Google Launches AI Update to Rival Microsoft

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Google announced it is incorporating generative artificial intelligence (AI) into its core search engine, a move which comes after Microsoft introduced GPT-4 into its Bing search engine earlier this year.

The company claims that Google’s search engine will now be able to provide responses to open-ended queries, an option called “Search Generative Experience”. However, this system is still in its “experimental” phase and will only be available to a limited number of users.

“We are reimagining all of our core products, including search,” said Sundar Pichai, the boss of Google’s parent company Alphabet.

Google made the announcement at its annual developer conference, where leaders of the company displayed their latest advancements in AI and new hardware. The company said it was removing the waiting list for its experimental conversation chat service, “Bard”, which is expected to be launched in English in 180 countries, and added that the chatbot will soon be able to respond with images as well as text.

The huge success of its rival chatbot, ChatGPT funded by Microsoft, put a lot of pressure on Google to polish its AI offerings. This pressure was increased by the previous failed attempt to show off in the field, in which Bard had provided an incorrect answer in an advert meant to display its abilities.

This incident from February made the parent company drop $100 billion in share value, which shows how closely investors are watching the developments in the AI field.

The race towards the leading AI chatbot is evident, with Microsoft deploying ChatGPT tech into its search engine, and Chinese tech giant Baidu launching a chatbot called Ernie.

As was said by Chirag Dekate, an analyst at Gartner, Google seems to remain an industry leader and has the tools to dominate the AI battles. The question is, will they?