Microsoft on Tuesday discussed new tools aimed at encouraging developers to incorporate AI-focused technology into Windows software as it races against Alphabet, Amazon.com and Apple to dominate the emerging field.
At a developer conference in Seattle, CEO Satya Nadella promoted new application programming interfaces, or APIs, that make it easier for developers to access the AI technology Microsoft offers.
The company said 1.8 million developers now use Github Copilot, Microsoft's generative AI tool that helps computer programmers be more productive.
“What stands out to me as I look back over the past year is how all of you as developers have taken all of these capabilities and are applying them, frankly, to change the world around us,” Nadella said during his keynote keynote at the Build conference.
Microsoft detailed new features for its Copilot AI software that helps business productivity apps like email and its Teams text and video chat product. At its developer conference last week, Alphabet's Google unveiled a similar batch of AI tools to help people with office apps.
Microsoft announced details of its new developer tools last week.
Microsoft shares were up 1.2 percent at $430.67 on Tuesday afternoon after hitting a record high of $432.97 earlier in the session. Microsoft shares have now gained 14 percent in 2024.
Also aimed at developers, Microsoft said last Thursday that it will offer its cloud computing customers an AMD AI chip platform that will compete with Nvidia, whose graphics processing units have become the gold standard for in AI computing.
The Microsoft-built AMD chip platform uses Nvidia-made networking technology called Infiniband to chain processors together.
OpenAI's new GPT4-o model, which runs on Microsoft's infrastructure, is 12 times cheaper for developers to use in their software than previous versions of the technology, said Kevin Scott, CTO of Microsoft.
Microsoft is the largest investor in OpenAI and uses some of the AI heavyweight's technology in its own products.
On Monday, Microsoft debuted a line of Copilot+ personal computers with AI features, including software that lets users search their past actions in almost any software. The new computers feature Arm-based processors made by Qualcomm.
© Thomson Reuters 2024
