Artificial intelligence's rise has already transformed personal lifestyles and business functions, but tech leaders predict the trend is just beginning.
As AI research continues and quantum computing moves toward the mainstream, leaders from IBM, Qualcomm and responsible AI nonprofit Humane Intelligence believe revolutionary industry shifts will occur at a breakneck pace.
The team at the University of Cincinnati's 1819 Innovation Hub attended South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, to gain insights into the future of tech. Southwest Ohio is establishing itself as the Center for the Silicon Heartland, leading the region's top innovators to travel from the Cincinnati Innovation District to Texas to gain the following insights into AI and quantum computing.
IBM's chairman and CEO, Arvind Krishna, has piloted the company as it transforms into a global leader in enterprise AI. He describes IBM's current purpose as "the glue that holds hybrid cloud or multiple cloud-based companies together."
Enterprise AI lets IBM quickly crawl information across various clouds to help businesses find pertinent data. So, the company's journey into enterprise AI has given Krishna insights into AI's status today and which areas it could soon transform.
One exciting opportunity that Krishna predicts is an explosion of creativity due to AI's automation of tedious tasks. Instead of navigating rudimentary workflows before reaching truly creative work, Krishna foresees artists and musicians finding the time and space to create works that previously seemed impossible. AI could allow creatives to devote more time to their passion: being creative.
Although AI is already enhancing productivity across nearly every industry, the technology itself is still far from being truly efficient. A Scientific American article from March 2025 reveals that "Text-generating systems can easily use 10 times as much energy to address a query" as standard Google searches, "and sometimes they use dozens of times more." Krishna predicts that due to rapid advances in quantum computing, AI's energy and water usage could be reduced by up to 99% within the next five years.
While it may not command the same spotlight as AI, quantum computing research is rapidly breaking boundaries behind the scenes.
Quantum computing considers many possible answers simultaneously and converges on the right one through a process known as interference. It works by using subatomic particles (smaller than an atom) known as qubits that can exist in various states at once. Unlike regular computer bits that are either 1 or 0, qubits can be both at the same time in a state known as superposition.
Cristiano Amon, the president and CEO of wireless communications tech firm Qualcomm, spoke at South by Southwest about AI's future as the next user interface (UI). Put simply, UI is where a user interacts with a digital application - an app, a website or even a smart assistant such as Siri or Alexa.
In Amon's view, personalized AI agents could replace current forms of UI in the next few years as intelligent computing becomes more widespread. Expect to see AI performing tasks such as sound isolation, planning out and booking vacations and tailoring your online shopping experience.
It's hard to match Rumman Chowdhury's responsible AI knowledge - she's served as an AI product leader at Accenture, a member of the Biden administration's Artificial Intelligence Safety and Security Board and an AI steering committee member for New York City.
Chowdhury currently serves as the co-founder and CEO of Humane Intelligence, a nonprofit dedicated to "giving people the tools and critical thinking to test AI models from their perspective and make a pipeline for companies to correct the issues they find." She believes a significant challenge for tech leaders today is creating AI products that perform effectively for the largest number of people.
Chowdhury envisions three key ways to make AI as responsive as possible to human needs:
- Increasing the number of AI tool providers: Ensuring that the future of AI is spread across various large and small businesses rather than concentrated in the hands of a few
- Developing accessible open-source AI models: Allowing industry entrants to work in open-source AI programs to innovate and shape the future of tech
- Crafting better methods of raising concerns to Big Tech: Developing a pathway for individuals to raise legitimate issues with large industry players
For the development of younger tech workers, Chowdhury emphasizes the value of open-source AI platforms. "Open source is used as the backbone of the tech industry," she says. "It's how so many people get into tech. It's what makes tech so accessible as an industry."
One additional suggestion was targeted toward young workers considering their paths in the tech sector: take the value gained at large firms - especially the need to think beyond simple products toward tech-based solutions to global issues - and later carry that expertise into the tech startup and nonprofit scenes.
Featured image at top: Futuristic city view. Photo/Nitsawan via Adobe Stock
