For years, Microsoft’s Bing search failed to take much market share from Google. Googling became a verb, an indication of its dominance. For 20 years, Google could introduce minimal features as it profited heavily from advertising.
Those days could change. Microsoft invested in ChatGPT, an OpenAI, in 2019. It increased its investment by $10 billion. Next month, Bing search will have ChatGPT’s AI running alongside the page. Microsoft only needs to win a handful of new users incrementally. If Bing and AI help visitors find what they need, the site could one day take much of Google’s market share.
Google’s Alphabet is not sitting still now. Before that, for nearly a decade, it developed AI but did not release it to the public. AI could cannibalize Google’s basic search. In addition, it could serve inappropriate content. That would damage its reputation. Now that Microsoft is at least a year ahead of Google in AI, Alphabet needs to respond.
Shareholders are fearful that Alphabet will stumble. Google is pressed for time. It is under pressure to retain the revenue stream from search as it pivots to AI.
Google has much to lose while Microsoft has nothing to prove. This is the conundrum that Google faces.
