If someone asks you what technological advancement would be most prominent in the upcoming years, your safest bet would be AI. Many tech giants agree that adding artificial intelligence to the business would boost revenue, and they're trying their best to convince others like investors of that as well.
Tech Giants Racing for AI Advancement
The most popular tech companies that provide services have already started their mission to create AI models and tools that would suit their products. From sticker-generating AI to generative AI that can draft a whole document for you, the technology has limitless potential.
Tech giants like Microsoft, Alphabet (Google's parent company), Apple, Amazon, and Meta are all leaning towards artificial intelligence when it comes to the next big thing for their products. More importantly, this is what will make them more money in the long run.
Right now, AI development is relatively at its early stages. We have not yet figured out how one could include the function without having to spend massive amounts of money on equipment, research, development, and more. With that said, companies need more investments to make it happen.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella already expressed to investors that the company is committed to putting more resources into the advancement of its AI and cloud projects, even if it means "looking closely at expenses in other departments," as mentioned in CNBC.
In an earnings call, the executive stated that by infusing AI across every layer of their tech stack, they are "winning new customers and helping drive new benefits and productivity gains." It would make sense that people would rather use a product that can help them lessen their workload.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that the company is also prioritizing the development of AI, and that the investments are the "key to realizing our big AI ambitions" adding that the company invests responsibly.
As for Amazon, the company's CEO Andy Jassy said in an earnings call that generative AI will "ultimately drive tens of billions of dollars of revenue for Amazon over the next several years," which is basically just asking investors to spend more now to learn a lot more later.
Not a Good News for Some
AI is almost certainly the next moneymaker for tech companies. Adding it to certain products will not only help streamline its uses, but it could offer functions that would entirely eliminate the need to work for something as simple as pushing numbers.
Unfortunately, investments cannot arrive soon enough to fund the development of the technology, if the funding is coming at all, and companies are resorting to other cost-cutting methods to make sure that their AI projects are not halted.
Many have already lost their jobs either because the allotted funds for their wages are redirected to resources for AI innovation, or because AI is already capable of doing their jobs more efficiently and for free.
In just the first month of 2024 alone, Silicone Valley has already laid off 25,000 employees, according to Layoffs.fyi. Google even announced ahead of time that it plans to conduct more layoffs this year in pursuit of adding more AI functions to its services and products.
