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☆ Twilio cofounder Jeff Lawson appears to have just bought The Onion
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-25 | by ( Katherine Long | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Satirical news website The Onion was sold to a company called Global Tetrahedron. Global Tetrahedron is also the name of a fictional evil megacorporation in a long-running Onion gag. But it's a real company, and Twilio founder Jeff Lawson appears to be behind it. AdvertisementJeff Lawson, the cofounder of cloud computing company Twilio, appears to have purchased the satirical news website The Onion from G/O Media. When asked whether he had purchased The Onion, Lawson played coy.

Persons: Jeff Lawson, —, Lawson, Jim Spanfeller, Katie Robertson, Spanfeller, coy, O Organizations: Service, O, New York Times Locations: San Francisco, Chicago

☆ Microsoft is blocking employee access to Perplexity AI, one of its largest Azure OpenAI customers
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-23 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Microsoft blocks access to Perplexity AI, a major Azure OpenAI customer, for at least some staff. Perplexity AI uses Microsoft's Azure OpenAI to power its AI chatbot search engine. Microsoft is blocking employee access to Perplexity AI, one of the largest customers of its Azure OpenAI service, according to two people familiar with the matter. Perplexity's product is an AI chatbot search engine that provides conversational answers. It's powered by Microsoft's Azure OpenAI service, which helps companies like Walmart and JPMorgan Chase build generative AI into their operations and products.

Organizations: Microsoft, Walmart, JPMorgan Chase, Cola, Business

☆ Microsoft has a target to amass 1.8 million AI chips by the end of the year, internal document shows
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-17 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: 1 min

Microsoft internally targets 1.8 million GPUs by December 2024, a document shows. Microsoft likely is buying and using several different GPUs for different tasks. Microsoft has an internal target to amass 1.8 million AI chips by the end of 2024, according to a document viewed by Business Insider. Microsoft is trying to make generative AI faster, better, and cheaper, but the effort relies heavily on Microsoft buying the chips, graphic processing units, primarily from designer Nvidia. The document suggests that Microsoft plans to triple the number of GPUs it has in 2024.

Organizations: Microsoft, Business, Nvidia

☆ Some Amazon employees are complaining about projected pay cuts, internal messages show
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-12 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Amazon employees are complaining about projected cuts, according to internal messages. Amazon has a complex pay system that includes a lot of equity-based compensation. AdvertisementSome Amazon employees are complaining about cuts in future pay, according to internal Slack messages viewed by Business Insider. This is the time of year when employees at Amazon hear about their compensation. Some staff posted on Slack recently that they were seeing cuts of as much as 20% to their projected total compensation.

Persons: —, Slack Organizations: Service, Business, Amazon

☆ Microsoft made cuts to its Teams chat app to focus on its Copilot AI tools, leaked memo shows
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-01 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Read previewMicrosoft reorganized teams under Jared Spataro, its head of "AI at Work," shifting focus to its Copilot AI products and reducing the number of employees working on its Teams chat app, according to an excerpt of an internal memo shared with Business Insider. "In early 2022, we recognized the pandemic as a once-in-a-generation opportunity and we surged on Teams to win," Spataro wrote. AdvertisementMicrosoft spokesman Frank Shaw confirmed Spataro is putting more resources behind Copilot, but said Teams remains a core priority and Copilot is a part of Teams. Copilot for Teams, Shaw said, is the company's most used and loved Copilot according to customer surveys and research and will continue to be a focus of future investments. Microsoft is leaning into the potential of its new Copilot tools, built on OpenAI's GPT models, which so far have mixed feedback from customers.

Persons: —, Jared Spataro, Spataro, Colette Stallbaumer, Frank Shaw, Shaw, OpenAI's, Ashley Stewart, Axel Springer Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Business

☆ Microsoft customers complain Copilot doesn't work as well as ChatGPT. Microsoft says they're not using it right.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-28 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

ChatGPT, OpenAI's artificial-intelligence chatbot, has set relatively high expectations for customers who are now trying out Microsoft Copilot tools for the first time. Feedback for the tool has been mixed to leaning positive so far, according to the Microsoft employees who spoke with BI. But Microsoft employees told BI the comparisons with ChatGPT kept coming up. Advertisement'Work' Copilot vs. 'web' CopilotA source of customer confusion is that there's a "work" version of Copilot for Microsoft 365 and a "web" version of the tool. For instance, a Microsoft customer may use the web version of Copilot to search publicly available information about a client.

