Gen AI Market Update H1'2024

While tracking GenAI space, I am having continuous conversations (not at a cross-sectional level but at a longitudinal level over last 5 months) with my acquittances and strategists at Microsoft, ZS, Boston Consulting Group (BCG), Mastercard, PVR Limited, HDFC Bank, Intel Corporation, BBVA, airtel, The D. E. Shaw Group about GenAI and you know in a matter of couple of months things have significantly changed:-

👉 Around Oct/Nov'23 risks weighed significantly more in the conversations - risks of crucial customer data getting leaked in process of training models, AI hallucination led knowledge management concerns, invisible ROI and thus most market participants were somewhat lack lustered after initial excitement

Fast forward to 2024/25.....

👉[ROI concerns getting assuaged] Microsoft say and I directly quote "for every United States dollar that a company invests in AI, it realizes an average return of USD3.50"

👉[GenAI use cases expanded] A Chandigarh based startup is working on first AI-led film and a close associate of mine told me PVR Limited might exclusively partner with them soon to build synergies for production and distribution

👉[Building on initial POC and IP - now GenAI first companies are coming] PE/VC firms were looking hesitant to join the GenAI boat due to heightened valuations but recently Intel Corporation created a new GenAI focused company called as Articul8 by leveraging capital from a global investment firm

👉[Competitive employee trainings at play] BBVA did this interesting in-house championship where employees competed against each other on 12 LLMs to find anomaly in financial reports, classify level of customer satisfaction etc. and rated toppers as people overcoming all the challenges with the fewest prompts and in the shortest time

Not just these, changes in the way AI/GenAI is seen is also coming as this statement brings in a positive perspective "retraining of the job force will happen and in the process, we will save time and energy. The countries where the happiness index is high, he added, are those where the obsession with work is less, people spend fewer hours at work, build better relationships, and have longer vacation time"