OpenAI's Altman confident Trump will keep US in AI lead

WASHINGTON, United States — OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on Sunday expressed confidence that US President-elect Donald Trump's administration would support the artificial intelligence sector to ensure the United States and its allies continue to lead it.

Speaking to conservative US broadcaster Fox News on Sunday, Altman said AI technology needed massive infrastructure support and that he believed Trump would be good at providing it.

"We need to build that here and we need to be able to have the best AI infrastructure in the world to be able to lead with the technology and the capabilities," he said.

"I believe President-elect Trump will be very good at that."

Altman was responding to a question on the United States' competition with China on AI, adding "we very much believe that the United States and our allies need to lead this."

The infrastructure that AI technology requires includes huge amounts of electricity, as well as large data centers and technological support in the form of access to advanced semiconductors and computer chips.

Altman also said the US Congress needs to pass legislation that erects safeguards for the use of artificial intelligence.

"I think, yes. At some point, when it is, what form it should be, I don't know when that will happen," he said, responding to a question.

"I think it should be a question for society. Like, it should not be OpenAI gets to decide on its own how ChatGPT or how the technology in general is used or not used."

OpenAI has seen its profile skyrocket over recent years as it has become a star player in the growing field of artificial intelligence.

Billionaire Elon Musk, who co-founded OpenAI in 2015 but has since left it, has asked a US court to stop the company from converting into a for-profit enterprise, US media reported on Saturday.