Is Microsoft Back with a ‘Bing’?

By Nischay Mittal, Partner and Global Head of Automation/AI, Zinnov

Bing+ChatGPT Blitzkrieg vs Google Search

ChatGPT has seemingly taken the world by storm and has become a highly talked-about technology in a short duration. Since its official launch on November 30, 2022, social media has been abuzz with discussions about its potential to revolutionize the way we interact with technology. ChatGPT quickly gained popularity, with 1 Mn users signing up within the first week of its launch, and reportedly reaching 21 Mn monthly users by December 2022. From Natural Language Processing (NLP) to text generation, the possibilities are seemingly endless.?

What makes ChatGPT even more interesting is Microsoft’s investment in OpenAI, the company behind the technology. In 2019, Microsoft invested USD 1 Bn in the company, and recently announced plans to invest an additional USD 10 Bn, pushing OpenAI’s valuation to a massive USD 29 Bn. Microsoft is already leveraging OpenAI’s Generative AI capabilities in its product line, but the most highly-anticipated announcement is the company’s plans to integrate ChatGPT into its Bing search engine. While Google currently dominates the search space with over 85% market share, Bing has the potential to disrupt the industry with the integration of ChatGPT. However, it remains to be seen whether ChatGPT is mature enough to challenge Google’s dominance and if Microsoft’s integration plans will be successful.

OpenAI and Microsoft Partnership

OpenAI was founded in 2015 by Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, Wojciech Zaremba, and John Schulman, with the goal of developing safe and ethical AI for humanity’s benefit. Elon Musk later resigned from the board in 2018, citing a potential future conflict of interest as his company, Tesla, began working on its own AI technology. Interestingly, OpenAI initially operated as a non-profit organization; but in 2019, transitioned into a “capped” for-profit model in order to secure funding for AI research and development. Soon after, Microsoft invested USD 1 Bn in the company, helping support OpenAI’s cutting-edge AI advancements, and gradually started embedding the Generative AI tech across its product lines.

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GitHub Copilot was launched in June 2022, which is a subscription service that uses OpenAI’s ‘Codex’ technology to automatically generate code from natural language instructions. There are already millions of developers using Copilot, and GitHub claims that as much as 40% of the code is now being written by Copilot! Additionally, Microsoft has also embedded Codex into its Power Platform to allow users (both business users plus pro-code developers) to convert natural language instructions into workflow automation. Microsoft also recently announced its Azure OpenAI Service which is now generally available, allowing more businesses to access advanced AI models — including GPT-3.5, Codex, and DALL E 2 — built on top of its Azure infrastructure.

“Over the last 18 months, we’ve seen this transition in technology from proving that you can do things with AI, to mapping it to actual scenarios and processes where it’s useful to the end user…”

-????????Charles Lamanna, Corporate Vice President of Business Applications and Platform, Microsoft

The ChatGPT juggernaut and Microsoft’s plans to integrate it into Bing have created ripples across the globe, and forced Google to issue a ‘Code Red’ to assess the potential threat from this ‘blitzkrieg’ coming its way!

Microsoft and ChatGPT: A Match Made in AI Heaven?

ChatGPT is a large language chatbot developed by OpenAI, based on the GPT-3.5 model. It is trained on a diverse set of 175 Bn parameters and 570 GB of Internet text, allowing it to generate human-like text. It is specifically trained to understand human intent in questions and provide truthful and harmless answers that are acceptable to humans. This is because ChatGPT is based on a Large Language Model (LLM), which is augmented by Reinforcement Learning with Human Feedback (RLHF) to generate responses that are more satisfactory and acceptable to humans.

ChatGPT’s capabilities have impressed many, but some have raised questions about Microsoft’s aggressive approach in using the technology to challenge Google Search. ChatGPT and Generative AI in general have the potential to revolutionize the way we search for answers. Currently, when we input a query on Google Search, we get a list of links to websites and blogs that may or may not contain the answer. With ChatGPT, we can put in a query and get a well-articulated and definitive answer in return, within seconds.

Interestingly, Google had announced LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications) back in 2017 and launched an updated version in May 2022. While LaMDA has chatbot capabilities similar to ChatGPT, it is not as sophisticated, and Google believed that the technology was not yet ready to be embedded in search. Additionally, Google’s search ad revenue model may be negatively impacted if it changes the way people search.

Microsoft is being aggressive in its adoption of Generative AI because it provides an opportunity for the tech giant to dethrone Google Search. Google’s market capitalization is around US 1.3 Tn, with 60% of this coming from its search business, valued at USD 780 Bn. Bing is targeting this market and plans to spend USD 10 Bn on ChatGPT over the next few years in a bid to bite off a large share of this search pie. With Microsoft planning to embed ChatGPT into Bing as early as March of this year, it will be interesting to see where this competition will lead.

How would BingGPT look like?

Microsoft and OpenAI have been working together to enhance Bing’s AI capabilities. The integration of DALL-E 2, an AI-based image generator, into Bing, allows users to create unique images by typing in keywords. This feature is currently available for limited preview in select regions.

ChatGPT’s integration into Bing has the potential to revolutionize search. Bing+ChatGPT would provide human-like, concise, and structured responses, and act as a virtual assistant for tasks such as writing poems, offering gift suggestions, and building travel itineraries. Additionally, BingGPT would be able to write and debug code, offering a unique advantage over Google Search. However, there are several limitations to overcome, including ensuring the accuracy and reliability of ChatGPT’s responses and ensuring real-time access to data. OpenAI has already announced the development of GPT-4, which will be less biased and more accurate. To ensure that responses are trustworthy, Microsoft must also implement a confidence score for instances where the algorithm may generate inaccurate or biased responses. Microsoft also plans to include both ChatGPT-generated responses and traditional links to relevant websites and blogs for those who prefer to browse existing content (more traditional search).

Microsoft is exploring multiple avenues to challenge Google’s dominance across both text and image generation. With OpenAI working on technology to enable video generation from natural language, Bing could become a truly multi-modal search engine that can potentially generate text, images, and videos from user queries. ?

What’s Next for Google and Bing?

It’s unclear if Microsoft Bing will be able to dethrone Google Search; but one thing is for sure – ChatGPT is a game-changing technology. With its integration, Bing has a strong chance to challenge Google and transform the search space as we know it. The future of search looks very different with the advancements in AI, and the potential for innovation is limitless.

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What does ChatGPT think about competing with Google Search?

ChatGPT sure is quite humble :)

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Generative AI is one of the top 10 technology trends that will not only disrupt industries but shape investments in 2023 and beyond. Visit https://bit.ly/3Rpbe0u or drop us a note at [email protected] to learn more about it.