OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has issued a serious warning about the disruptive potential of artificial intelligence and robotics in the near future. Speaking in a recent interview, Altman highlighted how rapid breakthroughs in AI technology and the development of humanoid robots could soon transform global job markets.
He predicted that these robots would soon be capable of handling a wide variety of jobs, triggering widespread changes across industries.
Humanoid Robots Could Arrive Soon, Says Sam Altman
“I don’t think the world has really had the humanoid robots moment yet, and I don’t think that’s very far away,” Altman said. “What happens when the humanoid robots get here? I mean, obviously do a lot of jobs.” Altman added that while technology has always shifted jobs—eliminating some and creating others—the speed of current changes is unprecedented.
“That’s just been happening for a long time,” he said. “The thing that is different this time is just the rate with which it looks like it will happen.”
AI Infrastructure, DeepSeek Rivalry & Political Signals
Altman also spoke about OpenAI’s ambitious $500 billion “Stargate Project,” a collaboration with tech giants like Microsoft, Nvidia, and Oracle to build large-scale AI infrastructure across the U.S.
“We used to think a lot about the compute we would need to train the models,” he said. “What we didn’t used to think about was how much people were going to use these models.”
He noted that a recent demand surge—sparked by AI-generated Ghibli-style images—forced OpenAI to redirect resources. “We had to borrow compute capacity from research. We had to slow down some other features,” he explained, adding, “If we had more GPUs, we would be more able to handle demand surges like this.”
On competition from Chinese AI firm DeepSeek, Altman acknowledged their team’s talent but dismissed claims of a breakthrough. “I don’t think they figured out something way more efficient than what we figured out,” he said.
Altman also addressed political dynamics, praising U.S. President Donald Trump for quickly grasping the importance of AI. “I think he [Trump] will get to make some of the most important decisions anyone in the world has gotten to make related to AI,” he added.
