Microsoft (MSFT) is making its new artificial intelligence (A.I.) powered Bing search engine available to anyone who has an account with the company.
Seattle-based Microsoft said that its revamped Bing search engine is now open to anyone with a Microsoft account and has features run by the ultra-powerful GPT-4 artificial intelligence model that has been developed by privately held start-up OpenAI.
Microsoft is hoping that adding A.I. to its Bing search engine will enable it to better compete against rival Alphabet’s (GOOG) Google search engine, which remains the market leader in online queries and digital advertising.
Microsoft has said that for every percentage point of share it gains in the profitable online search category, its revenue will grow by $2 billion U.S.
Generative A.I. has become the focus of the technology industry following the release last November of ChatGPT, a revolutionary chatbot that uses large language models to instantly complete tasks ranging from composing a song to coding a video game.
In addition to augmenting the Bing search engine with GPT-4, the successor to ChatGPT, Microsoft has announced plans to incorporate the A.I. model into its Microsoft 365 software.
Google is not taking Microsoft’s challenge lying down. The search giant says it is racing to also add generative A.I. to its search engine.
Users must continue to go through Microsoft’s Edge web browser on personal computers or the Bing app on mobile devices to use the new Bing search engine and the GPT-4 chatbot.
Google does not allow people to access the Bing chatbot from its Chrome browser.
Microsoft, Alphabet, and other tech companies have been criticized for racing to bring generative A.I. products to consumers without controls in place around the technology, charges the companies largely dismiss.
Microsoft’s stock is up 27% year to date and trading at $304.40 U.S. per share.
