At the Rise of AI Summit 2020, held online with more than 1,500 registered viewers, Fabian Westerheide, CEO of Rise of AI and of Asgard Capital, reviews the last decade of AI and previews the next. He traces his own path from discovering Ray Kurzweil's ideas in 2014, founding Asgard Capital as an early AI-dedicated venture fund, and hosting small gatherings in a Berlin hacker space, through 2016, when AlphaGo's win over Lee Sedol made AI mainstream and pushed China to prioritize it, to 2017-2019, when AI became big business, then political as governments published national AI strategies. He argues that in 2020 AI is less about vision and more about execution, with growing ecosystems but a shortage of talent, and that the internet is fragmenting into distinct American, Chinese and European blocks with different data rules. Looking ahead, he expects AI regulation, explainability requirements and debates over taxing AI-generated value, alongside tension between digitalization and sustainability and a widening conflict over privacy versus safety. He closes by arguing that AI's purpose should be to help people live longer and happier, and answers audience questions on European competitiveness and superintelligence risk.
Key takeaways
- Westerheide founded Asgard Capital in 2014 as the first venture fund dedicated specifically to AI investing.
- He calls AlphaGo's 2016 win over Lee Sedol the turning point that made AI mainstream and spurred China's AI push.
- He predicts the internet will fragment into roughly three blocks, American, Chinese and European, each with distinct data rules.
- He estimates that as of 2020 only about 1 percent of AI's realistic application potential has actually been executed.
- He argues AI's purpose should be to help people live longer and happier lives, not to maximize profit alone.
Detailed notes
Origins: from Ray Kurzweil to Asgard Capital (2014-2016)
Westerheide recalls that in 2014 an interview with Ray Kurzweil convinced him that acceleration and technology were reshaping the future, leading him into futurism and science fiction. That year he gathered about ten people at the Berlin hacker space C-Base and, finding that capital was largely ignoring AI, launched Asgard Capital as the first venture fund dedicated to AI. In 2015 the event, themed 'the singularity is close,' drew mostly engineers, visionaries and researchers to discuss radical ideas such as bio-narcissism and encryption of thoughts, with the core message that AI was coming. He calls 2016 the turning point: AlphaGo's win over Lee Sedol made AI visible to a mainstream audience, triggered heavy Chinese government interest in AI, and brought a wave of media attention.
AI becomes big business, then political (2017-2019)
Westerheide describes 2017-2019 as the period when AI became a major industry: the event grew into a full-day format, its audience shifted from researchers to business people, and a former Roland Berger CEO predicted the next trillion-dollar company would be an AI company. Activity became international, with corporate delegations and scholarship programs, and awareness campaigns emphasized opportunity. He says the hype then declined as AI became political: starting in 2018, countries including Japan, Singapore, China and the United States published national AI strategies, with Germany and Europe following late, and government involvement shifted the conversation toward regulation.
Where AI stands in 2020
Westerheide says the current phase is 'less dreaming, more work': AI has become an industry with stable ecosystems, clusters and institutes such as a new Tensor Institute, Cyber Valley and Berlin AI, but companies still lack talent, especially technical and sales roles. He notes that earlier fears of an Oxford study predicting 50 percent job losses to AI have faded, replaced by concern about needing more people to run AI systems. He predicts the internet is fragmenting into roughly three blocks, an open American model, a tightly controlled Chinese model, and a distinct European approach, each with its own data rules, alongside smaller unregulated players. He cites investment figures of roughly 130 billion in China (currency not specified in the talk), 2 billion plus 3 billion euros in Germany, and 20 billion euros from the European Union.
The next decade: regulation, taxation and sustainability
Looking ahead, Westerheide expects AI to become more political and bureaucratic, citing the European Union's AI strategy white paper and forthcoming Digital Services Act, and argues companies will need to clarify responsibilities, explain their models and expect AI-related insurance products. He raises taxation of AI-generated value as an emerging topic, comparing the much higher value generated per employee at a company like Facebook to that at a company like Siemens, and personally favors an export tax on data leaving Europe. He names 'digital and sustainable' as the two defining trends for 2030, noting a tension between AI's energy consumption and sustainability goals, alongside a talent bottleneck that requires more immigration into the field. He argues that companies optimizing purely for profit will lose to those focused on jobs, service and good products, citing Germany's Mittelstand as a model. He also expects growing conflict over privacy versus safety, pointing to social scoring and monitoring systems already active in China and Singapore and likely to reach Europe, and closes by stating that AI's purpose should be to help people live longer and happier lives.
Q&A highlights
Asked whether Europe and Germany remain competitive against Asia, Westerheide says he would have answered no two years ago but now sees hope, particularly in industrial, business-to-business applications, because European companies benefit from trust, local knowledge and regulatory advantages that make corporate clients prefer them over remote or foreign providers. Describing the scale of China's AI push, he cites purpose-built AI campuses in nearly every city, including a rebuilt medieval-style town near Shanghai offering ten years of tax exemption, and argues Europe's advantage lies in quality of life, while criticizing Europe's risk-averse capital allocation and calling for government-backed early-stage investment similar to DARPA in the United States. Asked about the current phase of AI adoption, he agrees the industry is in an extensive implementation phase but estimates only about 1 percent of AI's potential applications have actually been executed so far. On fears of superintelligence raised by figures such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, he says that discussion has faded and argues today's real AI risks are biased systems and flawed processes, not an imminent takeover. Asked about controlling AI, he points to a company that plans to speak the next day about using AI to monitor and find weaknesses in other AI systems. On AI ethics across regions, he predicts the emergence of distinct European and American AI products shaped by different cultural norms, for example around nudity and hate-speech moderation, and warns that personalization algorithms such as TikTok's risk trapping users in a 'perfect bubble' unless they deliberately seek out different content.
Quotes
AI is less streaming [likely: dreaming], it is more work. It became an industry, it became a real ecosystem.
Fabian Westerheide
Greed is not good. Especially companies will figure out that optimizing on income and profit will not work.
Fabian Westerheide
The purpose of AI should always be serving humans. AI is always there for two things: so we all live longer and happier thanks to AI.
Fabian Westerheide
Questions answered in this talk
Is Europe still competitive in AI compared to the US and China?
According to Fabian Westerheide at the Rise of AI Summit 2020, Europe was not competitive two years earlier but has gained ground, especially in industrial, business-to-business AI, where local knowledge, trust and regulatory strength give European companies an advantage over remote or foreign providers.
What does Fabian Westerheide say is the purpose of AI?
According to Fabian Westerheide at the Rise of AI Summit 2020, the purpose of AI should always be serving humans, specifically helping people live longer and happier lives.
How much of AI's potential had been realized as of 2020?
According to Fabian Westerheide at the Rise of AI Summit 2020, even though AI is in an extensive implementation phase, only about 1 percent of its realistic application potential had actually been executed at that point.