Microsoft will invest “several billion dollars” to expand its partnership with the artificial intelligence specialist OpenAI, creator in particular of the conversational robot ChatGPTaccording to a joint statement from the two companies released Monday.
This is the third phase of the collaboration between the two companies (after investments in 2019 and 2021), which aims, in particular, to strengthen Microsoft’s subsidiary dedicated to remote (cloud) computing, Azure.
Asked by AFP about the exact amount of the investment and a possible capital increase for OpenAI, Microsoft did not immediately respond, but several US media mentioned the figure of 10 billion dollars.
Little known by the general public so far, OpenAI, created just 7 years ago, has caused a lot of talk since the launch of its “chatbot” last November. ChatGPT.
Although it is not the first software of its kind, it has surprised by the quality of its responses, whether it is writing a text on a certain topic, explaining a complex topic in an intelligible way, or even creating a poem or song lyrics.
Soon integrated into the Microsoft universe
ChatGPT It wonders as much as it worries, somewhere between a precious tool that saves humans from tedious tasks and a threat to many jobs whose usefulness might be in question.
The agreement announced this Monday provides that each partner will be able to “independently market” products resulting from the jointly developed technology, based on artificial intelligence.
In addition to ChatGPTThe “billions of dollars” invested by Microsoft may benefit other software developed by OpenAI, such as Dall-E 2, which allows the generation of images on demand thanks to artificial intelligence, or GitHub Copilot, a computer assistant. programming.
OpenAI plans to release a paid version of ChatGPTwhich should offer faster responses and the ability to interact with the chatbot more frequently.
Under this collaboration, Microsoft will use software already developed by OpenAI “in its commercial and consumer products.”
This means that elements of ChatGPT it could be integrated into applications such as the Outlook email service or the Bing search engine.
“With this new phase of our partnership, developers and enterprises across all industries will have access to the best AI models, infrastructure, and toolset, with Azure to build and run their applications,” said Microsoft CEO Satya. Nadella, quoted in the press release.
Originally a software company, then a computer equipment company, Microsoft has for several years made remote computing a major development axis, much like its rivals Alphabet (Google) or Amazon.
For analysts at Wedbush Securities, “ChatGPT it can potentially be a game changer for Microsoft,” they explained in a note. With this investment, the Redmond (Washington) firm “is ahead of the rest of the + big technology +”, they added.
Source: BFM TV
