Catch-up: Amazon goes all in on AI

LAS VEGAS: Amazon’s cloud unit AWS unveiled new AI models and chips to take on rivals like Microsoft, which has had an edge due to its ties with ChatGPT-maker OpenAI.
Exactly two years ago, the launch of ChatGPT thrust Silicon Valley into the AI age, forcing tech giants to redraw plans and wiping out billions from market caps of companies that were slow to adapt. AWS, which pioneered renting out data infrastructure, was seen to be losing grip on its cloud dominance over the past two years amid the AI boom.

However, Andy Jassy, who built AWS before succeeding Jeff Bezos as Amazon CEO in 2021, sees it differently. “When we talk about AI, it is typically less to announce that we have beat the best chess player in the world… We are not using AI because we think it is cool. We are using it because we are trying to solve customer problems,” Jassy said at AWS’s annual tech event re:Invent in Las Vegas last week. AWS has sought to embed AI into its services and push customers to bring more of their applications by offering them a wide choice of AI models and chips, including its in-house ones, through its Bedrock platform.

“With the announcement of Nova, we have made it clear that we want to compete… Whether it’s chips or models, we will be very competitive on costs,” Sherry Marcus, director of applied science (GenAI) at AWS, told TOI. Nova, which launched last week, is AWS’s answer to

AI foundation models

like Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s GPT-4o. Essentially, these are

machine learning models

trained on vast datasets and designed to produce a range of outputs, including chatbots.

AI-related capabilities dominated AWS’s announcements at the cloud conference. The company unveiled AI semiconductor Trainium2 which is expected to chip away at Nvidia’s stranglehold by reducing customer costs. AWS unveiled Apple as one of its newest chip customers.
(The writer was in Las Vegas at invitation of AWS)