Gen AI: Firms Race To Make It Mainstream

As ChatGPT captures the imagination of the world, the focus is now on Generative Al, with IT services companies queuing up to crack the code.

- RUKMINI RAO

JUST FIVE years ago, watching a sci-fi movie on artificial intelligence (AI) taking over the world or machines thinking and processing information like humans seemed too futuristic to be true. Things changed dramatically last November, when San Francisco-based OpenAI—a start-up founded by Sam Altman and Elon Musk—unleashed ChatGPT, a chatbot built using Generative Pre-trained Transformer-3.5 large language model (LLM). In less than two months, ChatGPT saw a record 100 million+ users.

Today, social media is debating whether we are closer to an AI takeover of the world. In 2021, MIT Technology Review featured GPT-3 (Generative Pre- trained Transformer-3), a LLM built by OpenAI, trained on algorithms making it capable of reading and writing like humans as one of 10 breakthrough technologies of the year. Bill Gates, founder, Microsoft, wrote in a blog that two technology demonstrations have been truly revolutionary—the introduction of graphic user interfaces like Windows and AI.

Calling ChatGPT a tech watershed is not an exaggeration. Generative AI is becoming a customer-driven value initiative that IT service companies are queuing up to crack. According to Goldman Sachs, the annual incremental global IT services gain from Gen AI will be between $123 billion and $244 billion by 2030. “Assuming a gradual adoption curve, accelerated adoption during the latter half of the decade would translate into $18-36 billion in annual global IT services spend by FY27, or 1-2% annual revenue tailwinds for our India IT services coverage by FY27,” it says. The report says Gen AI could add 50-100 bps of incremental revenue growth to Indian IT from FY25, it adds. That’s the market that IT service companies are looking to tap.