Microsoft and OpenAI are competing against Google and others in the AI race. The latter wants to stop the two parties from being so closely tied to one another.
In early 2023, Microsoft invested $10 billion in OpenAI. Since then, courtesy of OpenAI models, it has built Copilot functionality into virtually every application covered by its own suite. Google is also not sitting still with AI capabilities in Workspace, Gemini, and more but is doing so independently.
End of exclusivity?
Google is primarily unhappy with Microsoft and OpenAI’s exclusive collaboration. According to The Information, the search engine giant wants the Federal Trade Commission to intervene. Sources familiar with the discussions reportedly stated that the U.S. competition authority was told the deal should be called off. Google is said to have reached this conclusion after being approached by the FTC to provide feedback on Microsoft’s behavior in the market.
Google is trying to place the partnership among the many alleged attempts at lock-in from Microsoft. Namely, those not already using Microsoft Azure would have higher costs to use OpenAI technology. From Google, this is a bad point because it draws users away from Google Cloud and Workspace, as these cloud services and this suite cannot run OpenAI models directly.
Unequal struggle
The revelation is the first development in the FTC investigation into Microsoft, which started recently. The authority would look at the Redmond tech giant’s practices in a variety of ways, with not only Azure, 365 or the OpenAI deal under discussion.
Incidentally, Google must also fear action from the U.S. government. Should a judge agree with the demand from Washington, Google must be broken up due to illegal monopolistic practices. There, the stumbling block is the company’s dominance in the field of search engines combined with advertising revenue.
Microsoft claimed that Google also holds a generous position in the AI field. Although it was behind the introduction of generative AI (ChatGPT came months before Google Bard -now Gemini- and is still considered better), according to Microsoft it is the only one that can handle the AI battle without outside help. Perhaps that theory will still be tested if Microsoft’s deal with OpenAI actually gets canned.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai threw additional oil on the fire this week. “They are using someone else’s models,” Pichai said. He said he would be happy to see a comparison between Google’s and Microsoft’s models. Earlier, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had said that Google had squandered its AI lead and should have been the “default winner” of the GenAI race.
Also read: Official investigation into possible Nvidia monopoly