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What execs are talking about at Goldman Sachs' Communacopia: AI, data centers, disruption

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Why This Matters

At Goldman Sachs' Communacopia conference, tech leaders acknowledged that public resistance to AI and data center buildouts has become a material business risk, not just a PR problem. CoreWeave's CEO admitted the industry has failed to explain AI's benefits, while Visa's CEO said consumer distrust is actually slowing adoption of agentic payments — a sign that sentiment is now affecting revenue timelines.

Key Takeaways
Worth a Look

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The public opposition to artificial intelligence and data centers is front and center at the Goldman Sachs Communcacopia + Technology Conference.

CoreWeave CEO Mike Intrator told CNBC's David Faber that companies haven't explained the technology's benefits well enough to the public.

"I don't think we have done a particularly good job of talking about the benefits of what the data centers allow the AI companies to be able to deliver to people, to governments, to decision making," Intrator said in comments that aired Wednesday.

The annual conference brings together leaders across the biggest tech and media companies, and AI adoption — along with the pushback many local communities are showing towards its buildout — is perhaps one of the biggest opportunities, and risks, facing businesses of every kind.

Intrator insisted that the fear around the transformation isn't about data centers, specifically, but is about how fast things are changing.

"It is really about: Hey, you know the world is changing, and it's changing very quickly, and that's going to have impacts on myself. It's going to have impacts on my children, and what is that going to look like? And that is frightening," he added.

Visa CEO Ryan McInerney said he's noticed consumers' distrust in AI in agentic commerce, and that the new method is developing "a little more slowly than we thought."

"When you ask consumers, do they trust these agentic platforms to go out and make payments on their behalf, the short answer is they don't," McInerney said.