Persons: —, ChatGPT, they're, ChatGPT Copilot, that's, Jared Spataro, Copilots, Spataro Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Business, SharePoint, Copilot

☆ Microsoft's hiring of Inflection staff came amid a lack of consumer-AI vision and board concerns about OpenAI, insiders say
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-20 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Microsoft's hiring spree from the startup Inflection AI came amid concerns from the software giant's board about instability at OpenAI and internal doubts about consumer-AI vision and strategy, insiders said. Suleyman, who cofounded the AI pioneer DeepMind, is set to be CEO of Microsoft AI. Microsoft's consumer-AI vision needed a boostSome Microsoft insiders told Business Insider the company's consumer-AI strategy needed a boost and more of a visionary leader. As the new CEO of Microsoft AI, Suleyman's purview is set to include thousands of employees who report to Mikhail Parakhin. Parakhin has played a significant role in Microsoft's AI work and is generally respected within the company for his technical prowess.

Persons: Mustafa Suleyman, Karén Simonyan, Suleyman, they've, Mikhail Parakhin, Parakhin, Rajesh Jha, Jha wasn't, Jha, Microsoft's, Frank Shaw, Shaw, Sam Altman, Satya Nadella, Nadella hadn't, Nadella, Amy Hood, It's, didn't, OpenAI Organizations: Big Tech, Business, Microsoft, BI, Google, Insiders, Microsoft's Locations: OpenAI

☆ An OpenAI mystery: YouTube videos, Google throttling, and AI training data.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-18 | by ( Alistair Barr | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Read previewThe AI community assumes that OpenAI uses vast quantities of YouTube videos to train models, including its new Sora offering. The mystery is how OpenAI accesses enough YouTube content to make this work. Business Insider asked OpenAI whether it has downloaded YouTube videos at scale and whether the startup uses this content as data for AI model training. Google, OpenAI, and other tech companies are currently arguing that using copyrighted content for AI model training is also legal. And when pressed again about sources of training data, Murati replied, "I'm not going to go into the details."

Persons: —, OpenAI, Mira Murati, Sora, I'm, Murati, Axel Springer, Ashley Stewart Organizations: Service, YouTube, Business, Google, Microsoft, Street

☆ Microsoft insiders worry the company has become just 'IT for OpenAI'
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-11 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Some Microsoft insiders worry the company's AI strategy has become too focused on its partnership with OpenAI. Insiders say Microsoft is focused less on the internal services that previously made up Azure AI Services and more on the Azure OpenAI service. The Azure OpenAI service has hundreds of developers supporting customers of Microsoft's Azure cloud service who use OpenAI's GPT models. Some Microsoft employees work so closely with OpenAI that they have badges to get into OpenAI's offices, and some OpenAI employees can badge into Microsoft locations. Axel Springer, Business Insider's parent company, has a global deal to allow OpenAI to train its models on its media brands' reporting.

Persons: Eric Boyd, Scott, That's, Frank Shaw, Shaw, Ashley Stewart, Axel Springer Organizations: Microsoft, OpenAI, Business, AI Services, AI Bot

☆ Copilot dreams and nightmares: Microsoft insiders share what they really think about the company's AI future.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-06 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

"Customers trust Microsoft more than OpenAI since they already buy Microsoft's ecosystem," a Microsoft AI researcher told BI. "Almost everyone I know is working on Copilot to a certain extent," the Microsoft AI researcher told BI. "It's too premature to assume this is going to be a race to the bottom on price," another Microsoft executive said. Some Microsoft employees work so closely with OpenAI that they have badges to get into OpenAI's offices, and some OpenAI employees can badge into Microsoft locations. Mistral models will be offered to Microsoft customers along with about 1,600 other models including Cohere and Meta's Llama.

Persons: there's, Morgan Stanley, Satya Nadella, they've, they're, Frank Shaw, Shaw, That's, OpenAI, JPMorgan Chase, It's, Dentsu, Shiva Vannavada, Vannavada, Eric Boyd, Scott, John Montgomery, Asha Sharma, Ashley Stewart Organizations: Microsoft, Business, Enterprise, Walmart, JPMorgan, BI, Google, Dentsu, Product, Technology, Employees, Nvidia, DA Davidson, AI Services, AI Bot, OpenAI Locations: OpenAI, Mistral

☆ Wall Street is loving AI while Big Tech is warning employees about how they use it
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-23 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

In today's big story, we're looking at Wall Street's love affair with Nvidia (and AI) while Big Tech still grapples with how to use the tools . Since Nvidia's GPUs sit at the center of the AI revolution, the company's success suggests the hype around the tech is warranted. One issue is bias showing up in AI tools . AdvertisementInternal documents show that Amazon is warning its employees not to use third-party generative AI tools for work , BI's Ashley Stewart and Eugene Kim report. It's an interesting acknowledgement of the risks involved with using AI tools — especially when Amazon is pitching its own chatbot to customers .

