Weekend Warp
Jaspreet Bindra
Founder: AI&Beyond and Tech Whisperer Ltd | ex-CDO Mahindra, Microsoft, TAS | Author - The Tech Whisperer | Faculty - AshokaU, SingularityU | M St - AI & Ethics, Cambridge University | Gurgaon, Cambridge, Dubai
In technology, there are decades where nothing happens. And then there are weeks where decades happen. In the last few months, technology seems to be moving at warp speed. To make some sense out of this, I pick three to five stories every week which are the most significant of all.
First the BIG news: Mustafa Suleyman cofounder and CEO of AI unicorn Inflection AI and one of the brains behind Google DeepMind has been snapped up by Microsoft to head a new division called Microsoft AI! This new consumer AI unit comprises generative AI, Copilot, Bing, and Edge. Already being referred to as the Nadella Gambit in Satya Nadella ’s game of ‘4D chess’, this kills several birds with one stone for Microsoft. They get two of the biggest talents in AI with Suleyman and cofounder Karén Simonyan , who comes in as chief scientist. This builds a hedge against anything going wrong with OpenAI (which I have predicted will one day). It makes one company less to fight against. I wonder how a certain Mr. Sam Altman is feeling these days?
Talking of Sam Altman, he teased GPT5 or some things as big coming up this year in a podcast with Lex Fridman (podcast). A combative Altman discussed the Board ouster shocker, Elon Musk’s comments and more. Worth hearing this podcast to see how the future of AI will unravel this year
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Other BIG news: Apple and Alphabet Inc. (Google) are at it again. Not fazed by anti-trust issues around the $20bn+ that Google pays Apple to have its search engine integrated into the iPhone, there is now talk of Gemini being integrated in also. Brave of them – with the antitrust issues looming plus Gemini being the most embarrassing GenAI chatbot our there (link on Gemini issues). But they both need each other this time. Google needs solid distribution for its beleaguered chatbot, and Apple needs to have GenAI on its phones, and it does not seem to have a product that it is comfortable with. Still rumours, let’s see what happens, and how competition and the regulators react.
Finally, some good news from Accenture – it’s Generative AI Revenue Surpassed All VC-Backed Startups Combined, with a recorded $1.1 billion from generative AI projects in the first-half of the fiscal! Julie Sweet , Chair and CEO, named a few customer like Merch, Telstra , McDonald's and Best Buy who it is working with on GenAI products. This gives a much needed boost to enterprise use cases of AI, but also raises questions on where other IT firms like TCS , Wipro , Cognizant , etc. are placed in this space…
The space is certainly heating up….at warp speed.