Microsoft has a long history with OpenAI, having pumped in a reported $13 billion in the ChatGPT maker as part of a long-term partnership. As part of the deal, Microsoft runs OpenAI’s models across its enterprise and consumer products and is also OpenAI’s exclusive cloud provider.
However, Microsoft called the startup a “competitor” for the first time in an SEC filing. In the company’s annual 10K, OpenAI joined a long list of rivals in AI, alongside Anthropic, Meta, and Amazon. OpenAI’s latest SearchGPt feature was announced recently.
It’s likely the tech giant is aiming to change the narrative on its relationship with OpenAI in light of antitrust concerns -- the FTC is currently looking into the relationship, alongside similar cloud provider investments into AI startups. The company recently gave up its board observer seat at the startup -- a seat it got after a kerfuffle last fall when OpenAI’s board briefly fired CEO Sam Altman.
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Microsoft And OpenAI Partnership In Danger?
SEC filings like this are usually places where companies throw out hyper-cautious warnings to investors. Partners and competitors are not mutually exclusive in Silicon Valley. In 2000, Yahoo announced an agreement to let Google’s search results appear on its web page.
The two firms were partners for a few years until Google launched its own search for the internet. The two companies were partners but were still threats to one another. There’s enough history of such power-switches in tech that it’s at least conceivable that Microsoft and OpenAI’s relationship will take a similar turn. Regardless, Microsoft is not putting all its eggs in one basket.
In March, Microsoft hired the co-founders of billion-dollar AI startup Inflection AI, Mustafa Suleyman and Karén Simonyan, to lead its new Microsoft AI division. The cloud provider is investing heavily in Microsoft Copilot and building out an AI future that’s entirely separate from OpenAI.
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Microsoft Could Bring Surprising Changes To Curb Outages
The recent IT outage wasn’t just bad for CrowdStrike, but also a wake-up call for Microsoft. To avoid such instances in the future, Microsoft could take some serious steps, as it is evaluating blocking third-party security software from accessing the Windows Kernel, according to a blog post by John Cable, VP of program management for Windows servicing and delivery.
If this change were to be put in place, the restriction would imitate Apple’s 2020 move, which limited third-party software from accessing its core OS. The change was brought to macOS Big Sur, making sure that every system partition that contains the core OS is cryptographically verified, down to every last file. The goal is to curb third-party entities that could melt down the whole system.