As eCommerce CEO replaces 90% of staff with bots, are fears of AI taking over jobs coming true?

At a time when there has been a lot of conversation and apprehension about artificial intelligence taking away people’s jobs, especially in the services industry, an Indian CEO is being criticised after he said that his firm had replaced 90% of its support staff with an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot.

In a series of tweets, which have over one million views currently, Suumit Shah, the founder of Dukaan wrote about his firm’s decision to use a chatbot. He said that though laying off staff had been a “tough” decision, it was “necessary”.

“Given the state of the economy, start-ups are prioritising ‘profitability’ over striving to become ‘unicorns’, and so are we,” he wrote. Mr Shah added that customer support had been a struggle for the firm for a long time and that he was looking to fix this.

He also wrote about how they built the bot and the AI platform in a short period so that all of Dukaan’s customers could have their own assistant. He said that the bot was answering all kinds of queries with speed and accuracy. According to Mr Shah, the chatbot had drastically improved first response and resolution time of customers’ queries. The tweet sparked outrage online.

“In the age of instant gratification, launching a business is not a distant dream anymore,” he wrote. “With the right idea, the right team, anyone can turn their entrepreneurial dreams into reality.”

Although adding that the firm was also hiring for multiple roles, he has faced backlash from users who accuse him of disrupting the lives of his staff with this “heartless” decision.

“As expected, didn’t find any mention of the 90% staff that were laid off. What assistance were they provided?” asked one user.

“Maybe it was the right decision for the business, but it shouldn’t have turned into a celebratory/marketing thread about it,” said another.

Mr Shah responded to one tweet by saying “As expected, someone will get offended on behalf of someone else” and added that he would post about assistance for his staff on LinkedIn because on Twitter, people are in search of “profitability and not sympathy”.

Read also: OpenAI founders worried “super-intelligent” AIs would destroy the world if not strictly regulated

Are AI fears coming true?

In recent years, generative artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT have proliferated the digital space and become more accessible. There have been reports of organisations using these tools to increase productivity while cutting costs. This has made workers fearful about losing their jobs to technology.

In March, Goldman Sachs published a report showing that artificial intelligence could replace the equivalent of 300 million full-time jobs. In India, several firms are investing in it to develop products and it has sparked concerns about job losses.

In May, Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, reported a profit of $5.7bn (£4.6bn) for the first quarter of this year, surpassing expectations for a period in which many jobs were cut at the big tech company. The company’s CEO and founder, Mark Zuckerberg said AI was all to thank for “driving good results” across its business.

The same can be said for Nvidia, the California-based tech company. The company recently achieved a significant milestone by reaching a $1 trillion market valuation. The impressive $1 trillion valuation was achieved thanks to the growing demand for AI chips and software in various industries.

With many big companies beginning to acknowledge the contribution of artificial intelligence in driving growth, profitability and productivity, other smaller ones may soon follow suit in their AI integration, thereby leading to the loss of more jobs.

The service industry, particularly customer response and assistance in recent years has become one of the most vulnerable with the introduction of bots. But with more access and availability of generative AI tools, there are fears that other sectors may soon become affected.

Given that many firms place a strong emphasis on profitability, if there is one thing you can count on, it is that business owners and CEOs will put profitability above all else. Yet, as is the case with every new invention, there will inevitably be a greater reliance on machines and computers, which will result in job losses.