Key facts
Blackstone's CEO says the AI transformation arrives five times faster than the last industrial revolution — while his firm pours tens of billions into the data centers only 14% of Americans want in their town.
Stephen Schwarzman has seen three market manias up close. The Blackstone chairman and CEO says this one isn't like them.
"The advent of artificial intelligence and the breakthroughs it is driving are comparable to the development of electricity and the invention of the steam engine, which took 50 years to transform the world," Schwarzman said in an interview on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos. "AI will do that in 10."
He acknowledged the froth — some under-capitalised AI firms are overvalued, he said — but insisted there is no market frenzy of the kind that preceded the 1999 dot-com crash or the 2007 financial crisis. The distinction matters because of who is saying it: Blackstone is the world's largest alternative asset manager, and it is putting its own balance sheet behind the call, pouring tens of billions of dollars into the businesses and infrastructure meant to increase compute capacity and run power-hungry models.
That bet is colliding with something the industry did not budget for: the neighbors. A June Reuters/Ipsos poll found that only 14% of Americans would support a data center being built in their community for technology firms — a rare point of agreement in an otherwise deeply divided electorate. The opposition is not theoretical. QTS, the data-center operator Blackstone took private for $10 billion in 2021, terminated a Virginia project earlier this month after years of planning, strong local opposition, and litigation — even though county authorities had approved it.
Schwarzman addressed the backlash directly on a conference call, saying Blackstone is working with portfolio companies "to address the workforce, environmental and community implications of development through the creation of union jobs, workforce training, water-free cooling systems, expanded power generation and significant local economic investment." He said he has personally been "spending a lot of time with leaders in the industry and various policymakers thinking about how to address these critical issues, while also preserving the advance of America's AI leadership."
His framing of the stakes reaches back two centuries. The impact of AI, he said, could echo the industrial revolution — which eventually raised living standards enormously. "Major change of this type also creates anxiety due to the uncertainty of how the technology will evolve," he added. The Trump administration, for its part, treats AI development as a race against China while trying to shield households from the attendant rise in energy costs — Schwarzman is a longtime Trump donor.
The through-line of the Davos interview and the earnings call is the same: the transformation is coming at industrial-revolution scale on a startup timeline, the capital is already committed, and the binding constraint is no longer chips or money — it is permission. Who grants it, community by community, will decide where the ten-year transformation actually gets built.
Sources & evidence
- At Davos 2026, Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman said AI's breakthroughs are comparable to electricity and the steam engine — which took 50 years to transform the world — and that 'AI will do that in 10.' corroborated
- Schwarzman acknowledged some under-capitalised AI firms are overvalued but said there is no market frenzy comparable to 1999 or 2007. corroborated
- Blackstone and other private capital firms are pouring tens of billions of dollars into businesses and infrastructure to increase compute capacity for power-hungry AI models. corroborated
- A June Reuters/Ipsos poll found only 14% of Americans would support a data center being built in their community for technology firms. corroborated
- QTS, which Blackstone took private for $10 billion in 2021, terminated a Virginia data-center project after years of planning amid local opposition and litigation, despite county approval. corroborated
- Schwarzman said Blackstone is addressing workforce, environmental and community implications via union jobs, workforce training, water-free cooling, expanded power generation and local economic investment. corroborated
- Schwarzman said AI's impact could echo the industrial revolution, which eventually raised living standards, while warning that 'major change of this type also creates anxiety due to the uncertainty of how the technology will evolve.' corroborated
Reported with AI assistance from public sources; reviewed before publication. — Powered by Creytix.