TURIN — Artificial intelligence is the new fire. We are witnessing an unprecedented technological revolution, one capable of changing the course of human history. Opening Wave by Vento at Turin’s OGR, John Elkann laid out a clear vision of the future and described the contours of a global challenge in which Italy can play a leading role.

“We’re talking about those early moments when we humans were trying to understand how to use fire and make sure it was put to use without burning everything down,” Elkann said, describing the scale of the transformation now underway.

His approach is to move beyond fear and embrace the unexplored opportunities of the decades ahead.

“We’re just getting started,” said Elkann, Chairman of Vento and CEO of Exor. This, he suggested, is a moment when curiosity should outweigh concern.

The debate over AI’s impact on jobs, he argued, should be reframed around the technology’s seemingly limitless potential. As AI continues to evolve and improve, it is opening the door to achievements that once seemed unimaginable.

“So what’s important for us is not to focus on what we may no longer be able to do, but on what we can do that we never imagined we could do,” Elkann said.

Autonomous mobility is a case in point. Startups such as Wayve are developing highly efficient autonomous-driving systems.

“This is an application of AI to something we never would have imagined could be done,” Elkann said.

He also believes technological innovation will tend to bring different parts of the world closer together, challenging the idea of a planet divided into opposing blocs.

“Fire was a universal technology at the time, and similarly, there will tend to be convergence in different parts of the world,” he said.

“I don’t see a world divided between the United States, China and what is called the Global South,” he added.

Humanity, Elkann argued, will work together to develop common tools as countries increasingly coordinate their efforts in frontier fields ranging from health care to space. That kind of global cooperation, he said, should provide the foundation for broad-based development around the world.

Italy, meanwhile, has an important role to play because of its human capital. Its talent, Elkann said, has enormous potential if it can overcome a tendency toward individualism.

“In Italy, we have an enormous amount of talent,” he said. “Italians, both here and around the world, have demonstrated tremendous capabilities.”

That is where Vento comes in. The fund was created in part to bring together technical expertise and entrepreneurial courage.

“What we had observed was that they often didn’t come together — someone who was highly skilled technically didn’t necessarily have the entrepreneurial courage, and vice versa,” Elkann said.

He sees a new generation of founders increasingly willing to combine their strengths and build companies together.

The results are already visible. Over the past decade, Italy’s startup ecosystem has grown from €5 billion to €60 billion. Vento has supported the creation of 220 companies. Together, they account for 3,000 jobs and generate €3 billion in value, equivalent to 5% of the national total.

“The contribution over 10 years is real,” Elkann said.

“We believe Italians are extraordinary and have tremendous capabilities. So, our goal is to help bring those capabilities to the fore,” he added.

The ambition for the next decade is even greater: the creation of 1,000 new companies, including ventures in industries that have yet to emerge.

“The bulk of Vento’s investments goes toward knowledge and industries that don’t exist,” Elkann said.

Turin, he suggested, offers fertile ground for this new wave of innovation, but the focus must remain global. For any Italian company, breaking beyond the domestic market should be the ultimate goal.

“If you manage to build a business in Italy, that business has to compete with the world,” Elkann said.

Italy’s strength, he added, lies in its ability to combine function and beauty.

“We Italians are very good at finding the balance between technology and aesthetics,” he said.

The winning formula, he argued, can be found in the country’s great industrial districts, from high-performance automobiles to furniture, where companies compete for excellence while also contributing to a shared ecosystem.

“On the one hand, you compete, and on the other, you collaborate,” Elkann said.

“There’s no reason why, if you are creating something of high quality that is very difficult to make, you shouldn’t be able to take it from Italy to the world,” he said, ending on an optimistic note about Italy’s ability to compete at the highest levels of the global market.