News

Microsoft and OpenAI Continue Partnership with Supercomputer AI Datacenter

• By Chris Paoli
• April 02, 2024

In a project estimated to cost more than $100 billion, Microsoft and ChatGPT creator OpenAI will build an AI-focused supercomputer datacenter.     

While the new infrastructure project has not been officially confirmed by either company, the planned project has been named "Stargate," according to tech industry outlet The Information. Its goal is to use AI technology to handle more advanced tasks than regular datacenters are currently capable of. According to the report, the proposed datacenter will be powered by OpenAI's future-generation AI technology.

If the projected budget holds, Stargate, which will be built in the U.S., will represent the biggest investment in a single datacenter in the world, dwarfing the currently largest datacenter price by 100. The Information reported that the bulk of the startup cost will come directly from Microsoft. The goal is to build the datacenter (or series of datacenters in close proximity to one another) by 2028.

While Microsoft has not responded directly to the reported plan, it did release a statement affirming its commitment to expand its footprint in the gen AI space. "We are always planning for the next generation of infrastructure innovations needed to continue pushing the frontier of AI capability," said a Microsoft representative.

OpenAI Removes Sam Altman from Company Startup Fund
In other news, open source company OpenAI announced it has removed its CEO Sam Altman from managing the company's corporate venture fund.
The move was made on Monday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. It basically takes away control of the account, which is used to fund startup companies. According to the company, Ian Hathaway, who has been a partner on the account, will take ownership.

The move is aimed at giving OpenAI executive board more control over the fund, instead of having the company's CEO hold on to the purse strings. While Altman did manage and solicit funds for it through partners like Microsoft, he or OpenAI was not investors in the fund.

 In 2023, OpenAI's venture fund invested $175 million in 13 different startup companies and, since its creation in 2021, has funded high-profile AI startups including Ambiance Healthcare, Harvey and Cursor.

ChatGPT Removes Login Requirement
Monday also saw the removal of required accounts needed to use OpenAI's ChatGPT. The company said it is gradually rolling out the change, saying the policy switch is to help encourage more people to try out the chatbot. However it does recommend that users create an account to gain access to the full experience.
"There are many benefits to creating an account including the ability to save and review your chat history, share chats and unlock additional features like voice conversations and custom instructions," wrote the company in a blog announcement. "For anyone that has been curious about AI's potential but didn’t want to go through the steps to set-up an account, start using ChatGPT today."

Two important things to note are that those using the service without logging in will be limited to ChatGPT 3.5 (similar to its free version of the chatbot) and that all queries will be recorded for LLM learning purposes without any option to opt out.