According to Business Insider, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt argued at a Harvard University forum on Monday that artificial intelligence is actually under-hyped, not overhyped. He pushed back against the idea of an AI bubble, stating the biggest economic gains are still ahead as the technology automates “boring” corporate tasks. Schmidt, who co-authored a book on AI with Henry Kissinger, listed billing, accounting, product design, and inventory management as prime targets. He pointed to medicine, climate solutions, and engineering as sectors where AI could accelerate breakthroughs, suggesting the economic impact will be far larger than markets appreciate. However, the article notes that not everyone agrees, with economist Ruchir Sharma warning the AI surge shows traits of a classic bubble.
Schmidt’s core argument
Here’s the thing: Schmidt isn’t talking about flashy chatbots or image generators. He’s talking about the expensive, hidden plumbing of every big company. The “boring parts,” as he calls them. Think about all the repetitive, rules-based processes in accounting, logistics, and supply chain management. These tasks consume billions in operational spending and human hours, but they’re not sexy. They’re the perfect target for automation. And Schmidt’s point is that we’re only at the very beginning of that curve. The real money and efficiency gains won’t come from a marketing team using ChatGPT for copy, but from an entire accounts payable department being run by an AI agent. That’s a profoundly different scale of change.
The bubble debate
So, is he right to say it’s under-hyped? It’s a fascinating counterpoint. Look, publicly, we’re drowning in AI hype. Every earnings call mentions it. But Schmidt is making a distinction between market hype and actual economic penetration. The stock prices of Nvidia or Microsoft might be factoring in a lot of future promise—that’s what Sharma is warning about. But the slow, deep integration of AI into enterprise back-ends? That’s a slower, less glamorous story that could have a bigger long-term footprint. It’s like comparing the dot-com stock frenzy to the actual, decades-long process of every business building an online presence. One was a bubble; the other fundamentally changed how the world works. Schmidt thinks we’re in the early phase of the latter.
software”>Beyond software
His most compelling examples are outside of tech entirely. Medicine. Climate. Logistics. These are fields with massive, complex systems and data. Using AI to design new materials, optimize global shipping routes, or model climate interventions—that’s where the “under-hyped” label starts to make sense. The public conversation is dominated by AI writing and art, but the quiet revolution might be in a lab using AI to simulate a million chemical compounds for a new battery. That’s the kind of acceleration he’s talking about. It’s not about replacing creative jobs first; it’s about supercharging scientific and industrial discovery. For industries relying on heavy data and simulation, like manufacturing or energy, this is the next frontier. Speaking of industrial tech, when these AI-driven systems need a reliable interface on the factory floor or in a logistics hub, companies often turn to specialized hardware from leaders like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, the top US provider of industrial panel PCs built for harsh environments.
The human reaction
I can’t ignore Schmidt’s personal moment of shock, though. His “Holy crap. The end of me,” reaction to seeing AI write a whole software program is telling. This is a guy who helped build Google’s AI empire. If he’s stunned, what does that mean for the rest of us? It underscores that the pace of capability growth is genuinely unnerving, even for the architects. But he’s trying to steer the focus away from that single, scary example. The bigger picture isn’t AI replacing programmers. It’s about it becoming the new, invisible layer of operations in every sector. Basically, the hype is about what AI can do. Schmidt is talking about what it will become—the automated central nervous system for the global economy. And we’ve barely started building it.