Persons: —, It's, Michael M, Tyler Le, it's, Matthew Fox, Wall, Jensen, Kathleen Brooks, XTB, BI's George Glover, Chelsea Jia Feng, — ChatGPT, Monica Melton, BI's Ashley Stewart, Eugene Kim, Paul Morigi, Jenny Chang, Rodriguez, Goldman, Joe Duran, Jensen Huang, Huang, Reddit, Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Gemini, isn't, RJ Scaringe, Rivian, Scaringe, Steve Conine, Niraj Shah, Lucas Jackson, Wayfair, Bruce Dixon, they'd, Dan DeFrancesco, Jordan Parker Erb, Hallam Bullock, George Glover, Grace Lett Organizations: Service, Nvidia, Big Tech, Getty, Nasdaq, Nikkei, GameStop, SEC, CNBC, EV, Warner Bros Discovery Inc, Hyatt Hotels Locations: Paul, New York, London, Chicago

☆ Amazon's internal documents warn employees not to use generative AI models for work
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-22 | by ( Ashley Stewart | Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Amazon is warning employees not to use third-party generative AI tools for work, according to multiple internal guidances viewed by Business Insider. Amazon's internal third-party generative AI use and interaction policy, viewed by BI, warns that the companies offering generative AI services may take a license to or ownership over anything employees input into tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT. Amazon's internal generative AI policy states employees can use third-party models for work if they obtain director and legal approval and comply with any applicable security reviews. Amazon's spokesperson Adam Montgomery said the company has been developing generative AI and large machine learning models for a long time and employees use its AI models every day. "We have safeguards in place for employee use of these technologies, including guidance on accessing third-party generative AI services and protecting confidential information," Montgomery said.

Persons: Amazon's, Adam Montgomery, Montgomery, Ashley Stewart, Eugene Kim Organizations: Business, BI, Microsoft Locations: OpenAI

☆ Silicon Valley's biggest ever 'dogfooding' experiment has begun. The implications are huge.
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-14 | by ( Alistair Barr | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Big Tech companies are testing AI tools internally in a massive 'dogfooding' experiment. This involves Big Tech companies taking large language models and generative AI tools and putting them to work inside their own organizations. The findings could also change how Big Tech companies operate — and how many expensive engineers they need. Big Tech companies want to sell AI tools to help businesses, developers, advertisers, creators, and other customers reach this new productivity nirvana. If these dogfooding tests go well, Big Tech companies may not need to hire as many workers in the future.

Persons: —, It's, Googler Anthony Vallone, Ruth Porat, Hugh Langley, it's, BI's Ashley Stewart, Stewart, there's, Urs Hölzle Organizations: Big Tech, Google, Microsoft, Service, Microsoft Microsoft Locations: Silicon

☆ Microsoft's pricey AI assistant Copilot is giving some early adopters buyer's remorse
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-13 | by ( Geoff Weiss | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Some early adopters of Microsoft's AI assistant, Copilot, are less than impressed, the Wall Street Journal reports. The first users balked at the hefty costs and said the AI would hallucinate wrong answers. AdvertisementMicrosoft is making a big bet on AI with its newly launched generative AI assistant Copilot, but some early adopters have been less than impressed. Others said the AI hallucinated wrong answers or calculated spreadsheets wrong, according to the outlet. And earlier this month, the techgiant rolled out Copilot internally, Business Insider's Ashley Stewart reported at the time.

Persons: —, Copilot, Copilot —, It's, wasn't, Jared Spataro, Spataro, Insider's Ashley Stewart, Satya Nadella Organizations: Wall Street, Microsoft, Service, Excel, Chemicals, Dow, Lenovo, Super Locations: Copilot, OpenAI

☆ Microsoft is rolling out a Copilot tool to internal teams as it tries to get more developers to use AI, leaked message shows
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-07 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Microsoft is rolling out its AI Copilots internally and trying to get employees up to speed. The rollout has include pilot tests on AI and an internal hackathon, one message suggests. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . AdvertisementMicrosoft is rolling out Microsoft 365 Copilot product to employees as it tries to get more developers to use AI, according to an internal message viewed by Business Insider. This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers.

