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- Meta is Going Hard on AI 🤖
Meta is Going Hard on AI 🤖
And also: Data insight on OpenAI hiring..
Update 2023-02-28:
Meta Formulates Generative AI Team with Chris Cox at the Helm
Qualcomm CEO: Apple 5G Chip Could be Ready by 2024
Alphabet Shuts Down Everyday Robots Project
Salesforce Facing Pressure to Increase Profits as Competition Mounts in CRM and CX Space
OpenAI, Ex-Big Tech Workers Fuel AI Race with Microsoft, Google
Navigating AI Deployment: Preparing for AGI and Beyond
Microsoft Rolls Out AI-Powered Cloud Platform for Telecom Companies with AT&T Seeing Positive Results
Snapchat Launches AI-Powered Chatbot My AI
State of Fintech - CBINISGHTS report
FTC Abandons Efforts to Block Merger of Meta and Within Unlimited
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Big Tech and Startups
Mark Zuckerberg has announced the creation of a new product group inside Meta focused on generative AI development. The new team will be led by Chief Product Officer Chris Cox and focus on creating expressive and creative tools for use in Meta's products, such as text chatting applications and image filters.
Competitors like Google and Microsoft have already integrated large language models developed by OpenAI into their products, while Snap recently announced plans to integrate ChatGPT into Snapchat.
Meta is also working on its large language model, LLaMA, but is distinguished as smaller and more affordable than competitor models.
At the same time, Meta is preparing a summit in its metaverse division, Reality Labs, next week at Menlo Park, California headquarters. The summit will focus on the "road map and vision-setting presentations," with one meeting titled "Must Go Faster."
Reality Labs has been struggling, incurring a loss of $13.7 billion in 2022 and $4.3 billion in Q4 of last year. As part of its "year of efficiency" plan, Meta is canceling projects and cracking down on its metaverse division with potential layoffs.
📝 Cloudly quick take: Meta is getting into the AI gold rush with full force. Given their already deep knowledge in the field, large data sets, and Ad business (which uses AI), we are surprised this did not happen earlier. It also seems like the focus on "Meta" will shift somewhat back from the "Metaverse," a venture that has received critics from the market. How long will it be before the Group changes its name again?
Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said Apple's 5G chip could be ready by 2024. Qualcomm is the current exclusive supplier of 5G modems for Apple devices, but Apple has been rumored to be designing its own chip as a replacement. The Snapdragon X75 modem from Qualcomm has further cellular speed and power efficiency improvements compared to the X65 found in iPhone 14 models.
Alphabet is shutting down its Everyday Robots project, with the technology and a portion of the team being consolidated into existing robotics efforts within Google Research. Alphabet has been cutting costs this year, with Google having laid off approximately 12,000 workers in January and another robotics venture, Intrinsic, having had a roughly 20 percent cut to its headcount in the same month.
Everyday Robots was launched in 2019 with the aim of designing armed robots that could help out in domestic and office settings. Building robots that can take on such work in unstructured and unpredictable environments like offices is notoriously tricky. Despite Alphabet's initial burst of activity in robotics acquisitions a decade ago, their ventures have never gotten off the ground.
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SaaS and Cloud
Salesforce, a CRM and CX giant, faces pressure to increase profit margins from an activist investor. The CRM software market is expected to show strong growth through 2025, and more companies are offering CRM tools to meet the demand.
According to analyst Dan Miller from Opus Research, Salesforce is attempting to be a single-source provider for CX and CRM. Still, it faces increasing competition from other cloud services such as AWS, Google, Adobe and Microsoft. Miller also discusses the macroeconomic changes affecting Salesforce's prospects and how AI enables a broader suite of services for customer experience.
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AI
OpenAI, Ex-Big Tech Workers Fuel AI Race with Microsoft, Google (4 minutes read)
OpenAI has hired dozens of former Google and Meta employees, according to new data. The data shows that the ex-Google staff makes up a large portion of OpenAI's workers.
The company is also employing former Apple and Amazon staff. OpenAI's leadership team consists mostly of ex-Big Tech workers, including several from Google, Meta, and Apple.
Its recent hire of Tesla's Andrej Karpathy as head of Autopilot indicates its ambitions in the AI race. In addition, as most is already aware of, Microsoft has incorporated OpenAI's technology into its "new Bing" search engine, setting up an AI war between the two companies and Google.
OpenAI has hired dozens of former Google and Meta employees, according to new data. The data shows that the ex-Google staff makes up a large portion of OpenAI's workers.
The company is also employing former Apple and Amazon staff. OpenAI's leadership team consists mostly of ex-Big Tech workers, including several from Google, Meta, and Apple.
Its recent hire of Tesla's Andrej Karpathy as head of Autopilot indicates its ambitions in the AI race. In addition, as most is already aware of, Microsoft has incorporated OpenAI's technology into its "new Bing" search engine, setting up an AI war between the two companies and Google.
📝 Cloudly quick take: According to LinkedIn data, there are 665 employee profiles at OpenAI. This company is not feeling any slowdown, and the number of profiles has nearly doubled in the last six months.
There is a significant amount of hiring across the board for OpenAI. Interestingly, the number of profiles within "General and admin" functions has increased significantly, likely due to the commercialization of their services. This has increased the need for more supporting tasks in the company.
Looking at the data, it is clear that the company is investing heavily in growing the organization. There is currently 39 open position at OpenAI, slightly down compared to three months ago. That the open positions have not increased much might, indicate significant inbound of potential hires (so open positions are not needed) or that the hiring phase might slow down slightly in the near term.
OpenAI has released a blog post that discusses the planning preparation for AGI. The following is a short summary:
Microsoft has launched Azure Operator Nexus, an AI-powered cloud platform for telecom companies. Microsoft's flagship customer, AT&T, has seen positive results from the platform. The new platform is intended to make telecommunications networks more efficient and cost-effective.
Snap Inc. has released a new AI-enabled chatbot, My AI, powered by OpenAI’s GPT technology. My AI will be available at the top of Snapchat's chat tab, allowing users to interact with it like they would with their friends. Snap has warned users not to share any secrets with the bot.
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Fintech
Global fintech funding reached $75.2B in 2022 but dropped 46% from 2021's record levels. Deals also fell 8% YoY to 5,048 in the same period. In addition, mega-rounds of $100M+ accounted for $36.5B of the total funding — a 60% decline compared to 2021.
Bank sector funding saw the sharpest decline (63% YoY), while Africa was the only major region with an increase (25%) in deals. US fintech funding plunged 50% to $32.8B; however, it remained the second-highest year on record for US fintech. Insurtech M&A exits reached an all-time high at 81 deals (up 40%). Fintech unicorn births decreased significantly (87%) in Q4'22, rivaling pre-Covid lows.
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Funding & M&A
The Federal Trade Commission on Friday abandoned its effort to block the merger of Meta and Virtual-Reality startup Within Unlimited, resulting in a victory for Facebook parent company Meta. The challenge originated from FTC Chair Lina Khan's opposition to the expansion of big technology companies. Both the administrative case and the federal court litigation were closely watched due to the FTC's focus on potential future competition in a nascent industry.
In July 2021, the FTC sued to block the Meta-Within deal, claiming it would lessen competition. On Jan. 31, U.S. District Judge Edward Davila denied the FTC's request for a court order halting Meta's purchase of Within and found that "Meta did not have available feasible means to enter [the] relevant market other than by acquisition." The FTC accepted this ruling without appeal and allowed Meta to close its acquisition of Within on Feb. 8 officially.
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