OpenAI announces an AI-powered search engine that could compete with Google, and Alphabet shares fall 3%. Here’s what you need to know.

admin October 06, 2024

Top line

Shares of Google parent Alphabet fell 3% to a 2024 low on Thursday after OpenAI launched a test version of SearchGPT, a new artificial intelligence-powered search engine that will be implemented in ChatGPT and could push OpenAI into a Google-dominated internet search market.

The AI-powered search engine will first be launched to a small group of users and then combined … [+] with ChatGPT.

NurPhoto via Getty Images

Highlights

SearchGPT, a new search engine built with OpenAI’s AI models, has launched as a temporary “prototype” to a small group of users — about 10,000 people — and publishers, the company said.

Alphabet shares fell to a new 52-week low of $167.32 at the close of trading Thursday.

SearchGPT summarizes information from websites, then provides brief descriptions with an attribution link instead of linking directly to a website, and allows users to ask follow-up questions or open other relevant links in a sidebar.

In one example, searching for music festivals in Boone, North Carolina in August produces a list of each festival and a brief description, followed by a link to a website for that festival, with a sidebar containing links to other relevant results like event schedules or ticket sales.

Publishers will be able to “manage how they appear” in search results, according to OpenAI, noting that publishers can choose not to have their content used to train OpenAI’s models while still appearing in searches.

OpenAI said it plans to “integrate the best of these features” into ChatGPT in the future, though the company did not specify what features would be included.

Get SMS alerts for the latest news from Forbes: We send you text alerts so you’re always on top of the biggest stories making headlines. Text “Alerts” to (201) 335-0739 or sign up here.

What we don’t know

It is not yet known how long the testing period will last or when SearchGPT will be more widely available.

Key context

Rumors have swirled that OpenAI would launch a new search engine this year, as the company prepares to compete with Google in the search market. Bloomberg reported in May — citing a person familiar with the matter — that OpenAI was developing a new search feature for ChatGPT intended to compete with Google and AI search startup Perplexity. At the time, OpenAI was “aggressively trying to poach Google employees” to develop the product, according to The Verge. OpenAI reportedly planned the new search engine in May, before Google announced its plans for its Gemini AI product at the company’s annual developer conference. OpenAI has partnered with several publishers over the past year, including the Associated Press, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal’s parent company News Corp., and Politico and Business Insider’s parent company Axel Springer, among others. These partnerships allow OpenAI to use each publisher’s content to answer user queries and train the company’s AI models.

Tangent

In December, The New York Times filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging the publisher’s “unlawful use” of millions of copyrighted articles to train AI models. The Times claims that the OpenAI and Microsoft technology that powers ChatGPT and Bing Chat, now called Copilot, could “generate output that recites Times content verbatim, accurately summarizes it, and mimics its expressive style.” OpenAI filed a motion to dismiss parts of the complaint, suggesting that users did not use ChatGPT or the company’s other products as a “substitute” for a Times subscription. The lawsuit is ongoing.