OpenAI: Wealth-generative AI
OpenAI’s launch of its trailblazing chatbot ChatGPT late last year was a staggering success, notching up 100-million monthly active users in its first two months to enter the hall of fame as the fastest-growing app ever.
Since the launch it has rolled out video and speech recognition capabilities for ChatGPT and revenues are reported to have topped $1bn; unsurprisingly, this has stuck a healthy dose of rocket fuel under its valuation.
The company raised money at a valuation of $29bn in April, something of a bargain compared with the $86bn valuation at which it is now looking to sell another $1bn of employee shares. It has an unusual corporate structure; originally set up as a pure nonprofit, it pivoted to a partnership between this and a for-profit subsidiary because of the scale of the fundraising needed. This partnership could raise funds from investors to build capital and hire high-grade geeks.
To try to allay the concerns of those who are nervous that untrammelled AI will end up devouring the rather hopeless humans who got the ball rolling, the for-profit remains totally controlled by the nonprofit for the benefit of humanity as a whole.
The fundraising is intended to allow employees to cash in on the success of the operation, as well as give the company firepower in the rush to hire talent now that all the tech giants are piling into the sector with chequebooks blazing. ChatGPT has a useful head start, and this mighty valuation is what it needs to keep its nose ahead.
Pick n Pay: Summers to end the winters?
A dismal performance from the retailer demonstrates that after years of drift, the canny local consumer has decided to pick, and indeed pay, elsewhere.
Its numbers weren’t helped by a R396m bill for diesel to keep the generators roaring during load-shedding, and R596.8m in incremental abnormal costs, but the extent to which it has had its lunch comprehensively devoured by its competitors is reflected in the fact that its market capitalisation is now less than 10% of that of Shoprite.
Trading profit margin was down at 0.1%, and headline earnings per share tumbling from a profit of 97.73c last year to a loss of 138.24c demonstrates that it was time to dust off the guillotine and loosen some vertebrae in the boardroom. So it was adios to CEO Pieter Boone and time for group veteran Sean Summers, who led the company successfully from 1996 to 2006, to squeeze his way back into the superhero costume and take command. Just when you thought it wasn’t safe to go back in the grocery aisle, it’s Summers 2, The Return of the Jedi.
It remains to be seen how much difference one man can make to transform a huge organisation like this, but Summers is talking about a two-year time frame to get the company back on its feet.
The plan involves, among other things, rekindling customers’ love for the brand, improving customer service levels and energising staff — all of which will be considerably easier to stick in a PowerPoint than to execute in reality. It’s a mighty big challenge, but Summers seems to be up for it.
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