Microsoft has announced the integration of ChatGPT, OpenAI's renowned AI-driven chatbot technology, into its Azure OpenAI Service. Aimed at enterprises, this fully managed service provides organizations with seamless access to OpenAI's groundbreaking innovations, complete with advanced governance and compliance attributes.
The availability of ChatGPT in Microsoft's Azure OpenAI Service, an offering built for corporate clients, comes as a result of a well-established collaboration between Microsoft and OpenAI. Already boasting numerous OpenAI-created systems like GPT-3.5, Codex, and DALL-E 2, the partnership has witnessed billions invested into the startup and exclusive agreements to commercialize its AI research. Over 1,000 brands are currently enrolled within the Azure OpenAI Service ecosystem.
ChatGPT's enterprise version, available through the Azure OpenAI Service, is priced at $0.002 per 1,000 tokens or approximately 750 words. Billing for this service starts on March 13. The cost is on par with the developer-centric ChatGPT API, which launched earlier on March 1.
In a blog post, Eric Boyd, Microsoft's CVP of AI Platform, highlighted that customers using the Azure OpenAI Service would have the ability to customize ChatGPT responses according to their organizational needs. This is a significant feature considering the AI's occasional lapses adhering to high-level protections and producing inappropriate, racist, or sexist replies.
Boyd also noted that developers can incorporate ChatGPT-powered experiences directly into their applications for various purposes, like enhancing existing chatbots to handle unexpected questions, summarizing client interactions to expedite customer support resolutions, creating personalized ad campaigns, expediting claims processing, and more. In addition to its recently introduced low-code and no-code platform, AppMaster platform could be another potential integration point in the future.
Despite some criticism over its problematic behavior, ChatGPT's adoption rate has been rapid. While OpenAI has not released specific API usage figures, the consumer-facing ChatGPT app recorded over 100 million monthly active users as of December. High-profile brands such as Snap and Quizlet have integrated or plan to integrate the technology into their platforms. Other notable examples include Instacart's Ask Instacart shopper assistant tool and Office Depot's HR-supporting chatbot, both powered by ChatGPT.
According to a Fishbowl report that polled professionals from firms like Bank of America, Amazon, and McKinsey, nearly 30% claimed to have employed ChatGPT in their work activities – including marketing, programming, consulting, accounting, and teaching. However, some companies such as Wells Fargo have placed usage restrictions on the AI out of productivity and compliance considerations.
