Microsoft Adds Up To IDR 150.3 Trillion Investment To OpenAI For ChatGPT Development

Microsoft said it was expanding its long-term partnership with OpenAI. (photo: doc. openai)

JAKARTA - Microsoft says it is expanding its long-term partnership with OpenAI through a new "multi-year, multi-billion dollar investment". The investment comes just weeks after Microsoft was rumored to be investing $10 billion into OpenAI, the maker of popular AI tools like ChatGPT and DALL-E 2.

"We formed our partnership with OpenAI based on our shared ambition to responsibly advance cutting-edge AI research and democratize AI as a new technology platform," said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, as quoted by The Verge.

“In the next phase of our partnership, developers and organizations across industries will have access to the best AI infrastructure, models, and toolchains with Azure to build and run their applications,” said Nadella.

The deal will see Microsoft increase its investment in the development and deployment of supercomputing systems to assist OpenAI research. A key part of the deal means that Microsoft is the exclusive cloud partner for OpenAI, and Microsoft's cloud services will power all OpenAI workloads across products, API services, and research.

Microsoft also plans to use the OpenAI model in various consumer and enterprise products. Microsoft is reportedly preparing to challenge Google with ChatGPT integration into Bing search results, and the company is reportedly considering integrating some language AI technologies into its Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook applications.

Microsoft did not disclose exactly how much it has invested in OpenAI, but the company has been looking to use its close relationships to further commercialize its Azure OpenAI service.

Microsoft started rolling out the service last week, and it includes a number of OpenAI-built AI models including GPT-3.5, Codex, and DALL-E. It is designed for businesses to use the OpenAI model by packing GPT-3.5 essentially with the scaling you expect from Azure and added data management and handling.

Rumors about this deal suggest Microsoft could receive 75 percent of OpenAI's profits until it secures a return on its investment and a 49 percent stake in the company. OpenAI says it remains a limited-profit company after this deal, allowing it to continue raising capital with checks and balances.

“The last three years of our partnership have been extraordinary,” said OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. “Microsoft shares our values ​​and we are excited to continue our independent research and work towards creating powerful AI that benefits everyone.”

Microsoft purchased the exclusive license for the technology underlying GPT-3 in 2020 after investing $1 billion (15.2 trillion) in OpenAI in 2019. Microsoft has built a close relationship with OpenAI and is also planning to add a text-to-image model AI to Bing powered by DALL-E 2 OpenAI.