At Meta's and Tesla's earnings calls, Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk adopted the term "superintelligence" promoted by President Trump. Last month, Trump directed the U.S. government to replace "artificial intelligence" with "superintelligence" internally.
This week, the CEOs of Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet continued to use the term AI during their earnings calls.
On September 29, 2026, after a lunch with tech leaders in the East Room of the White House in Washington, U.S. President Trump spoke with Meta CEO Zuckerberg on the White House driveway. On September 29, Trump signed a directive requiring all departments and agencies of the U.S. executive branch to use "superintelligence" instead of "artificial intelligence." One month later, his core allies in the tech world, Musk and Zuckerberg, were the first to follow suit on earnings calls; other tech giant CEOs were less eager.
Trump announced this requirement during a White House lunch with AI industry leaders. At the time, he hoped to promote AI development in the U.S. under a relatively relaxed regulatory environment. This week, Trump posted on Truth Social demanding that the term "AI / artificial intelligence" be banned in "all relevant documents" and other materials. Musk's SpaceX and Tesla complied with this wording during their earnings calls last week. As early as early October, Musk had renamed the rocket company's AI division to SpaceXSI. On Tesla's earnings call, while discussing the humanoid robot project, Musk said: "Some robots look very impressive, but they actually don't use any advanced AI or superintelligence (SI)."
Zuckerberg also actively cooperated on Meta's earnings call on October 21, emphasizing that the company's goal is to "provide personal superintelligence to everyone." However, Meta had already been using this concept—it established the Meta Superintelligence Lab last year. Musk and Zuckerberg are among the tech CEOs most supportive of the Trump administration, but they are not the only ones. Executives at major tech giants have all contributed to Trump's inauguration activities, and some companies have proactively shut down diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs that Trump opposed. But at least for now, on the matter of abolishing the term "AI," the other giants are choosing to wait and see. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy repeatedly used AI on the earnings call, mentioning it more than a dozen times in his opening remarks. The day before, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that one of Microsoft's three key focus areas is "building AI that empowers humanity." Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said at the very start of his earnings commentary that the search giant's "AI investments are driving usage and overall user growth."
Trump's push for this renaming comes just before next week's midterm elections. Republicans risk losing control of both the Senate and the House. Trump's approval ratings continue to slide, and the latest survey shows his economic approval rating has hit a historic low.
Practical Results
Of course, these executives who continued to use AI on earnings calls are not necessarily openly defying the president's directive. The "superintelligence" term Trump has promoted has slowly permeated other documents and communication materials. In Microsoft's annual report filed last week, the opening of the letter to shareholders mentioned superintelligence multiple times, with a total of 8 occurrences throughout the document. Nadella wrote: "Entering the era of superintelligence, the core question facing Microsoft is not just how big the opportunity is, but how to deliver the practical results that every country, every community, and every business needs and deserves." IBM CEO Arvind Krishna did not attend the September White House lunch, and on last week's earnings call he used both SI and AI terms. Krishna said: "Technological innovation in hybrid infrastructure and superintelligence is driving improved business performance." He also said IBM is positioned as "a software-centric hybrid cloud and AI platform company." Chip giant Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said on Thursday's earnings call that the chip industry is currently experiencing supply tightness, rooted in "unprecedented demand brought by superintelligence." Some tech executives are already laying the groundwork for next month's earnings, publicly supporting Trump's new terminology. Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora used SI multiple times and also posted on September 30: "The White House's superintelligence-themed meeting was a landmark moment."
There is also Nvidia's Jensen Huang—this chip company, the world's most valuable, has underpinned the current AI boom. Huang, like Musk and Zuckerberg, is one of Trump's most vocal supporters in the tech world and a core ally of Trump on AI safety issues. Like Arora, Huang posted after the White House meeting, praising the "White House Superintelligence Accord." He wrote: "Superintelligence brings enormous opportunities, driving scientific exploration, productivity gains, security assurance, healthcare, and social prosperity. The future of superintelligence depends not only on what it can do, but also on how much trust it can win."
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