Google CEO Sundar Pichai told The Wall Street Journal that the company plans to add an AI-powered chatbot to its search engine as more tech giants use the service. Adding AI features will allow Google to compete with OpenAI, which Microsoft is investing in.
Pichai says conversational AI will help his company handle a broader range of search queries. Google is leading the way in developing large language models (LLMs) that can generate responses and respond to prompts in much the same way as a human. The company will now work to use this technology to improve the user experience on its search engine. The head of Google is confident that users will be able to ask questions to the system and interact with LLM in the context of the search.
In March of this year, OpenAI released an updated version of its language model, GPT-4, while Google created the Bard chatbot as a competitor to ChatGPT. The rapid development of artificial intelligence technology is causing concern both within the industry and beyond. Last month, Elon Musk and a number of other experts called for a pause in the development of advanced artificial intelligence systems, as this could carry a risk to society. Sundar Pichai doesn’t think chatbots can threaten Google’s search business, but noted that the “opportunity space” is now larger than it used to be.
Google has begun experimenting with new AI features in Gmail and its other services. Pichai considers it necessary to adapt resources to continue the development of AI. The company’s two main artificial intelligence divisions, Google Brain and DeepMind, will begin to work more closely with each other to build larger algorithms.
