Google will implement artificial intelligence in its search

Google plans to use artificial intelligence (AI) technology to improve its search engine and compete with other companies in the field. The American The New York Times (NYT) wrote about this, citing internal company documents. The project, dubbed Magi, is already in development and should make search more personalized.

According to NYT sources, Google employees were “shocked” when it became known in March that the South Korean IT company Samsung is considering replacing Google on its devices with AI search engine Bing from Microsoft . According to their estimates, Google’s annual income from the contract with Samsung is estimated at $ 3 billion. Against the backdrop of this news, Alphabet shares in premarket fell by more than 4%, writes Reuters. A similar contract between Google and Apple, which brings the corporation about $ 20 billion a year, will be extended in 2023, writes NYT.

In addition, Google is concerned about the development of OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot and created a dedicated group in the search division to develop AI products almost immediately after its release in November 2022, the NYT sources add.

GPT is a transformer type neural network architecture that was originally published by Google researchers, recalled Vladimir Sveshnikov, co-founder of Parodist AI. “So it turns out that a competitor has grown out of the company’s publication, which poses a really serious threat to their core business for the first time in many years,” he said.

According to the NYT, a large team of designers, engineers and department heads is currently working on finalizing the Google search engine – about 160 people in total. The updated search engine will be able to offer users “a more personalized experience and try to anticipate their needs.” In addition, one of the new features of the search engine will be a chatbot for developers who can write code. At the same time, advertising will remain in the search results, as this is the main way to monetize the system, the newspaper notes.

It is expected that users will be able to use the modified Google search engine as early as May 2023, and in the fall the company will add additional functions to it. Initially, about a million people in the United States will have access to the functionality, and by the end of 2023 this number should grow to 30 million.

Google is also set to develop an entirely new AI-based search engine, but the process is still in its early stages, according to the NYT. It is assumed that the search engine, based on previously made requests, will understand what users want to know and offer pre-selected information or products for purchase. In addition, this search engine will be more “conversational” – communication with it should be similar to a conversation with a person.

Other AI-powered Google projects in various stages of development include an image-generating tool called GIFI, Tivoli Tutor that will help learn new languages ​​through text-based conversations in a dialog box, and Searchalong, which allows users to ask questions via chat -bot while surfing in Google Chrome browser, lists NYT. For example, users can ask for things to do near their selected Airbnb listing, and the tool will suggest options to choose from.

The introduction of AI in the Google search engine is primarily aimed at better understanding the user’s request, explained Alexander Zhukov, development director of the Code Format software development company. AI will be able to better understand natural language, and the search engine will return the answer to the question, even if it is not clearly formulated, he added. In addition, a better understanding of the language and subject area of ​​texts will produce much more relevant results.

Another area of ​​work for Google, according to Zhukov, is to teach the search engine to retain knowledge of the context of the conversation and refine queries without repetition, for example: “No, I only asked to show the results for the last year.” This set of changes will allow users to get results with less time and mental costs, he concluded. It is more convenient for the user to search for information in a chat format, where you can clarify details, ask additional questions, etc., rather than open several links and switch between them, Sveshnikov agrees.

At the same time, according to experts interviewed by Vedomosti, Google will not abandon the classic version of the search engine. This, in particular, may confirm the fact that the company has plans not only to update its search engine, but also to create a completely new one, says Sveshnikov. “Most likely, the main search engine will remain the same as it is now, but the new one will already be in the chat format, so as not to lose users who are used to the current version and are not ready to immediately rebuild,” he argues. AI functions will need to be provided without fundamentally changing the existing experience, Zhukov agreed with him. In addition, it is currently unclear how exactly advertising, which forms the basis of Google’s financial strength, will be integrated into the AI ​​search engine, he added.

Google’s tool is unlikely to be available in Russia, Sveshnikov noted: “ChatGPT is not available in Russia and Ukraine, and I think Google will follow the same logic to minimize the risks of either side being used for military or propaganda purposes.”

Russian companies, such as Yandex and Sberbank, also have large text models and serious experience in training and deploying such systems, Sveshnikov recalled. Sber shows good results in the direction of text to image (creating images on a text request. – Vedomosti) in its Kandinsky 2.1 solution, and “Yandexis working on the YaLM model, a variant of text-based generative AI, said an analyst at the company’s Transformation Strategy practice.Reksoft Consulting” Dmitry Grudnev. But, despite the publication of the model in the public domain, the development of Yandex is not yet adapted for the work of a wide range of unprepared users, he noted.

According to MForum analyst Alexei Boyko, one of the largest Russian IT companies can offer the possibility of interacting with AI based on a large language model in the next two years.