Google on Wednesday said that it is opening Bard, a rival to Microsoft Corp-backed ChatGPT, to 180 countries as it expands use of artificial intelligence (AI) across its platform.
Executives at an annual Google developers conference in Silicon Valley said that generative AI would also be used to supercharge the tech giant’s leading search engine.
“We have been applying AI for a while, with generative AI we are taking the next step,” Google chief executive Sundar Pichai told thousands of developers gathered for the event.
Photo: Bloomberg
“We are reimagining all our core products, including search,” he said.
Google is racing to catch up with Microsoft, which has rushed to integrate ChatGPT-like powers in a wide array of its products, including the Bing search engine.
Google Search vice president Cathy Edwards said the new experience would be akin to a search that is “supercharged” by a conversational bot.
Photo: Bloomberg
Other Google executives laid out how generative AI is being woven into Gmail, photo editing, online work tools and more.
The company’s AI efforts would be carried out in a “bold and responsible” way, senior product director Jack Krawczyk said during a briefing.
Google’s expansion meant it removed a waitlist for Bard, letting users around the world engage with it in English after months of testing it out in the US and Britain.
Photo: AFP
Bard would be modified to support 40 languages in coming months, Krawczyk said.
“We’re excited to get Bard into more people’s hands,” he said. “We’re pretty fired up about where Bard is going.”
Google also announced browser “extensions” that would imbue apps and services such as Gmail and Maps with AI features.
Bard technology would enable features such as filling in text to help draft e-mails and suggesting ideas for artwork by scrutinizing a picture of available supplies.
Google is also letting partners build such extensions, including one from Adobe Inc that would let users generate images, Krawczyk said.
The tech titan also unveiled new Pixel devices including a US$1,799 foldable smartphone with a bendable screen that is the size of a tablet computer when opened.
"You're getting the best of both worlds," Google senior vice president of devices Rick Osterloh said of the Fold.
"It's a powerful smartphone when it's convenient and an immersive tablet when you need one."
Google also added a new tablet and a lower-priced version of its flagship smartphone to the Pixel lineup.
Google’s announcements came a week after Microsoft expanded public access to its generative AI programs, which are powered by models made by OpenAI Inc, the company behind ChatGPT.
“This could be a defining moment in the AI battle with Google and Microsoft going head-to-head for market share,” Wedbush Securities Inc analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors.
Microsoft's early investment in OpenAI gave it a head start "in this Game of Thrones Battle for Big Tech with Google now playing major catchup mode," Ives added.
AI-enhanced features of Microsoft’s Bing search engine and Edge Internet browser recently became open for anyone.
The services have been enhanced with the ability to work with images as well as text, and Microsoft intends to add video to the mix.
Despite the rollouts by two of the world’s biggest companies, risks from AI include its potential uses for disinformation, with voice clones, deep-fake videos and convincing written messages.
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