🤖 AI-Powered App Boom: 4000%+ Increase in User Spending

📝 Update 2023-04-13

Headlines for today’s Business Edge update.

• 🐘 Big Tech

  • LinkedIn Offers Free Identity and Employment Verification Options

• 📈 Startups and technology

  • Intel and Arm Partner for Mobile Chipset Development Using 18A Process

• ☁️ SaaS and Cloud

  • Microsoft Expands Cloud Capabilities for Payers and Launches New AI Services

• 🤖 AI

  • UMG Calls for AI Lyric and Melody Scraping Ban on Apple and Spotify Microsoft Integrates ChatGPT-Powered AI into Bing Search Results

  • AI-Powered Apps Surge in Popularity, User Spending Increases by Over 4000%

  • Nvidia Upgrades Mid-Range Gaming Chip with AI Technology

• 💰 Venture Capital and M&A

  • VC Funding Plummets in Q1 2023; Late-Stage Deal Value Drops to $11.6 Billion

Let’s get started 👇

🐘 Big Tech

The Big Tech companies that move the market, FANG, and more.

LinkedIn Offers Free Identity and Employment Verification Options

LinkedIn is introducing new ways for users to verify their identity and employment without a price tag. The company has partnered with CLEAR, a secure identity platform, to provide identity verification for LinkedIn users in the United States. Users will need to provide a government-issued ID and phone number to verify their identity, which will then be displayed in a new "Verifications" section on their profile. In addition, users worldwide can verify their employment through their company email, and LinkedIn has partnered with Microsoft to issue digital workplace IDs for free to eligible users. These features aim to increase trust and authenticity on the platform and differentiate LinkedIn from Twitter and Meta, which bundle verification with additional paid features.

💎 PRO LinkedIn's introduction of free identity and employment verification options is a strategic response to Twitter's paid verification. By offering these features for free, LinkedIn enhances trust and credibility within its professional community, setting itself apart from competitors like Twitter and Meta. This move encourages user engagement, attracts businesses and recruiters, and ultimately strengthens LinkedIn's position as a social network focused on trust, authenticity, and accessibility.

📈 Startups and technology

The latest from the world of startups and technology companies.

Intel and Arm Partner for Mobile Chipset Development Using 18A Process

Intel and Arm announced a partnership to develop low-power SoCs on Intel's 18A process, focusing initially on mobile chipsets with Arm-based CPU cores. The collaboration will later extend to automotive, IoT, data center, and aerospace and government applications. Intel's foundry will manufacture the chips, while Arm will provide design technology co-optimization for improved power, performance, and cost. The partnership aligns with Intel's IDM 2.0 strategy, which invests in global manufacturing capacity to ease supply chain bottlenecks. The 18A process, a 1.8 nm technology, signifies a move towards smaller SoCs with increased transistor density.

☁️ SaaS and Cloud

Software-as-a-Service and Cloud-based company news.

Microsoft Expands Cloud Capabilities for Payers and Launches New AI Services

Microsoft has introduced new cloud capabilities and AI services for payers to enhance data management, member outreach, and care management. These include a unified member view, a care management outreach tool, and remote care management features. Additionally, Microsoft has launched AI tools as part of Azure AI Services for Health, focusing on extracting social determinants of health information from unstructured text and leveraging cancer data for research and clinical trial matching.

🤖 AI

Keeping you updated on the latest in AI.

UMG Calls for AI Lyric and Melody Scraping Ban on Apple and Spotify

Universal Music Group (UMG) has requested streaming platforms like Apple and Spotify to block AI services from accessing copyrighted song lyrics and melodies. UMG aims to protect its artists and prevent AI bots from generating music based on popular artists' intellectual property. The company has been sending takedown requests for unauthorized AI-generated songs appearing on streaming services.

