AI is having real-world impact in the digital lives of consumers and the operations of companies. Porting over these gains to industries with more tangible products such as drug discovery in biotech, commodity chemicals and materials for energy and sustainability, or manufacturing is an exciting opportunity. Here, we will discuss the current state and the opportunities for the application of (generative) AI in the context of chemistry and materials. In contrast with tech, these are capex-intensive, risk-averse industries where AI needs to close an "execution gap" between the digital and physical words for value creation. We will identify paths to remove existing technical and cultural bottlenecks.