Alphabet’s dominance of search while leveraging artificial intelligence is under threat more than ever. The US Department of Justice reiterated that the company needs to split its Chrome browser and Android mobile operating systems, which threatens to disrupt its biggest business empire.
Google vs. DoJ
In August, a federal district court justice ruled that Alphabet was guilty of antitrust abuses in its search and search advertising markets. With the ruling, the DoJ is pushing for the breakup of the company as one of the ways of minimizing Google’s dominance in search.
If Chrome and Android mobile are to be split into independent business units, they would deprive Google of the much-needed data it needs to deliver artificial intelligence-powered search results. Regulators believe the move would end up shaping the economics of how artificial intelligence works.
Earlier this year, Google added “AI overviews” to its search results by fusing the chatbot capabilities of its Gemini AI model with a method called retrieval augmented generation (RAG), which pulls new data from websites.
The push to split Google comes when the company’s search business is more threatened than ever. The search giant is staring at stiff competition with the entry of new entrants into the lucrative business. You.com Andi and Perplexity AI is the latest search engine poised to enter the search AI market with plans to run ads next to AI-generated search results.
Sierra $4Billion Expansion
Meanwhile, OpenAI Chairman’s startup Sierra, co-founded with former Google executive Clay Bavor, is in the process of securing new funding at a valuation of $4 billion. The funding round underscores the strong investor interest in AI amid concerns that valuations around artificial intelligence startups are getting out of hand.
Bret Taylor, who joined the board of OpenAI and became one of the most significant players in the emerging field, would benefit from a deal of that magnitude. Sierra’s funding came days after the developer of ChatGPT closed one of the biggest rounds of funding in startup history, totaling $6.6 billion, which gave the generative AI pioneer a $157 billion valuation.
Even though there aren’t any apparent applications or game-changing apps that deal with demonstrated investor willingness to fund increasingly expensive AI development and optimism about the technology’s future.
Meta AI Expansion
Separately, social media behemoth Meta Platforms Inc. is taking its AI-powered chatbot to 21 new countries, including Brazil and the United Kingdom, where it has a sizable user base. The company’s chatbot, Meta AI, allows users to communicate and receive recommendations on Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook apps.
According to CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Meta AI is used by nearly 500 million people every month. In addition to the expansion, the chatbot will support additional languages, such as Tagalog. Prior to encountering regulatory opposition, Meta had also intended to introduce its AI chatbot in the EU earlier this year.
Public posts on Facebook and Instagram are part of the training process for the company’s large language model, Llama. Following the Irish Data Protection Commission’s rebuttal to its June announcement, Meta said it would temporarily halt its plans to begin training Llama on posts from European users. Meta stated at the time that it still intended to release the product in Europe, but it would not provide a specific date.
