Category: A.I.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/29/canva-acquires-leonardo-ai-to-boost-its-generative-ai-efforts

The financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but Canva co-founder and chief product officer Cameron Adams said it’s a mix of cash and stock. All of Leonardo.ai’s 120 employees will be joining Canva, including the executive team.

“Leonardo will continue to run independently of Canva with a focus on rapid innovation, research and development, now backed by Canva’s resources,” Adams told TechCrunch. “We’ll keep offering all of Leonardo’s existing tools and solutions. This acquisition aims to help Leonardo develop its platform and deepen their user growth with our investment, including by expanding their API business and investing in foundational model R&D.”

https://investors.autodesk.com/news-releases/news-release-details/autodesk-acquires-wonder-dynamics-offering-cloud-based-ai

This strategic move supports Autodesk’s goal to democratize creative tools and foster innovation in the media and entertainment industry. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

https://www.indiewire.com/news/general-news/ridley-scott-gladiator-2-ai-rhino-fight-scene-1235030508/

Despite embracing technology, the “Blade Runner” and “Alien” director has long incorporated the fear of AI in his stories onscreen and knows better than most about its ramifications. Scott previously told Rolling Stone in November 2023 that when it came to his concerns about artificial intelligence broadly, he said that AI was “dangerous” and akin to a “technical hydrogen bomb.”

https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/ais-600b-question

The expanding economic impact of AI, highlights a significant gap between AI infrastructure investments and actual revenue generation. Despite easing GPU shortages and increased investments by cloud providers, AI-related revenue, particularly dominated by OpenAI, remains insufficient to justify the massive capital expenditures. The analysis reveals that this gap has grown from $125 billion to $500 billion, posing challenges for the AI industry while emphasizing the need for realistic expectations and sustainable value creation.

OpenAI training and inference costs could reach $7bn for 2024, AI startup set to lose $5bn – report

https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/openai-training-and-inference-costs-could-reach-7bn-for-2024-ai-startup-set-to-lose-5bn-report

AI: Are we in another dot-com bubble?

The power of AI will transform every facet of our society, from the micro changes in our day-to-day lives to the macro changes in global geopolitics. It will challenge our values and assumptions and make us reconsider what it means to be human. It is inevitable that some capital will be wasted getting there. We may even experience a bubble or two. But this is part of the growing pains of advancing humankind. Society, like our individual lives, seldom take the shortest route. As to the argument that we are in a bubble right now, we think it deserves some reconsidering.

https://kelvinmu.substack.com/p/ai-are-we-in-another-dot-com-bubble

https://www.goldmansachs.com/intelligence/pages/gs-research/gen-ai-too-much-spend-too-little-benefit/report.pdf

Tech giants and beyond are set to spend over $1tn on AI capex in coming years, with so far little to show for it. So, will this large spend ever pay off? MIT’s Daron Acemoglu and GS’ Jim Covello are skeptical, with Acemoglu seeing only limited US economic upside from AI over the next decade and Covello arguing that the technology isn’t designed to solve the complex problems that would justify the costs, which may not decline as many expect. But GS’ Joseph Briggs, Kash Rangan, and Eric Sheridan remain more optimistic about AI’s economic potential and its ability to ultimately generate returns beyond the current “picks and shovels” phase, even if AI’s “killer application” has yet to emerge. And even if it does, we explore whether the current chips shortage (with GS’ Toshiya Hari) and looming power shortage (with Cloverleaf Infrastructure’s Brian Janous) will constrain AI growth. But despite these concerns and constraints, we still see room for the AI theme to run, either because AI starts to deliver on its promise, or because bubbles take a long time to burst.

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