The chief executive of AI chipmaker Cerebras Systems used his appearance at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 to challenge what he described as an increasingly negative tone in discussions about artificial intelligence. Andrew Feldman suggested that "some of the leaders in the AI world maybe shouldn't be allowed to talk in public," a remark aimed at those who have warned of existential risks from the technology.
Feldman referenced a recent skit on "Saturday Night Live" that parodied Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, which he said illustrated how mainstream the doomsday narrative has become. The fictional character on the show summed up the discourse by saying, "We do not condone what we are doing."
Rather than focusing on worst-case scenarios, Feldman argued that AI leaders should spend more time telling people about the positive potential. He said AI could lead to a world where your grandkids will "never meet anybody who dies of cancer."
The Cerebras CEO acknowledged his company has a vested interest in AI being successful. Its customers include OpenAI, Block, Figma, pharmaceutical giant GSK, and Lovable. But he also took a pragmatic view of the trade-offs between risk and reward.
"I don't think there are powerful technologies that don't come with the challenge of 'what happens when powerful technologies are in the hands of bad people?'" Feldman said. "I think you can't make one and not have the other." He added, "I think what we have to say is that this technology is powerful. We have to be thoughtful about it. We have to regulate it reasonably."
Feldman also criticized how the data center industry has handled the buildout driven by AI demand. He said the industry "wasn't super good for the past few years at working with local communities, particularly in the U.S." He contrasted this approach with other industries like oil and gas, which he said engaged communities more effectively. He named Brazil, Canada, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Mexico, and Sweden as countries that are encouraging companies to build data centers.
On the question of whether efficiency improvements might reduce demand for chips like those made by Cerebras, which competes with Nvidia, Feldman said he was not concerned. "We can do our job as hardware vendors to make our compute more efficient, and then the model makers can do improved work in making their models more efficient to achieve the same goal," he said.