OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently indicated that AGI might be closer than anticipated, claiming that the benchmark is achievable with current hardware. Despite the safety concerns expressed by users, the executive says they won’t be experienced at the AGI moment as the milestone would whoosh away with surprisingly little societal impact.
More recently, AGI predictions by ChatGPT and Copilot unanimously placed OpenAI as the top contender for the crown, partly due to its Microsoft tie-up and early lead in the AI landscape. Interestingly, there seem to be varied definitions of what AGI means, with the most common version stating that it’s an AI system that surpasses human cognitive capabilities across a wide range of tasks.
But what does the coveted milestone mean to Microsoft and OpenAI? According to a leaked document exclusively obtained by The Information, Microsoft and OpenAI signed an agreement in 2023 stating that the ChatGPT maker will only hit the AGI benchmark once it develops an AI system that can generate up to $100 billion in profits.
READ MORE: Sam Altman says AGI is becoming a “less useful term” with o1
This seems like a stretch because OpenAI was on the verge of bankruptcy, with projections of making a $5 billion loss within the next few months. A round of funding from key investors, including Microsoft, NVIDIA, SoftBank, and Thrive Capita,l managed to keep the firm’s operations afloat after raising $6.6 billion, pushing its market cap well beyond $157 billion.
For context, OpenAI spends $7 billion on training its AI models and an additional $1.5 billion on staffing while generating $3.5 billion in revenue. Perhaps more concerning, a report suggested that the ChatGPT maker could endure a massive $44 billion loss before seeing profit in 202,9 partly due to the Microsoft tie-up.
This potentially explains OpenAI’s recent introduction of a $200 subscription plan (ChatGPT Pro) with unlimited access to OpenAI o1, GPT-4o, and Advanced Voice mode. Additionally, OpenAI could raise the subscription fee for its next-gen AI models to a whopping $2,000/month.
Elsewhere, the AI firm is under immense pressure to transform into a for-profit business entity following the huge investment made by investors during its recent funding round. Failure to meet this threshold could open up a can of worms for the company, including outsider interference and hostile takeovers.
Market analysts predict Microsoft could acquire OpenAI within the next 3 years, attributing their speculations to the AI hype fading away, prompting investors to channel their resources into other ventures. Interestingly, a technical employee at OpenAI claims the firm might have already achieved AGI following the release of its o1 reasoning model to broad availability.
Could this be the reason the company is reportedly working on scrapping a stringent AGI clause that could sever its partnership with Microsoft? If OpenAI’s tech bromance with Microsoft ends, it may no longer have enough funding for its sophisticated AI advances and computing power. It’ll be interesting to see how the ChatGPT maker will sieve through the exorbitant costs of building and developing AI and still generate up to $100 billion in profit.
