A bunch of AI startups just died today. OpenAI announces AI Bot Builder, AI App Store, multimodal, & more š
Silicon Valley has been so hyped for OpenAIās Developer Day, specifically the Sam Altman keynote that it's giving Steve Jobs-launches-the-iPhone energy. OpenAI kicked off its first developer conference in San Francisco today, 1 year after releasing the GPT publicly.
Letās get down to the announcements and what they mean for B2B SaaS companies looking for their AI angle.
AI Assistants for All: Introducing GPT Builder
OpenAI now empowers anyone to build their own AI Assistant (something they are calling āGPTsā) ā no coding required! You can make them for yourself, for your companyās internal use, or for everyone on the internet.
Creating one is as easy as starting a conversation with ChatGPT - by typing or talking - giving it instructions and extra knowledge (through uploading files of any type, or inputting custom instructions), and picking what it can do, like searching the web, making images or analyzing data for you.
You can customize your AI Assistant using your own custom prompts and instruction sets, so your AI assistant does only what you want it to and nothing more. I have to say their demo was extremely impressive and Iām sure many developers in the audience were getting nervous, watching AI automation make their day job redundant.
For Enterprise GPT customers, they are also allowing for the creation of custom enterprise models. This lets businesses modify every aspect of the LLM design process, offering a deep level of customization. With the ability to fine-tune, businesses can tailor the AI model to their unique needs which makes the LLM more useful for their specific use cases.
Implications for AI startups: A LOT of OpenAI āwrapperā startups just died today. AI startups building frontends on top of OpenAI APIs are now better positioned as features (or GPTs) vs. stand-alone products. It's rough time out there for AI founders š
Implications for B2B SaaS: As Iām thinking about Microsoft Co-Pilot, Zoom Companion, Canva Magic Studio, the hundreds of customer service chatbots, virtual agents and so onā¦ it seems that the only MOAT these SaaS companies have (in offering AI products) is their incumbency with existing client bases. OpenAI is the clear leader in developing LLMs by a long shot. What is the differentiated value of the [Insert SaaS Company] AI Assistant vs. OpenAI GPTs? The only one I can think of is easier implementation into X use case? Further, now that ābuild your own custom GPTā is available with no coding needed and very competitive pricingā¦ Iām not sure āthe great AI pivotā will work for the generic SaaS business anymore.
Net net, OpenAI is democratizing LLMs and you donāt need to code to make a custom AI Assistant or Bot. That is HUGE.
Introducing the first AI App Store
Yeap - Sam is going for it and the introduction of the GPT Store confirms many suspicions. Make no mistake, OpenAI is on a mission to build a new kind of computer or operating system entirely, beyond just an LLM for a middleware / frontend.
Once your AI Assistant (or GPT) is in the store, GPTs become searchable and can climb leaderboards. OpenAI will also spotlight some GPTs in categories like productivity, education, and ājust for funā. They are also planning to launch a revenue sharing program for developers. Builders will have the power to combine different AI tools into custom workflows, while AI will learn to do the same.
Implications for AI startups: If you are building an app on top of an AI API, itās now a candidate for the GPT store. Unfortunately, this severely limits your margins and pricing abilities. I wonder how long it will take Sam to realize he can cut out the developer community and get his AI to build all his GPTs for himā¦ š
Implications for B2B SaaS: OpenAI is positioning itself as THE new AI platform on which business is conducted - like iOS or Android. I think every B2B SaaS business should be looking at their OpenAI strategy if they donāt already have one. There is a unique opportunity for you to build on top of the APIs and supercharge a custom model with a real-time data boost. Much of an AI's power comes from its training and fine-tuning, but it can be supercharged by tapping into real-time high quality data. If you have this, you could unlock a whole new level of capabilities.
I suspect OpenAI plans to unveil a new operating system in 2024ā¦ I wonder what Microsoft will think of this. Ps. Did anyone else catch the weird energy between Sam and Satya on stage? Definitely felt like Satya forced himself onto that stage (that $10B cheque probably helped) and Sam did not want him thereā¦
GPT-4 Turbo: More capable, cheaper and multimodal
GPT-4 Turbo was announced to have knowledge of up to April 2023 with an increased context window that fits 300+ pages of text in a single prompt. It now accepts images, files and voice inputs (through Whisper V3). Yes you can talk to GPT now instead of just typing in it. HUGE!
It also offers Text to Speech functionality, providing natural-sounding audio output with six preset voices. Great for improving accessibility.
GPT-4 Turbo also has an āall modelsā mode, which differs from GPT 4 where you had to select the model to run your query on. (ie. Browse with Bing, DALLĀ·E, Whisper 3). The AI will determine which model is best to use for your question so you donāt have to.
Developers will also have more control over GPT with the introduction of JSON mode, ensuring they can fine-tune their interactions. Furthermore, OpenAI is enhancing GPT's world knowledge by allowing users to input their own documents into its knowledge base (not shared with other users), making it an even more knowledgeable and versatile tool for various tasks.
Implications for AI startups: If you were building any of the aboveā¦ Let this be a lesson learned. The incumbent in your industry is never your friend. This is the risk of building on someone elseās stack, it always comes back to bite you.
Implications for B2B SaaS: OpenAI has an unprecedented investment from Microsoft ($10B) and thus they are going to make unprecedented strides in developing their LLMs vs. anything you are doing internally. Itās going to be tough to catch up, perhaps an API strategy is the way to approach development to keep your existing customer base sticky and manage costs in the long term. Expect OpenAI to come collecting their past due royalties at a later date though. I will double click again on the real time, high quality data opportunity for B2B SaaS here - AI's power comes from training and fine-tuning of LLMs on specific data sets. If you can offer real-time high quality data inputs, this could be a differentiator.
My predictions on OpenAIās next 12 months roadmap
Disclaimer: I am not an AI expert, this is not financial advice :) Just a girl on the internet who likes to write about interesting technologies.
But if I were to guess, here is where the online chatter says OpenAI is heading that I agree with:
Upload Anything to ChatGPT: You'll be able to input just about anything into ChatGPT.
Connect All Apps into the OpenAI Operating System: You heard it here firstā¦an AI operating system coming 2024 from Mr. Altman
Persistent Memory: ChatGPT will remember past conversations, ensuring a smoother chat experience unless you prefer a fresh start.
Customizable Personality: You'll have the power to customize ChatGPT's personality towards your likings, political leanings, education level and more.
Multimodal Responses: ChatGPT will communicate through text, voice, images, diagrams, and videosā¦. The modes will continue to expand.
Lightning-Fast Responses: ChatGPT will become so quick that it'll feel like you're chatting with a real person.
Reduced Errors: Mistakes and hallucinations in responses will decrease significantly.
Improved Self-Moderation: As ChatGPT gets better at moderating itself, the rejection of questions will become less common.
Autonomous agents (or AI assistants) with 100-fold capabilities that will replace entry level professional services labor (bye bye interns)
Exciting times are ahead as OpenAI pushes the boundaries of AI and makes it more accessible and capable than ever before. We're only scratching the surface of what's possible!
Too bad they are killing the startup ecosystem as they continue to innovate. AI Founders - Send Lina Khan your 2 cents in the masses, petition for fair competition regulation, thatās the only hope anyone has against OpenAI & Microsoft right now. Good Luck!
