Microsoft announces multibillion-dollar investment in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI

Microsoft announced a brand new multiyear, multibillion-dollar investment with ChatGPT-maker OpenAI on Monday.

Microsoft declined to supply a selected greenback quantity, however Semafor reported earlier this month that Microsoft was in talks to take a position as a lot as $10 billion.

The deal marks the third part of the partnership between the 2 corporations, following Microsoft’s earlier investments in 2019 and 2021. Microsoft stated the renewed partnership will speed up breakthroughs in AI and assist each corporations commercialize superior applied sciences in the longer term.

“We shaped our partnership with OpenAI round a shared ambition to responsibly advance cutting-edge AI analysis and democratize AI as a brand new expertise platform,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella stated in the discharge.

OpenAI works carefully with Microsoft’s cloud service Azure. In July 2019, Microsoft backed OpenAI with $1 billion, and the investment made Microsoft the “unique” supplier of cloud computing companies to OpenAI. Microsoft stated Monday that Azure will proceed to function OpenAI’s unique supplier.

Microsoft’s investment may even assist the 2 corporations have interaction in supercomputing at scale, and create new AI-powered experiences, the discharge stated.

OpenAI is ranked by AI researchers as one of many prime three AI labs worldwide, and the corporate has developed game-playing AI software program that may beat people at video games like Dota 2. However, it is arguably obtained extra consideration for its AI text generator GPT-3 and its quirky AI image generator Dall-E.

ChatGPT automatically generates text primarily based on written prompts in a trend that is far more superior and inventive than the chatbots of Silicon Valley’s previous. The software program debuted in late November and rapidly become a viral sensation as tech executives and enterprise capitalists gushed about it on Twitter, even comparing it to Apple’s debut of the iPhone in 2007. 

The expertise additionally caught the eye of Google executives, who said in a recent all-hands meeting that whereas it has related AI capabilities, Google’s fame may endure if it strikes too quick on AI-chat expertise.

OpenAI’s founders included Sam Altman, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, Wojciech Zaremba and John Schulman. The group pledged to take a position over $1 billion into the enterprise when it launched. Musk resigned from the board in February 2018 however remained a donor.

–CNBC’s Jonathan Vanian and Jennifer Elias contributed to this report