While AI is all over the stages, Trump is dominating the side conversations.
This story first appeared in The Debrief, our subscriber-only newsletter about the biggest news in tech by Mat Honan, Editor in Chief. Subscribe to read the next edition as soon as it lands.
Hello from the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. I’ve been here for two days now, attending meetings, speaking on panels, and basically trying to talk to anyone I can. And as far as I can tell, the only things anyone wants to talk about are AI and Trump.
Davos is physically defined by the Congress Center, where the official WEF sessions take place, and the Promenade, a street running through the center of the town lined with various “houses”—mostly retailers that are temporarily converted into meeting hubs for various corporate or national sponsors. So there is a Ukraine House, a Brazil House, Saudi House, and yes, a USA House (more on that tomorrow). There are a handful of media houses from the likes of CNBC and the Wall Street Journal. Some houses are devoted to specific topics; for example, there’s one for science and another for AI.
But like everything else in 2026, the Promenade is dominated by tech companies. At one point I realized that literally everything I could see, in a spot where the road bends a bit, was a tech company house. Palantir, Workday, Infosys, Cloudflare, C3.ai. Maybe this should go without saying, but their presence, both in the houses and on the various stages and parties and platforms here at the World Economic Forum, really drove home to me how utterly and completely tech has captured the global economy.
