Shares of Amazon soared by more than 4% to close above US$ 130 at the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday, after the world’s biggest online commerce company announced it’ll invest millions on generative artificial intelligence.
Amazon Web Services said it would invest US$100 million to establish an innovation center that connects experts and customers in utilizing AI and machine learning. The center is more like a “program” rather than a physical facility.
AWS said the center will help a wide range of customers engaged in healthcare, financial services and manufacturing to custom their business and apps with the new technology. Amazon stated Highspot, Twilio, Ryanair and Lonely Planet will be early users of the innovation center.
The move is seen as efforts to sell more services to compete with other rival tech giants such as Microsoft and Google, which have had flashier entrances with generative AI since the release of ChatGPT last November.
Amazon unveiled its own generative AI tools last month, but a report citing one customer who tested the tools said the technology is “incomplete,” in which Amazon has promptly denied. This is not the first time Amazon has tried to put AI in its forefront with its application for shopping recommendations and Alexa voice assistant.
Despite its late adoption on generative AI tools, Amazon still enjoys a commanding lead in the business of renting out servers and data storage to companies that sought to improve their businesses via the power of cloud technology to streamline their processes, enhance efficiency and achieve greater scalability.
Amazon currently accounts for about 40% of the global cloud service market, Microsoft for about 20% and Google for about 10%. According to a new report by Bloomberg Intelligence, the generative AI market is to grow to a US$ 1.3 trillion market over the next 10 years from a market size of US$ 40 billion in 2022.
