Don't worry about AI! Why PPFAS CIO Rajeev Thakkar wants Indian investors to read what tech analyst Benedict Evans said

IT stocks have seen sharp upswings and downswings this year so far amid the frenzy around artificial intelligence, but PPFAS CIO Rajeev Thakkar feels that fears around AI threatening jobs in the sector are overblown, citing two articles by tech analyst Benedict Evans.

Independent analyst and former partner at Andreessen Horowitz, Benedict Evans, in an old article released back in 2023, wrote that almost everyone in tech field argue that generative AI, large language models and ChatGPT are a generational change in what can be done with software, and in what can be automated with software.

"But everyone agrees there’s a lot more automation coming, and entirely new kinds of automation. Automation means jobs, and people," Evans said, adding that investors should begin by remembering that work is being automated for 200 years. "Every time we go through a wave of automation, whole classes of jobs go away, but new classes of jobs get created. There is frictional pain and dislocation in that process, and sometimes the new jobs go to different people in different places, but over time the total number of jobs doesn't go down, and we have all become more prosperous," he wrote.


Agreeing that it is natural to worry when this shift is occurring in one's own generation, Evans explained that history has taught new jobs will be created. "So, we don’t know what the new jobs will be, but we have a model that says, not just that there always have been new jobs, but why that is inherent in the process. Don’t worry about AI!” according to the analyst.

Which jobs are the most exposed to AI?

In another article released in May this year, Benedict Evans argued that attempting to quantify and map which jobs, companies, or industries will be destroyed or transformed by AI is mostly impossible. He explained with a simple historical example. Over 50 years, tech companies automated accounting through spreadsheets, databases, and software. Yet, the number of Certified Public Accountants (CPAs) consistently grew.

According to the analyst, the underlying business may change, but the job itself doesn't. Evans contends that while we can use historical mental models and speak in broad, qualitative terms about AI's direction, trying to build precise quantitative charts of AI exposure is an exercise in self-deception.

What Rajeev Thakkar says about AI

PPFAS Mutual Fund CIO and Director Rajeev Thakkar, in a note to unitholders published earlier this month, said older investors may remember the time when there were massive bank union protests around the computerisation of bank branches. “Banks moved from handwritten ledgers to computerised branches, to networked branches on a centralised core banking system to internet banking to mobile banking. Despite this, banks today employ far more people in the banking business as compared to the 1980s and 1990s,” he wrote.

According to Thakkar, the fears around employment are largely overblown at the aggregate level. He noted that surely there will be individual companies and individual roles that may be under threat, and the pain around re-training and re-employment of the affected individuals will be real.

On IT services, the market veteran noted that there are clear outliers in terms of looking at the current sell off as an opportunity rather than an existential threat. “Our base assumption right now is that while Artificial Intelligence (AI) writes a significant portion of the code, the need for implementation does not go away. What was an outsourced activity to a team of people is now an outsourced activity to a team of people and AI,” he wrote in his letter.

While AI will eliminate some work, the nascent technology will create more work in other areas, according to Thakkar, who added that people who have been watching this space will note the increased concern around cyber security given the efficiency with which hackers can use AI. “This will arguably create more work in cyber security,” he wrote.

Also read | Parag Parikh Flexi Cap current underperformance not noteworthy; cash at 14-15%, HDFC Bank outlook unchanged: Rajeev Thakkar

(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times)