OpenAI CEO Sam Altman played the role of closing act for the opening keynote at Microsoft’s Build developer conference in Seattle on Tuesday morning, in an appearance that was perhaps more symbolic than substantive.
“This is probably the most exciting time to be building a startup, doing a product, whatever it is, that we’ve seen at least since the mobile phone, and probably since the internet,” he said. “And maybe even bigger than that.”
Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott set up the talk with Altman by using a marine metaphor — referencing the relative growth of AI supercomputing systems from the size of an orca to the scale of a giant whale over the past two years. OpenAI, he told Altman, is “making good use of the whale-sized computer right now.”
The elephant in the room was not addressed.
OpenAI has been embroiled in controversy this week after actress Scarlett Johansson questioned the similarities between her voice, as featured in the movie “Her,” and one of the voices in ChatGPT, after OpenAI reportedly tried unsuccessfully to get Johansson to provide the voice. OpenAI removed the voice in response.
Altman wasn’t asked about the dustup, and didn’t bring it up voluntarily, but he referenced the fact that OpenAI has been able to introduce new modalities such as voice as the speed of AI has increased and the cost has come down.
“Voice mode has been actually a genuine surprise for me,” he said.
Microsoft is a major investor in OpenAI, integrates OpenAI technology into its products, and provides computing resources to train and run OpenAI’s models.
Altman’s appearance Tuesday underscored the ongoing close relationship between the companies, which was perhaps more important after OpenAI announced it was releasing its new ChatGPT desktop app on Apple Mac computers last week, despite working closely with Microsoft on AI technologies.
During his keynote Tuesday morning, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called the company’s relationship with OpenAI its “most strategic, most important partnership” in the realm of AI.
At the event, Microsoft announced the availability of GPT-4o as part of its Azure OpenAI Service.
Other points made by Altman during his appearance:
- AI models will continue to get smarter, improving safety, utility and the value they can provide.
- While AI enables new capabilities, building enduring products and services still requires hard work.
- Significant progress has been made in developing robust and safe AI systems.
Referencing the growing ubiquity of artificial intelligence, Altman compared the current platform shift to the late 2000s, when companies would refer to themselves as “mobile,” before the technology reached the point that the designation was assumed, and no longer required to be explicit.
As with mobile, he said, AI is quickly becoming table stakes.
