Artificial intelligence is "a big help, not a hindrance," according to a Salesforce executive.

"AI is not gonna replace people," Peter Schwartz, senior vice president of strategic planning at Salesforce, told CNBC on Tuesday at the Singapore FinTech Festival.

On the flip side, Schwartz added: "It's going to make people far more capable."

Instead of thinking about the "most mundane things," Schwartz said AI would allow people to "focus" on issues such as creativity and interpersonal skills.

Schwartz's comments on the impact of AI were in line with a report from the World Economic Forum in September, which said developments in automation technologies and artificial intelligence could result in 58 million net new jobs being created by 2022.

"We have smartphones today, but it began with the Blackberry and the Palm Pilot which was pretty crude, but you got a hint of what was to come," he said, using the development of the smartphone industry as a parallel example for where he sees the future of artificial intelligence.

In a similar manner, personal digital assistants such as Amazon's Alexa and Apple's Siri are "the beginnings of a next wave," he added.