Persons: —, Jason Zander's Organizations: Microsoft, OpenAI, Service, Business, Jason Zander's Strategic Missions, Technologies

☆ The Apple exec that Microsoft hired to fulfill its hardware dreams has quietly left
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-06 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Rubén Caballero, the ex-Apple executive Microsoft hired in 2020 to run device engineering in mixed reality and AI, appears to have quietly left the company. Microsoft also recently published a post stating its commitment to the HoloLens 2 device and mixed reality. Caballero worked for Apple from 2005 to 2014, including a stint as president of engineering. Microsoft hired Caballero in 2020 to work on devices such as HoloLens in the company's mixed reality and AI organization. Caballero joined Panay's Windows and Devices organization in 2022, and Microsoft has whittled down some hardware teams since then.

Persons: Rubén Caballero, Caballero, Microsoft's, Frank Shaw, Panos Panay, Ashley Stewart Organizations: Apple, Microsoft, Business, Amazon, Insiders, BI, Windows, Panay's Windows Locations: Panay

☆ Meta told staffers it's increasing upcoming cash bonuses due to the company's stellar performance
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-02 | by ( Kali Hays | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: 1 min

Meta employees who made it through a year of layoffs and tougher performance reviews will get to share in some of the company's financial resurgence . The company formerly known as Facebook on Thursday reported a blowout fourth quarter, sending the stock to a new all-time high . The same day, Meta told staffers their annual performance bonuses would be 1.5 times as much as originally planned, according to two people familiar with the company. The company is set to inform employees of their performance ranking this month to complete the 2023 performance review cycle, and it will pay out bonuses in March. This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers.

Persons: Meta Organizations: Facebook, Business

☆ Some Amazon employees discuss unionizing over the company's return-to-office mandate
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-26 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Read previewA small number of Amazon employees are discussing unionizing over the company's return-to-office policy. AdvertisementAmazon's RTO policy is unusually strict. Some Amazon employees recently took to the Slack channel to announce their resignations specifically over the return-to-hub policy. "Tomorrow is my last day at Amazon," one of the employees wrote in December. Unionization among corporate tech employees is rare.

Persons: —, RTO, Ashley Stewart Organizations: Service, Business, Amazon, Amazonians Locations: Staten Island

☆ Microsoft's $3 trillion market cap milestone is the latest in a string of wins for Big Tech's elder statesman
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-25 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

In today's big story, we're looking at Microsoft notching another big win by briefly reaching a $3 trillion valuation. It's an impressive run for a company often viewed as the least sexy in Big Tech. 3 things in marketsInstagram/grandmabetty33The stock market is looking gray, and that's a bad thing. A famed economist said you shouldn't confuse a booming stock market with a strong economy. Nobel economist Paul Krugman recently wrote about how consumers feel too optimistic about the economy due to the current stock market rally.

Persons: —, Ethan Miller, Phil Rosen, OpenAI, Ashley Stewart, Tim Matsui, Ashley, That's, it's, It'll, aren't, We're, Taylor, Paul Krugman, Patrick Pleul, Mark Zuckerberg, Marc Benioff chatted, Brad Barket, Jon Stewart, Stewart, Trevor Noah, Donald Trump, Jean Carroll's Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Big, Rosenberg Research, AP Tesla, EV, Microsoft Windows, Walmart, Comedy Central, Bank of America, Intel, Visa, Southwest Airlines, Comcast Locations: Big Tech

☆ Corporate America's loyalty problem is on display in Big Tech
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-22 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

In today's big story, we're looking at how there's no more loyalty in corporate America between employers and their workers. Business Insider's Aki Ito, who has covered workplace trends better than anyone, dove into the deterioration of loyalty in corporate America. The best example of the deterioration of loyalty in corporate America these days is in Big Tech. AdvertisementOne year later, Big Tech's layoffs are back and could become the new normal, Business Insider's Peter Kafka writes. However, the best representation of the growing employee-employer chasm in Big Tech is at Google.

