Meta is developing a new, more powerful AI system as AI race heats up, WSJ reports

Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook, is working on creating a powerful new artificial intelligence (AI) system intended to be as powerful as the OpenAI’s most advanced model, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter. According to the report, the plan is to have the new AI system ready by next year.

This move comes at a time when businesses and enterprises across industries are showing a heightened interest in generative AI, a trend largely fueled by the remarkable success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Notably, reports have previously surfaced indicating that Apple, the tech titan renowned for its innovations, is also in the process of crafting AI solutions akin to ChatGPT and Bard. Apple has been building its proprietary framework, code-named ‘Ajax,’ and conducting internal testing of a chatbot referred to as ‘Apple GPT.’

What sets this initiative apart is the anticipation that the resulting AI model will surpass Meta’s current commercial AI model, Llama 2, by a considerable margin. Llama 2, introduced to the public in July, is currently being distributed through Microsoft’s Azure services, and was designed to compete with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard.

Previously, Meta had restricted access to the model, providing it only to a select group of academics for research purposes. However, Meta has now announced that the model will be accessible through direct download as well as other platforms such as Amazon Web Services and Hugging Face, as mentioned in the blog post and confirmed by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a separate Facebook post.

The idea behind Meta’s new AI system, while still in the planning stages, is geared towards assisting external companies in the development of services capable of generating intricate text, performing complex analyses, and producing various other forms of output. The tech giant plans to kickstart the training of this expansive language model in the early months of 2024, signaling their commitment to pushing the boundaries of AI capabilities.

Despite the growing excitement and curiosity surrounding Meta’s AI venture, the company has chosen to remain tight-lipped on the matter, declining to provide any official comments or responses to inquiries. The tech world now eagerly awaits further developments in this rapidly evolving AI competition, where giants like Meta and Apple aim to redefine the boundaries of artificial intelligence.

Meta hasn’t commented on this yet, and it’s happening at a time when many businesses are interested in AI, especially since OpenAI’s ChatGPT did so well. Apple is also working on similar AI technology, and they’ve created their own system called ‘Ajax,’ along with testing a chatbot they call ‘Apple GPT.’