Apple The Latest Tech Giant To Invest In OpenAI

Reports from The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg are suggesting that Apple and Nvidia are considering investing in OpenAI. This is a change for Apple, who usually focuses on manufacturing partners’ investments.

The upcoming funding round, led by Thrive Capital, could value OpenAI at more than $100 billion (about £76 billion). Microsoft, which has been a consistent investor in OpenAI, is also expected to participate.

These investments would further strengthen the relationships between these tech companies and OpenAI, solidifying their roles in the fast-growing AI sector.

What Could These Giants Gain From The Investment?

For Apple, investing in OpenAI could really help the company advance its AI, especially when it comes to improving the Siri feature. This investment could mean more access to advanced AI tech for Apple for better integration into its products and services.

For Nvidia, joining this funding round could deepen its ties with OpenAI so its hardware stays a critical part of AI operations, which could in turn reinforce the chip maker’s position in the AI hardware industry.

How Does This Fit Into Apple’s Plans For AI?

As seen in recent news, Apple has been trying to expand its AI features, with the latest Apple Intelligence feature being introduced. Apple Intelligence includes a combination of its own AI models, as well as those from partners such as Openai. In investing in OpenAI, Apple has the opportunity to develop these AI more.

This is not one of Apple’s usual investments as noted, because they focus on mainly securing supply chains and manufacturing partnerships, so this investment is definitely a change from the norm. This could mean that Apple is growing more interested in directly engaging with tech that intends to improve their products.

Although this investment would be an exception, Apple has made similar strategic investments in the past, such as its involvement with DiDi Chuxing and SoftBank’s Vision Fund.

How Could This Affect Consumers?

For consumers, Apple investing in OpenAI could mean more sophisticated AI features in everyday devices, for a new way to interact with and use Apple products. Improved voice assistance, and more personalised services means that these devices could become more responsive and intuitive going forward.

With greater integration of AI into consumer products, privacy and security become more of a priority inevitably. Consumers might be worried about how their data is being used and shared.

Apple and Nvidia, along with OpenAI, would need to address these with plans and transparent policies that comply with regulations at the same time as upholding consumer trust.

What Do Experts Think Of This Move?

Ben Waterman, Founder of Strabo shared his views on this move. He said, “It’s certainly interesting and comes as no great surprise given firstly the ongoing AI hype and the significant cash burn that they’re running to keep Chat-GPT alive.

“The Nvidia investment is not particularly novel – they’re a key supplier to Open AI, who rely on Nvidia chips. It’s the Apple investment which is interesting as this increases the likelihood that Apple will integrate ChatGPT into iOS, which would be a significant departure from the theme of tech giants building their own AI.

“Personally I think it’s a smart move – they are risking little and sticking to what they do best – hardware. It also means that OpenAI will have Microsoft, Nvidia and Apple as investors, which could throw up some interesting incentives in future as their competition hots up.”

This is definitely a conversation that will continue to unfold as time goes, and as the companies confirm and announce the partnerships. The tech world will be watching closely as this progresses.