Carl Bass on AI Investment
From Carl Bass: CAD, Autodesk, Engineering Software and AI · · emosh
“I think the vast majority of money invested in AI will be lost, but you will get dozens of very valuable companies. Same thing during .com times. You know, a lot of companies came of age during the dot, you know, and our, you know, Fortune 100, if not Fortune 5 companies now. So, I think you'll have a lot of successes, but the majority of companies won't succeed.”
On , Carl Bass, Former President & Chief Executive Officer at Autodesk, spoke about AI Investment during Carl Bass: CAD, Autodesk, Engineering Software and AI on emosh.
About Carl Bass
In two recent podcast appearances, former Autodesk CEO Carl Bass discussed the company's history, his departure and return, and his views on current technology trends. He recounted Autodesk's founding, noting that the company's name stood for "automated desktop" and that early AutoCAD was initially considered only suitable for small buildings, though it was later used on the Freedom Tower. Bass described being fired by then-CEO Carol Bartz in the 1990s after telling her the company was "a messed up place," only to return three years later when Autodesk acquired his startup, Buzzsaw. He served as COO and later CEO until around 2016. Bass characterized the transition to subscription licensing as "not that much fun" during the change but said it became "financially very beneficial." Bass offered several strong opinions on current technology. He said he believes "there is no reason" for 2D drawings in 2026 and that those who still use them "should be shot in the head." He stated that "the vast majority of money invested in AI will be lost" but predicted it will produce "dozens of very valuable companies," comparing the situation to the dot-com boom. Bass expressed skepticism about humanoid robots, saying he "would absolutely never" design one from scratch, and criticized efforts to achieve full self-driving without lidar or radar, calling it "a bad idea." He described machine learning as "the biggest change I've seen in my lifetime," on par with the internet and the PC.