periods in history, and the decisions we make now will shape the global order for decades to come.
Redefining possibilities with AI
In just two years, we’ve seen AI models like OpenAI’s GPT evolve at breakneck speed.
GPT-4 was a leap forward, with multimodal processing and faster performance, and within six months, GPT-4o was launched, which operates at twice the speed of its predecessor and integrates various input and output modalities.
This kind of relentless innovation is forcing businesses to adapt faster than ever.
Developers now rely on AI tools like GitHub Co-Pilot to code faster with fewer errors. At Fireflies.ai, we’re using AI to automate meeting notes, analyse conversations, and track action items—saving teams hours of manual work and keeping everything organised. Platforms like Midjourney are cranking out high-quality visuals in minutes and cutting time and costs drastically.
And the future we’re heading toward is one where a solo entrepreneur with AI agents can run a company as efficiently as a 500-person operation. AI will be able to manage customer service, drive operations, and even close deals.
In industries like healthcare, the advancements are just as massive. DeepMind’s AlphaFold has reduced drug development timelines from decades to weeks by cracking the code for predicting protein structures in minutes.
AI is also our frontline defense in cybersecurity, protecting critical infrastructure and enhancing military capabilities. Tools like IBM Watson and Microsoft Cyber Signals are identifying and preventing cyberattacks before they happen.
Countries know what’s at stake, and the race is on. The US, China, and other global powers have invested billions into AI. India and Saudi Arabia are racing to secure their edge.
Navigating the risks of AI
With all the opportunities, AI also brings some serious risks.
The democratisation of generative AI tools is a good thing, but there are also bad actors. For example, GenAI has made it easier to create and spread misinformation and false narratives online. These AI systems can create highly personalised content that mimics real human interactions. It is making phishing scams more convincing and harder to detect.
To fight these threats, we need AI to defend against AI. Today, we have models that can achieve security success rates between 80% and 92% and significantly outperform legacy systems.
AI’s ability to process large amounts of information makes compliance and auditing more efficient and automated. Looking ahead, AI could take it even further with self-configuring networks that detect vulnerabilities and fix them autonomously. We’ll have smarter threat detection capabilities that catch what humans and traditional tools might miss.
The question isn’t whether AI is good or evil. It is just a tool with enormous potential, and we need to ensure that it’s wielded responsibly while preparing for the challenges it will bring.
Looking ahead
AI is no longer some fringe tech you see in sci-fi movies—it’s real and already reshaping the world. In a few years, it will stand alongside electricity, the internet, and smartphones as one of the most transformative forces in history.
AI will be the driving force behind a new global order. The companies and countries that push the boundaries of AI will lead the future. For everyone else, the race might already be over.
