CEO, President & Chairman, IBM Common Stock
IBM CEO Arvind Krishna's Big Quantum Bet On India: 'Where Else Will You Get The Talent?'
IBM CEO Arvind Krishna is positioning India at the heart of the global quantum computing revolution. Krishna emphasizes that ...
About Arvind Krishna
Arvind Krishna, CEO, President, and Chairman of IBM, has recently discussed the company's progress toward achieving "quantum advantage" using its hardware by the end of 2026, stating that early signs of progress are visible through partners such as the Cleveland Clinic and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He described potential early applications for quantum computing in materials science, lubricants, EV batteries, and small molecule drugs, and said he believes the United States is ahead of China in quantum development by a couple of years, though he added that he is "paid to be paranoid" about the competition. Krishna also commented on a $1 billion investment from the Trump administration to build a quantum chip foundry in Albany, which he said would be open to all comers acceptable to the United States. On AI, Krishna argued that foundation models are becoming commodities and that many enterprises are not seeing clear ROI from deploying AI, advising companies to focus on using existing models more effectively rather than deploying more. He said IBM tripled its entry-level hiring in 2026 compared to 2025, reasoning that AI tools make new graduates more productive and allow the company to build capacity at a lower cost. He described the Trump administration's AI executive order as hitting a "Goldilocks spot" with light regulation and guardrails. Regarding workforce impact, Krishna stated that while some displacement is inevitable in areas like compliance and accounts payable, he expects net demand for jobs to increase. He also emphasized that taking no risk is the most risky strategy for a business.
Transcript (16 segments)
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Arvind Krishna0:00
This is completely wrong in the current AI economy that you're not going to need labor. You are going to need labor and that is one of the few places they can get enough of it with people who are motivated, who are hungry, who want to get work done. So, you take the political environment, the regulatory environment with the talent and you would begin to say is this not the same story as Japan went through in the 50s and 60s, that South Korea went through in the 70s and 80s, that Germany went through in the 50s and 60s. Why wouldn't you want to be part of that explosion and be able to participate in it? And the reason I picked those examples, every one of those became a member of the global ecosystem. It was not for internal only.
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Interviewer0:47
Arvind, you're nothing if not consistent because I remember on this stage a year ago you when everyone was talking about AI and job destruction, you actually painted a more optimistic picture partly because of the labor, partly because of the need for that. I'm curious that there a lot of folks who think of India and think of the services industry. With you have been a pioneer in talking about quantum. Can you tell us a little bit about what that will do for the US-India relationship and how you see that from a workforce perspective?
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Arvind Krishna1:24
Yeah. Look, it's early days on quantum. Let me acknowledge that. It's not far out into the future, but it's still early.
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Interviewer1:33
You said earlier when I heard you say it's a You said earlier, I thought you meant 10 years away. Then you said a year away.
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Arvind Krishna1:38
Two to three.
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Interviewer1:39
Two to three, okay.
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Arvind Krishna1:40
Two to three for massive commercial advantage. So, so why are we and Ambassador Quarter mentioned it, we have put in one quantum computer that is going to go into Amravati and that is a agreement with the state there and with the national government. We are talking about another one. I will leave that location unstated until it is done. The reason we are putting it there is where are you going to get enough talent who has knowledge of math and physics, who wants to work on translating the problems that we know can be done onto the unique mathematics that quantum computers can do. They will certainly leverage it for themselves, but they will also leverage it to then be able to take that problem set globally. That is the investments that we are making and we are committed to because the number of places in the world where you have enough of that deep math talent, but in this case it's not volume, it's quality and depth of talent. And the ability to think about these really hard problems and be able to then put them on these systems in ways that are going to be unique for at least the next decade. That is what we are trying to tap into, and when I talk into those people, I'll give you an example. There are these problems called prime number problems. Can you factorize these large numbers? And for 100 years people thought these were impossible. That's a problem because Prem mentioned one of the IITs. That is a problem that three people from one of the IITs actually solved about 15 years ago. We can tap those people to leverage these computers. I think it unpacks all kinds of possibilities.
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Interviewer3:35
So, Prem, I'm watching your face as you're listening to this.
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Co-Panelist3:38
Yeah, I was going to say I wasn't one of those IITs.
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Interviewer3:41
So, how do you as an investor, I mean, you know, you went to, you know, I'm not an IIT guy like this Raj and others and all you guys and, you know, these guys over here. You went to Canada, I went to rural Ohio for college, you know, so I was like I'm listening to this and I'm like, how are you as an investor thinking about, okay, how do I capitalize on this? How do I take advantage of this? How do I understand this?
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Co-Panelist4:06
So, here's the thinking of what Arvind said, simple. You've got Norway and you've got the state of Maharashtra, it's a big state in India. 500 GDP, GDP is 500 million billion. Norway, 500 billion. Norway's got 6 million people. Maharashtra's got 125 million people. Do you need to know anything more? 500, 6 million people and 125 million people. Right? So, I mean, like the opportunity is huge, like massive opportunity. Not if you're looking at it 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, but as Arvind was saying, if you look at it over time, massive opportunity.
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Interviewer4:53
Okay, so this is a very good optimistic person, but I spent 25 years in the professional cynicism business, so what's the downside? What does India need to avoid?
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Co-Panelist5:08
The big risk for India is Mr. Modi is the man. He's the guy who's got it going and you know, he's in great health and he should be there for at least the next complete the term and maybe another one. But you have to get someone. The fellow from Maharashtra is very good. He's not even 50. But you know, in a democracy, it's who comes after Mr. Modi, right?
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Interviewer5:38
Arvind, from where you sit?
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Arvind Krishna5:40
Look, we can debate democracy forever. And democracy has many ills around it. Certainly populism is one of them. And what is that famous phrase? While I'm not a political scientist, I've read enough of it. Democracy is terrible except all of the systems are much worse. So while I agree with Prem in that sense that you need somebody who's a good leader, I think if you unlock enough hunger in people, they will actually vote out bad leaders because now they have the appetite is wet. Can our quality of life get better? Can there be more economic opportunity for our children? And I think that is unlocked right now in India. And I do not see it switching away from democracy and I do not see them trying to fall backwards. So it has to get through a lot. I mean like we talk about the positives, there is certainly low-level corruption that should be removed. That's only a tailwind there, not a headwind. I think as you take and improve risk, what I think is perhaps the single biggest for me, there is very little appetite for risk capital. There's a little bit in the venture community and in some of the new companies, but if you unlock a little bit more risk capital, returns get better over time and you begin to get more of a economic opportunity. I think that's the next unlock to come.
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Narrator7:17
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