Persons: —, hustleharder, Insider's Aki Ito, they're, Insider's Peter Kafka, Kali Hays, BI's Eugene Kim, Ashley Stewart, Long, Sundar Pichai, BI's Hasan Chowdhury, Brian Moynihan, Moynihan, Laura Labovich, Asher, Emerson, Bill O'Leary, there's, Frederic J . Brown, haven't, Christian Dior, Dan DeFrancesco, Diamond Naga Siu, Hallam Bullock, Jordan Parker Erb Organizations: Service, Big, Workers, Amazon MGM Studios, Big Tech, Google, OsakaWayne, Investment, New, Bank of America's, Fed, Washington, Getty, Meta, OpenAI Mafia, Shoppers, Spotify, Couture, United Airlines, The, Business Locations: America, Big Tech, Big, Bethesda, That's, Paris, New York, San Diego, London

☆ Amazon employees fear increased 'quiet firing' tactics and a 'brain drain'
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-13 | by ( Eugene Kim | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Silent sacking, Garrison told BI, "is how Amazon is going to reduce operational costs without negatively affecting the stock price. Some Amazon employees recently took to Slack to announce their resignations specifically over the return-to-hub policy. Another AWS employee told BI they feel like they are "doing the job of three people." Any suggestion to the contrary is untrue," the Amazon spokesperson said. Are you an Amazon employee or do you have insight to share?

Persons: they're, Justin Garrison, Garrison, wasn't, URA, hasn't, that's, Slack, RTO, we'd, They've Organizations: Service, Amazon, Business, BI, Amazon Web Services

☆ Leaked presentation reveals how Microsoft built one of its top AI products, from cherry picking outputs to pitching government clients
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-10 | by ( Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

GPU supply problemsOriginally, Microsoft was working on its own machine-learning models for security use cases, according to the presentation by Microsoft Security Research partner Lloyd Greenwald. AdvertisementThe pitchThe pitch centered around the benefits of mostly using a single universal AI model rather than many individual models. "Today, our Early Access Program customers regularly share their satisfaction with the latest version of Security Copilot." He also mentioned ServiceNow connectors, and information from Microsoft Defender, the company's antivirus software, along with other sources of security data. It described Security Copilot as a "closed-loop learning system," that gets feedback from users and improves over time.

Persons: —, Lloyd Greenwald, Greenwald, Frank Shaw, Shaw, Microsoft's Shaw, Kevin Scott, Satya Nadella, Eric Douglas, doesn't Organizations: Service, Business, Microsoft, Microsoft Security Research, BI, Microsoft Sentinel Locations: GPT

☆ Sam Altman says tech world 'should be united' in supporting Muslim colleagues
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-05 | by ( Sarah Jackson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

He says Jewish tech workers like himself have had more support from the industry. Altman added that he sees "much less of that" for his Muslim and Palestinian peers. AdvertisementOpenAI CEO Sam Altman says Palestinian tech workers he's spoken with don't feel free to express themselves because they fear it may hurt their careers. One commenter asked, "How are the Jewish colleagues?" Apple deleted Slack messages from employees about the war before pausing dedicated Slack channels for Muslim and Jewish employees, Business Insider's Ashley Stewart previously reported.

Persons: Sam Altman, Altman, —, Business Insider's Ashley Stewart, Paddy Cosgrave, Israel, Cosgrave Organizations: Service, Twitter, Business, Google, Web, Intel, Stripe Locations: Israel, Gaza, Palestinian, Irish, Europe

☆ Hugging Face CEO says he's focused on building a 'sustainable model' for the $4.5 billion open-source-AI startup
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-28 | by ( Ashley Stewart | Monica Melton | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

It's an open-source platform where scientists, researchers, and engineers build, train, and deploy AI models. With his company, Delangue wants to follow in the footsteps of companies such as Red Hat by making open-source AI a profitable endeavor. "If we don't support openness, open science, and open-source AI, just a few companies will be able to do it," Delangue told Business Insider. The episode has made open-source models look more attractive because they don't rely on a single company that could suddenly lose all its employees. What do you see your customers using Hugging Face's AI models for most?

Persons: Clément Delangue, Delangue, OpenAI, Sam Altman, —, Giada, Pistilli, We're, autocomplete, We've, we've, that's Organizations: Service, Business, Investors, Amazon, Google, Nvidia, IBM, BI, Microsoft Locations: Amazon

☆ The top 15 people in enterprise artificial intelligence
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-27 | by ( Ellen Thomas | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Insider has compiled a list of 100 people at the forefront of artificial intelligence . download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . AdvertisementCloud companies such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Google have been building AI offerings for years, and now they are opening the door to generative AI. This year, generative AI took hold of the world. Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud soon followed suit with their own investments and AI products — Google invested in the AI startup Anthropic.

Persons: — Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Google, Web Services, AWS, Business Locations: OpenAI

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