Why the AI future won’t be decided by algorithms and chatbots

Professor Syed Munir Khasru is chairman of the international think tank IPAG Asia-Pacific, Australia, with a presence also in Dhaka, Delhi, Dubai, and Vienna.When people talk about the race for Artificial Intelligence, they usually focus on software. Headlines revolve around ChatGPT, Gemini, DeepSeek or the latest breakthrough model.Governments announce AI strategies and investors pour billions into start-ups promising to transform everything from medicine to education. Nonetheless, the most consequential battle in the AI age may not be over algorithms at all. It may be over the machines.Behind every chatbot response and AI-generated image lies a vast physical infrastructure of semiconductor factories, data centres, cloud networks, transmission lines and power plants. These are the factories of the 21st century. Increasingly, the divide may be between countries that own the infrastructure behind AI and those that only access the applications built on top of it.