On Wednesday, Sept. 18, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai traveled to Carnegie Mellon University to tour research labs, talk with faculty and students about emerging technologies and officially kick off the first President’s Lecture Series event of the new academic year.
Pichai’s whirlwind visit concluded in the newly constructed Highmark Center for Health and Wellness, where he delivered a lecture entitled, “The AI Platform Shift and the Opportunity Ahead,” before sitting down for a fireside chat with Carnegie Mellon President Farnam Jahanian.
During the event, attended by 1,500 community members — the majority of whom were CMU students — Pichai made it clear that he was a fan of the talent and innovations coming out of Carnegie Mellon.
“At Google, we have an incredible admiration for what you do at Carnegie Mellon,” Pichai noted during his time onstage. “You can’t work in technology without feeling the impact of the important research that’s been done here or feeling the influence of Herb Simon and Allen Newell and so many others who paved the way for this moment, and we feel really fortunate to have deep ties to the CMU community.”
When introducing Pichai to speak, Jahanian noted reciprocal feelings of admiration within the CMU community. He pointed out that the registration count for Sundar’s lecture was so high, the university had to move the event into a bigger space and offer simulcast options for overflow attendees. He also went on to describe the Google CEO as someone who “recognizes the powerful role that technology can play in nurturing new opportunities, forging new connections and driving transformative change to benefit society.”
The CMU and Google Connection
Carnegie Mellon’s connection to Google dates back nearly two decades.
Google’s presence in the city began at Carnegie Mellon University’s Collaborative Innovation Center in 2006. Today, the company’s Pittsburgh office is located in Bakery Square and has grown to around 800 employees. (Pichai began his day at the local office, where he announced Google’s investment of over $25 million in AI training for educators and students, supporting five education organizations: International Society for Technology in Education, 4-H, CodePath, aiEDU and STEM From Dance.)
But there are always new things to see at CMU, which is why Pichai spent the hours before his lecture on campus and exploring a variety of projects being worked on by students and faculty. “I’d told him that — and he knew this already — he could spend the next two days at Carnegie Mellon, and you wouldn’t still see everything that’s happening,” Jahanian said.
Pichai’s first stop, Carnegie Mellon Mission Control, included a visit with Founders University Research Professor Emeritus Red Whittaker and Research Professor David Wettergreen, alongside the Iris Moon Rover student team. The group discussed lessons learned from the recent space mission, MoonRanger, and the team’s plans for the future.
Pichai also met with several experts in robotics for a demonstration of CMU’s work in the field: JPMorgan Chase Associate Professor of Computer Science Katerina Fragkiadaki, Raj Reddy Assistant Professor of Robotics Deepak Pathak, and Professor Abhinav Gupta. Gupta and Pathak serve as co-founders of AI and robotics company Skild AI.
Pichai’s final stop on the campus tour was a meeting with the Delphi Research Group at CMU, which focuses on epidemic detection, tracking and forecasting, and employing these methods to drive smarter decision making. Professor Roni Rosenfeld, Delphi Research Group Executive Director Peter Jhon and Assistant Professors Bryan Wilder and Will Townes showcased the work of the lab. Google has funded and partnered with Delphi at many points throughout its development.
Sundar Pichai: Ingenuity, vision and the transformative role of AI
Pichai joined Google in 2004 and helped lead the development of Google Toolbar and then Google Chrome, which would become the world’s most popular internet browser.
In August 2015, he was named CEO of Google, and in December 2019, CEO of Alphabet. Most notably, Pichai has overseen the company’s innovation in the fields of AI, computer vision and machine learning. Under Pichai’s oversight, the company has developed and released several innovative products and services that utilize cutting-edge AI and machine learning, including its Gemini large language model. Additionally, Google has invested in new opportunities such as Google Cloud and YouTube and has continued to be a leader in advanced technologies, including machine learning and quantum computing.
For his distinguished lecture at CMU, Pichai spoke about the near-future of AI, including the ongoing development of Project Astra, a multimodal interface that uses computer vision, voice recognition and Gemini’s chatbot to process the world in real time and respond conversationally — even showing off a video of a prototype pair of glasses that interact with their wearers.
Other technological highlights from Pichai’s lecture included a mention of Google DeepMind’s success competing in the International Mathematical Olympiad. The model functioned at the level of a silver medalist, exceeding the performance of any AI math model to come before it.
After Pichai’s remarks, he and Jahanian held a wide-ranging discussion on the role artificial intelligence can play in enabling human intelligence, workforce development and creativity.
Jahanian noted that he and the Carnegie Mellon University community at large shared Google’s excitement about AI.
“We have a number of colleagues at Carnegie Mellon who’ve been working on this for a long time,” Jahanian noted. “In fact, some have argued this AI is probably one of the most transformative intellectual developments of our time and that its potential impact on society — and on every sector of our economy — is undeniable.”
Pichai was similarly enthusiastic, describing AI as destined to become a “natural extension” in everyday life.
“As AI interactions come to feel more intuitive and human, they’ll put us at the center of the experience,” he noted. “Technology begins to feel like a natural extension, augmenting human capability, bridging gaps and expertise and experience, and breaking down barriers like language and accessibility.”
Achieving this, he added, requires the “bold and responsible” approach that Google has taken, balancing trustworthy AI development and utilization practices with technological advancement.
“All of this is poised to drive an explosion in knowledge, learning, creativity and productivity that will shape the future in exciting ways — what I call a new Golden Age of innovation — and we are in the very beginning of this platform shift.”
Jahanian launched the President’s Lecture Series, now in its second year, to bring distinguished thought leaders and world leaders to campus to speak with the CMU community on key societal issues. In addition to Pichai, this year’s series will continue with a visit from Dr. Sethuraman “Panch” Panchanathan, director of the U.S. National Science Foundation, on Oct. 11, 2024, followed by visits from The Washington Post journalist David Ignatius; actress, director and producer Tamara Tunie; and Hollywood producer, writer and director John Wells.