CNBC recently had a CEO of a large corporation appear on one of their shows. The topic was about employees refusal to return to work in the office. He said, the argument that the employees had about being able to perform just as well remotely only helped the employer's position. If companies are going to have a remote workforce, they will hire competent workers from overseas for 25% the cost of a US worker.
Now Microsoft is adding AI to it's MS365 apps, specifically Word and Outlook that will write, edit and send correspondence. Microsoft plans to charge $30/month for the added capability.
Microsoft has joined with Meta to challenge Google's Bard for dominance in the AI market.
Hackers are already using AI to write and distribute malware. See WSJ article about Chinese hackers being in Microsoft's 365 sites below.
The following from Barrons.com;
Microsoft Shows Investors the Money from AI. Why its Meta deal threatens Google.
Microsoft has just closed the gap between the hype and the reality when it comes to AI.
The tech giant unveiled its plan to monetize the technology Tuesday, answering a key question surrounding the recent AI stock boom. The company plans to charge businesses
That was more than expected and sent the stock to a record high. It also highlights the pricing power of AI, and is driving another move higher for the usual suspects, including Nvidia,
The frenzy around AI and the desire to be at the forefront of its boom is making Big Tech companies do funny things. Microsoft, alive to the threat of Meta Platform's new free AI language model Llama 2, has teamed up with its peer to make the software available to companies.
Llama 2 is a direct challenger to OpenAI, in which Microsoft has invested billions, but the tech giant has acted decisively -- after all, it's better to keep its enemies close. Given that more open-source models are likely to appear, is Microsoft's plan to go after them all?
The unlikely partnership only adds to the pressure on Alphabet's
Microsoft is displaying a ruthless streak to maintain its position as an early leader in AI but the other places at the top table are still up for grabs.
Tech earnings season, which begins in earnest Wednesday, will reveal more about who's winning and losing the AI race.
--
Stock Hits Record High After Software Move
Shares of software giant Microsoft rallied to a record, gaining
-- Microsoft said the plan offers AI to users to draft emails in Outlook and
write documents in Word, among other functions. Bernstein analyst Mark
Moerdler said the price is an increase of between 53% and 240%, depending
on which version of Microsoft 365 a customer is using.
-- Citi analyst Tyler Radke said pricing was well above the $5 to $20 a
month he projected. Although months from being widely available, it's
still "an incremental positive" for Microsoft stock, he wrote.
-- Microsoft is also steering business clients to Bing Chat Enterprise, its
search engine chatbot that is included in some subscriptions. The company
is racing to offer generative AI tools in competition with Alphabet's
Google , IBM and others.
-- Microsoft and Meta Platforms are releasing a new version of Meta's AI
language model called Llama 2. It will be free and available to
developers who are building software on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform,
the companies said.What's Next: In making Llama 2 available to its Azure customers, Microsoft is demonstrating it is willing to reach beyond the ChatGPT tools by OpenAI, a company in which Microsoft has invested billions of dollars. Cloud computing rivals
-- Eric J. Savtiz and
***
