Two, seemingly contradictory, stories are told about the impact of artificial intelligence. The first is that the industry will be dominated by a handful of giant tech companies, which boast the data, compute power and expertise to transform our lives. These will make the most money.

The second is that AI is a wildly disruptive technology that is going to kick over the chess board on which the current economy is played, enabling nimbler insurgents to invent new games. The reality is: both stories may be simultaneously true.

The publication this week of the Artificial Intelligence Index Report, a 500-page pulse check of the global industry from Stanford University, provides ammunition for both arguments. But most striking is the current omnipresence of the big US companies — including Google, Meta and Microsoft — in terms of research, investment and AI model development.