November 11, 2025 – NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang recently addressed concerns about whether the current AI boom resembles the dot – com bubble. He firmly stated that the present computing demand for AI is very real, a stark contrast to the internet era.
Huang pointed out that the similarities between AI and the dot – com bubble do not lie in the core technologies or their impacts on industries. Instead, they are found in stock valuations and the “crazy returns” that retail investors have witnessed in the past.
During an interview in the “Minds of Modern AI” column of the Financial Times on November 7, Huang put forward his view. He emphasized that, unlike the dot – com bubble era, the deployment of “dark fiber” has created real computing demand for AI.
When asked if he was worried that the industry had advanced too rapidly, reaching a point where people couldn’t fully comprehend it and a bubble burst was imminent, and if not, what the biggest misunderstanding was when comparing AI – driven demand to that of the dot – com bubble era, Huang responded with a clear distinction. He explained that during the dot – com bubble, a large amount of fiber was “dark fiber.” In other words, the industry laid far more fiber than was actually needed at that time. Back in the mid – to late 1990s, during the massive internet infrastructure construction, companies overestimated the growth in cable demand and pre – laid a large quantity of optical cables for future use. However, this assumption failed, and the return on investment was almost zero, essentially creating false demand.
In contrast, Huang noted that today, almost all GPUs are in use. He also mentioned that AI has made significant progress. While mainstream consumers still mainly perceive the technology in the form of ChatGPT or image – generation applications, AI has reached a stage where it can “think effectively and self – verify through research.” But this advanced form of technology has not yet been widely adopted by the general public.
He further pointed out that companies’ computing demands are not only growing exponentially but also the number of queries generated is on the rise. This clearly indicates that the demand for AI is genuine and not artificially created.
