Google is set to invest $2 billion in the AI startup Anthropic, created by former members of OpenAI, as competition in the AI field intensifies. This funding deal will comprise $500 million initially and up to $1.5 billion later, according to reports from The Wall Street Journal. Google has not yet issued an official comment regarding this development. In April, Google had already invested $300 million, gaining a 10% stake in the company. In September, Amazon also announced plans to invest as much as $4 billion in Anthropic, securing a minority ownership position in the firm, reflecting the fierce competition within the growing generative AI sector dominated by OpenAI's ChatGPT.
Anthropic is the creator of Claude 2, a rival chatbot to OpenAI's ChatGPT, which boasts strong performance on GRE reading and writing exams, as well as quantitative reasoning, ranking above the 90th percentile. Anthropic had the honour of being one of four companies invited to a meeting at the White House to engage in discussions on responsible AI development with US Vice President Kamala Harris. The other companies in attendance included Alphabet, Microsoft, and OpenAI.
Anthropic has selected Amazon Web Services (AWS) Trainium and Inferentia chips for building, training, and deploying its future foundational models. This choice leverages the price, performance, scalability, and security benefits of AWS. As of July 2023, Anthropic had successfully raised $1.5 billion in funding. The company was founded in 2021 by former senior members of OpenAI, most notably Daniela Amodei and Dario Amodei, with the latter having served as OpenAI's Vice President of Research.
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This significant investment by Google highlights the escalating race among tech giants to advance their AI capabilities and foothold in the AI market.
Inputs from IANS