Microsoft Integrates ChatGPT-Powered AI into Bing Search Results

Microsoft has begun integrating its ChatGPT-powered AI into Bing search results, allowing the chatbot to automatically provide users with information related to their queries. Previously, users had to activate the AI feature manually. Microsoft's integration is currently in the testing phase, and concerns remain about the AI's potential to provide misleading or inaccurate information. Additionally, some websites worry that the chatbot's integration may divert traffic away from their sites, as users may rely solely on the AI-generated response rather than visiting the cited sources.

💎 PRO If users begin to rely solely on AI-generated responses and stop visiting the websites that produce content, it could indeed have a negative impact on the overall content quality on the web. Content creators and publishers currently invest time and resources into producing high-quality content in order to attract traffic from search engines, which in turn generates revenue through advertising or other means.

Without the incentive of search engine-driven traffic, content creators might struggle to maintain the same level of investment in producing quality content. This could lead to several potential consequences:

Lower quality content: As the financial incentives diminish, content creators may prioritize quantity over quality, resulting in a decline in the overall quality of content available on the web.

Reduced diversity of content: With fewer resources available for content production, there might be a reduction in the diversity of content offered on the web. Niche topics and specialized information may become less available, limiting users' access to a broad range of perspectives and knowledge.

Adverse impact on smaller publishers: Smaller publishers and independent content creators may be disproportionately affected by this change. Unable to compete with larger players, they may struggle to maintain their online presence, leading to reduced competition and further consolidation of content production.

Increased reliance on AI-generated content: As human-produced content quality declines, users may increasingly turn to AI-generated content, which may not always be accurate or reliable. This could perpetuate a cycle of declining content quality and further reliance on AI-generated information.

In order to prevent this decline in content quality, it is essential for search engines like Bing and Google to find a balance between providing AI-generated responses and encouraging users to visit the original sources. This will help maintain the incentives for content creators to produce high-quality content while still offering users the convenience of AI-generated information.

AI-Powered Apps Surge in Popularity, User Spending Increases by Over 4000%

The increasing interest in generative AI tools has led to a significant rise in AI-powered apps on app stores, resulting in a 1480% YoY increase in such apps in Q1. Analytics firm Apptopia reports that user spending on these apps has skyrocketed by 4184% YoY, reaching nearly $3 million in March. Microsoft has also benefited from integrating OpenAI tech with Bing, seeing a 1000% increase in average daily downloads. However, analysts remain cautious about the staying power of these AI-assistant apps.

Nvidia Upgrades Mid-Range Gaming Chip with AI Technology

Nvidia Corp has announced the introduction of its new RTX 4070 chip, which features more artificial intelligence capabilities to enhance graphics in video games. Priced at $599, the new chip will be positioned in the mid-range of Nvidia's GPU offerings. The chip it replaces, the RTX 3060, is currently the fourth most popular gaming chip on the market. Although Nvidia has experienced substantial revenue growth from its data center chips used in training AI systems like ChatGPT, gaming chips still contribute to about a third of the company's $26.9 billion fiscal 2023 revenue. The new RTX 4070 chips employ AI technology to predict the values of pixels on a screen, allowing for faster image rendering and more realistic visuals in games.

💰 Venture Capital and M&A

Follow the market trends in Venture Capital and the latest tech M&A.

VC Funding Plummets in Q1 2023; Late-Stage Deal Value Drops to $11.6 Billion

Venture capital (VC) funding took a nosedive in Q1 2023, with late-stage deal value declining for the seventh consecutive quarter to just $11.6 billion. The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank added pressure to the market, causing uncertainty and further funding reductions.

Median late-stage VC pre-money valuation fell 16.9% to $54.0 million, and total exit value plummeted to $5.8 billion, which is less than 1% of the total exit value generated in 2021. Only 20 public listings occurred in Q1, intensifying pressure on the ecosystem due to a high number of unicorns unable to realize returns.

Furthermore, only $11.7 billion was closed across 99 funds, starkly contrasting the fundraising momentum in 2021. Market confidence has taken a significant hit due to numerous factors, including high-interest rates, bank failures, and the possibility of government default.