Nvidia CEO Offers Message to New Graduates About AI and the Future of Work

KOMPAS.com - The trend of artificial intelligence (AI) has recently been accused of being the cause of the wave of layoffs. However, amid the panic, Nvidia CEO, Jensen Huang, has offered a refreshing dose of optimism for college graduates. While giving a graduation speech at Carnegie Mellon University last week, the tech billionaire stated that now is the best time in history for new graduates to start their careers. “Now is the time for you to realize your dreams, and the momentum could not be more perfect,” Huang said to the graduates. According to Huang, the presence of AI is acting as a bridge that closes the ‘technology gap’. Now, anyone has access and the ability to build something useful, which will ultimately open up new opportunities for young people in the years to come. This optimistic statement seems to reflect his own life journey. The 61-year-old, who now has a net worth of around $186 billion (about Rp 3.1 trillion), also started from scratch. He graduated from Oregon State University with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1984, then earned a master’s degree in the same field from Stanford University. Huang then founded Nvidia in 1993, just as the internet revolution was beginning. He seemed to see that today’s graduates are on the verge of the same major revolution. This anxiety is not without reason. According to a study by the Pew Research Center, about half of the people in the United States feel “more worried than excited” about the increasing use of AI in their daily lives. Many US citizens are now actively opposing the construction of new data centers in their communities, even though these facilities are the lifeblood of AI products such as chatbots. In the world of work, the impact is even more felt. At least a dozen major companies, including Cloudflare and Snap, have openly stated that increased efficiency thanks to AI is one of the main reasons they have laid off thousands of employees this year. For new graduates, AI is also making the job search process more difficult. The interview process has become longer and more complicated. At its peak, the unemployment rate for new graduates has reached a record high in the last four years at the beginning of 2026.