Companies Are Flocking to a Corporate Version of ChatGPT

In the year since OpenAI unveiled ChatGPT and brought AI into the public consciousness, the startup has worked to get businesses to embrace — and pay for — the AI chatbot. Now, four months after the option was announced, the AI startup has signed up 260 enterprise customers for ChatGPT to date, COO Brad Lightcap said in an interview.

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OpenAI launched ChatGPT Enterprise in August, promising added features and privacy safeguards, including data encryption and a guarantee that the startup won';t use information from customers to develop its technology.

Those companies who signed up for the enterprise option of ChatGPT have more than 150,000 employees combined who are registered to use the product, an indication of strong demand for the startup's best-known product.

Mark Zuckerberg’s Pivot to AI

At first, Meta framed its interest in AI mostly as a way to achieve Mark Zuckerberg's vision for the metaverse. But after the 2022 launch of ChatGPT, the company began focusing far more on generative AI.

As public interest in the metaverse largely dissipated, Meta's AI division had been making significant progress behind the scenes. The division hired researchers from all over the world and was seen as a real rival to OpenAI or Google's DeepMind.?

The thing Meta hadn't been developing was many consumer products that were clearly powered by AI. The potential for such efforts to benefit Meta's core businesses was real.?

But without anything tangible for consumers to interact with, Meta wasn't breaking into the public imagination. If Zuckerberg can maintain his focus and not get in the way of product development, he has a real shot at transforming Meta into an AI powerhouse.

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AI Stories Not to Miss

• OpenAI is in talks with CNN, Fox and Time to license their work.
• A Norwegian startup raised $100 million to bring to market its second-generation android robot.
• Google is laying off hundreds of workers on its digital assistant, hardware and engineering teams as part of a continued effort to lower costs and focus on AI.

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