OpenAI expands ambitions by targeting Google-dominated search and browser markets

The news: ChatGPT-maker OpenAI isn’t just shifting away from its nonprofit roots into a for-profit AI company, it’s looking to reinvent itself as a Big Tech company and using AI as an anchor to expand into services like search and web browsing.

OpenAI is already making inroads in search, hoping to challenge Google’s dominance and disrupt the status quo by making search more customized and conversational. Now, it’s taking aim at web browsers, potentially challenging Google Chrome’s 65% web browser market share, per Statista.

Open to compete: OpenAI’s aggressiveness in pursuing profitable new businesses goes hand-in-hand with its ambitious growth strategy and desire to sustain investor interest and keep those AI billions flowing in. 

• OpenAI is in the early stages of developing a web browser that will be integrated with ChatGPT, similar to how Google Search and Gemini are preloaded on Chrome browsers. 
• It’s reportedly in talks with travel, retail, real estate, and food websites to integrate a ChatGPT-like conversational search tool called NLWeb, or Natural Language Web.
• While it could take months or even years for OpenAI to create a comparable web browser, it’s already making huge strides, including by hiring key Google Chrome developers this year.

Bad timing for Google Chrome: The news of AI companies getting into search engines and browsers couldn’t come at a worse time for Google—the Department of Justice (DOJ) proposed a sale of Chrome to break up Google’s search monopoly.

The continued influx of AI capital at OpenAI could accelerate its browser plans. OpenAI could simply acqui-hire a smaller web browser company and infuse it with ChatGPT, resulting in something similar to what Microsoft Edge has done with Copilot. 

Our take: The uncertainty around Google Chrome’s future gives competitors like OpenAI a window to grab market share. It might take years to overcome Google’s decades-long lead in browsers, but Google’s antitrust cases are opening opportunities to share the wealth. 

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