Alphabet (GOOGL), the parent company of internet search engine Google, has introduced a new artificial intelligence (AI) service called “Bard” that is aimed at consumers.
The AI service is Alphabet’s response to ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence application that has taken the world by storm since it was introduced last fall.
Alphabet said that Bard will be widely available to consumers in coming weeks and will provide detailed answers to conversational prompts such as how to repair a car engine or write an essay on the moon landing.
Bard is powered by LaMDA, a large language model developed by Google that caused controversy last year when a software engineer at Google claimed that the AI was “sentient” and that Alphabet had achieved the “singularity,” or AI that is aware and capable of making decisions independent of programmers.
Alphabet is scrambling to assert its progress and AI technology amid heightened competition in the space from OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT.
Alphabet has also said that it plans to integrate Bard and other advanced AI into its Google search engine. Rival Microsoft (MSFT) has partnered with OpenAI amid rumors that it plans to use the AI chatbot to enhance its Bing search engine.
Last week, Google announced a partnership with AI start-up Anthropic, which is testing its own chatbot rival to ChatGPT. Google has invested close to $400 million U.S. in the start-up.
Alphabet’s stock has declined 26% over the past year to $102.90 U.S. per share.
