It is difficult to overstate the sea change that the world is facing as a result of the rapid acceleration of advanced computing technologies and their applications—especially in AI, robotics, quantum computing, and micro-nuclear power. Thanks to a generation of human invention and innovation, the long-imagined world of science fiction writers is now here. A consequence of this faster-than-expected advent is that world leaders are scrambling to ensure their nations are not left behind.

Advances in AI and other computing-based technology have gone parabolic. The computational power of the world’s 500 largest supercomputers has grown from one teraflop in 1995 to 10 exaflops in 2025. These strange-sounding figures represent an astronomical increase in calculations per second amounting to an 18 million-time increase in computing power over three decades. Already a $60 billion revenue market today, the supercomputing market is projected to grow by 7.5 percent per year over the next decade, to nearly $125 billion by 2035.

The U.S., China, and other competing countries are now in a Cold War 2.0 arms race. Their leaders firmly believe that whichever country dominates AI and advanced computing will have a substantial strategic, economic, and military advantage over its adversaries.

The late-stage Cold War arms race initiated by President Ronald Reagan against the USSR in the early 1980s was so expensive that it eventually led the Soviet Union to the edge of bankruptcy and brought down the Communist regime. Today, both the spending required and the emergent risks of the AI and computing wars threaten to make the stakes of that era feel like child’s play.

One of the most important applications is in the robotics and automation space. We are already at the point where robots are training robots to build robots. It is not difficult to imagine that the interests of creator and creation may one day diverge. World War III could be fought by humanoid robotic soldiers, drones, and other autonomous devices enabled by ever more powerful—and autonomous—AI agents, the prototypes of which exist today. Increasingly, humans will function as cyborgs, integrating with these massive AIxRobot armies. Who will be serving whom is unclear.

Robocars and driverless taxis are now deployable at scale. As much as I love driving, it is hard to argue that my life expectancy won’t increase if the highways are free of drivers who fall asleep, get distracted by phones or screaming children, drive drunk, or lash out in road rage. Driverless cars and robot housekeepers are one thing. But the power of computing, previously deployed within tools used by humans, is now employed by AI agents functioning themselves as the workers, not merely as the tools.

Did I mention robots training robots to make robots? AI is already busy designing entire industrial cities, which will be built in AI factories by AI robots and run by others.

Data centers—required to support the growing needs of cloud computing, AI, crypto, and quantum computing—are being built at breakneck speed and depend upon massive amounts of power and water. Global data center investment is projected to grow from $450 billion last year to $1.1 trillion by 2029, an annual growth rate of 21 percent.

One way to gauge the size and growth of computing capacity is to measure the electricity that data centers consume. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), data centers used 415 terawatt hours (TWh) in 2024, or about 1.5 percent of global electricity consumption. Data center power consumption has grown at a rate of 12 percent a year over the last five years, and that pace is expected to continue. By 2030, the IEA expects data center energy consumption to more than double to 945 TWh and for data centers to account for more than 20 percent of demand growth.

Energy grids are already under strain in the U.S. and around the world. Modernization of American energy infrastructure is a priority of the Trump administration, and the benefits of this effort will be widely distributed among rich and poor alike. That means energy security and capacity will remain at the forefront of U.S. and Chinese domestic policy concerns for the foreseeable future.

Experts estimate that $6.7 trillion in capital expenditure is required by 2030 to meet global computing demand—77.6 percent of which would be for AI-enabled capacity.

Nvidia is the bellwether company of the AI age, and it is now also the most valuable company in the world. It is the  world’s best maker of graphics processing units (GPUs, which are the backbone of AI hardware). Nvidia has seen its market capitalization explode to $5 trillion from $2 trillion over just two years. This makes the company more valuable than the S&P 500, the entire crypto market, and the rest of the semiconductor industry. Nvidia’s market cap is larger than the annual GDP of all of South America.

This valuation may, or may not, be deserved. Despite being a $130.5 billion revenue company, it continues to double revenue year over year. It is also one of the most profitable companies in the world, with $81.5 billion of operating income, a 147 percent increase over the previous year. It trades at a valuation of 30 times forward earnings, a 28 percent premium to the S&P500, but not out of line with expectations for continued strong growth.

Most importantly, the world cannot function as it currently does without Nvidia’s hardware and related products. The world’s largest governments, industrial corporations, and technology companies all depend on Nvidia’s GPUs and hundreds of application libraries. They are competing with one another for prioritization from this single company. The deepening links between public policy and the private sector is illustrated by the newly strengthened connection between Nvidia and the U.S. government.

As evidence for this sea change, consider that Nvidia recently committed to invest over $500 billion in U.S. infrastructure, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Energy and other agencies. The company has invested $5 billion in Intel to help rehabilitate the struggling former U.S. leader of general-purpose CPU manufacturing. Nvidia has aligned itself with the Trump administration’s agenda to reestablish the U.S. as the world leader in the most important industries, but especially in high-tech.

Nvidia’s dominant market power and the company’s visible alliance with the Trump administration has led to consternation abroad. The Trump administration has restricted sales to China of Nvidia’s most advanced Blackwell chips, but recently rolled back restrictions on the still powerful but less cutting-edge H20s. China, in turn, has pressured its tech industry not to buy Nvidia chips, due to cybersecurity concerns and the fear of monopolistic control of the sector by its global adversary. But for the foreseeable future, China needs access to Nvidia, just as it needs access to the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). Taking these away in a disorderly fashion would pose an existential threat to the Chinese Communist Party. It is dangerous to back someone into a corner with no way out but one.

Nvidia’s name—connected with the Latin word invidia, a noun meaning “envy”—and its green eye logo symbolize both the company’s vision and the world’s envy. Nvidia’s position and power are untenable for China, now desperately racing to develop its own advanced AI chips.

The name Nvidia reversed is Aidivn, which, as “AI divine,” which suggests a “god” of Artificial Intelligence. The desire to make AI the god of this age is becoming common among techno-utopians in the U.S. and it is shared by Chinese leadership. They see the AI god providing the answer to the imperfect and mortal state of humanity, as well as an alternative to the biblical Creator God and a perpetually fallen Man.

During the Cold War, the USSR and the United States maintained an uneasy balance of power and were able to prevent a nuclear apocalypse. It took the cool heads of prudent and far-sighted statesmen on both sides to resist the belligerence of their generals and the magnetic momentum of military escalation. Let us hope and pray that this generation of leadership in China and the U.S. will show similar restraint.