HKTV boss Ricky Wong on the power of AI and inevitable job losses

While most of us are comfortable with the usage of AI for our day to day aid and execution, Ricky Wong, co-founder, vice chairman, and group CEO of Hong Kong Technology Venture Company strongly argues that marketers and the business community at large have vastly underestimated the true power of AI, which he believes is going to wipe out the majority of jobs in the next three years. 

"I think it's very wrong that many governments or anyone to think AI as a tool. AI is not a tool," Wong argues. "A tool normally means passive tools. A chopstick is a tool. Camera is a tool. But AI is not a tool."

Instead, Wong, who was a keynote speaker at Digital Marketing Asia Hong Kong says marketers should treat AI as an advisor or "a boss" to get the maximum output. He added:

Just treat your AI as your teammate and as a human. It is not a screwdriver. Then you will proceed much faster.

Highlighting how AI has reshaped the company's workflow, Wong said the company CEO Jelly Zhou recently communicated with Opus 5.5 on building a test system for customer service. 

"Opus asked a lot of questions, understood her needs. After two hours, Opus gave them a 27-page proposal," he said. The company also used AI to match product prices against rival supermarkets, achieving a 70% satisfaction rate, Wong added. "With AI, you only need domain knowledge; you don't need to know anything technical."

Wong added that senior marketers and managers need to treat AI as a new colleague or fresh graduate, but the difference, he articulated, is "this fresh graduate will not quit your job two years later. They will stick with you for the rest of your life. So teach everything you know." 

The unfortunate reality, according to Wong, is that job losses are inevitable. 

Revealing that his company reduced 20% of its headcounts in August, he said, "We may do [it] more because we don't need so many staff anymore. AI can do a better job and is more cost-effective."

When asked by audience members if Wong himself thinks he can be replaced, candidly, he shares:

"I think for that to happen, we need to train the AI as emotional and as crazy as I am. But because most of the AI systems are based right on LLM at the moment, and are still very logical. But if the AI can be as emotional as I am, of course I can be replaced."

Then what's the way out for human beings? Wong said only those with entrepreneurial spirit and those with passion can survive. "What is the difference between human beings and AI? AI has a larger memory and a faster CPU than me. What can I do better than AI? I have the initiative and the driving force. I want to do something crazy. 12 years ago, no one believed Hong Kong mobiles work. We tried to go online. Definitely not logical decisions, that was emotion."

From what I understand, AI does not have passion. Passion is an artwork. I don't how to describe passion, but passion is passion. I wish you can feel my passion. Passion can only be filled, but cannot be defined. So you have to put yourself in the passion.

The other way human beings can survive is to make themselves listen to AI, he added. "Many people are trying to give instructions to AI. But human's role is to listen to AI. Let AI guide you what to do if you want to be successful."

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