Microsoft is developing its own AI model to become less dependent on OpenAI
Microsoft is taking steps to reduce its reliance on OpenAI for AI by developing its own AI model. The company recently announced public testing of MAI-1-preview, an internal model that could potentially enhance its Copilot assistant for consumers. The tests are being conducted on LMArena, a platform for evaluating AI models.
Microsoft plans to gradually integrate MAI-1-preview into Copilot over the coming weeks and use user feedback to make improvements. Developers can request early access via a dedicated form.
Despite this move towards independence, the company remains a major investor and strategic partner in OpenAI, which is currently valued at around $500 billion dollars (€428.4 billion). Microsoft has invested more than $13 billion (€11.1 billion) in OpenAI, and the start-up relies on Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure to run its models.
OpenAI’s technology powers various AI features in Microsoft products, including Bing and Windows 11. However, the relationship between the two companies is evolving into a more competitive dynamic. Last year, Microsoft officially listed OpenAI as a competitor in its annual report, following in the footsteps of other tech giants such as Amazon, Apple, Google, and Meta.
OpenAI’s immense popularity, with ChatGPT reaching 700 million users per week, has led it to diversify its cloud partnerships beyond Microsoft, collaborating with providers such as CoreWeave, Google, and Oracle.
The MAI-1 model currently ranks 13th on LMArena for text workloads, behind models from companies like Anthropic, DeepSeek, Google, Mistral, OpenAI, and xAI. The model was developed using approximately 15,000 Nvidia H100 graphics processing units and a cluster of Nvidia GB200 chips.
MAI-1-preview is Microsoft’s first fully self-trained foundational model, marking an important step in building its own AI capabilities. Suleyman previously worked with OpenAI at start-up Inflection before joining Microsoft last year with several colleagues. His extensive experience, including co-founding DeepMind (later acquired by Google), underscores Microsoft’s commitment to strengthening its AI expertise.
Business AM
Subscribers 0
Fans 0
Followers 0
Followers