Who Is Mo Gawdat? Ex-Google Exec Warns Next 15 Years Will Be Hell, AI Will Start Disrupting Society From 2027
According to Gawdat, the rise of AI will spark social unrest as people grapple with job losses. This will result in wider problems such as loss of purpose, mental health issues and loneliness.
Former Google top executive and author Mo Gawdat has warned people that the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) could begin disrupting society by 2027, eliminating white-collar jobs. He said this is likely to potentially wipe out the middle class and jobs will be impacted across professions, including developers, CEOs and podcasters, as AI advances rapidly.
"The next 15 years will be hell before we get to heaven," Gawdat told British entrepreneur Steven Bartlett on his 'Diary of a CEO' podcast.
During the conversation, Gawdat cited his startup, Emma.love, a relationship-focussed AI venture. The entrepreneur noted that his company is run by only three people. "That startup would have needed 350 developers in the past,” he said.
According to Gawdat, the rise of AI will spark social unrest as people grapple with job losses. This will result in wider problems such as loss of purpose, mental health issues and loneliness.
"Unless you're in the top 0.1%, you're a peasant. There is no middle class," he predicted.
Who Is Mo Gawdat?
Gawdat served as the Chief Business Officer at Google till 2018. After leaving the US technology giant, Gawdat made "happiness as his primary topic of research", according to his LinkedIn profile.
Months before leaving Google, he founded the One Billion Happy movement, which is aimed at "making one billion people happy."
In April 2020, he launched his 'Slo Mo' podcast that is focussed on "exploring the extraordinary lives of everyday people".
Gawdat spent more than a decade at Google, where he served as Google’s head of business in central and eastern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa regions before being promoted to the global post in July 2013.
Prior to that, he was associated with the Skolkovo Foundation, an initiative by the Russian government to create a “Silicon Valley type of environment in Russia”.
He has also been on the board of UAE-based company Rings, Egypt-based Smartgym and has worked at Microsoft and IBM.
He completed his MBA in International Business Focus in 1996 from the Netherlands-based Maastricht School of Management. He holds a BSc in Engineering degree from Egypt’s Ain Shams University.
Since turning into an entrepreneur, Gawdat has penned several books, including Solve for Happy, Scary Smart, That Little Voice in Your Head and Unstressable.
