Dario Amodei, co-founder and CEO of artificial intelligence startup Anthropic.
Chesnot | Getty Images
Anthropic, an Amazon-backed artificial intelligence startup founded by former OpenAI research executives, announced on Tuesday that it has reached an artificial intelligence milestone: an artificial intelligence agent can complete complex tasks using computers in the same way as humans.
Anthropic is the company behind Claude, a chatbot that, like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, has exploded in popularity. Startups like Anthropic, and tech giants like Google, AmazonMicrosoft and Meta are both involved in the generative AI arms race to ensure they don’t fall behind in the market Expected to exceed US$1 trillion Income over ten years.
Anthropic’s new computer usage features, part of two of its latest artificial intelligence models, allow its technology to interpret content on a computer screen, select buttons, enter text, navigate websites and perform tasks through any software and real-time Internet browsing.
Anthropic chief scientific officer Jared Kaplan told CNBC that the tool can “use computers in basically the same way we do,” adding that it can complete “tens or even hundreds of steps.” task.
Anthropic told CNBC that Amazon has been using the tool for a long time, with early customers and beta testers including Asana, Canva and Notion. Kaplan said the company has been developing the tool since the beginning of this year.
Anthropic released a public beta of the feature to developers on Tuesday. According to Kaplan, the team hopes to make it available to consumer and enterprise customers in the coming months or early next year.
Anthropic said future consumer applications include booking flights, scheduling appointments, filling out forms, conducting online research and submitting expense reports.
“We want Claude to be able to really help people with a variety of different types of jobs, and we think the chatbot setup is pretty limited in that you can ask questions and (get) context, but that’s about it,” Kaplan told CNBC.
What is an AI agent?
After OpenAI’s ChatGPT went viral, the industry quickly shifted from text responses to AI-generated photos. Video and voice. Now, both startups and large tech companies are working hard to develop artificial intelligence agents.
Agents are not just about providing answers (the domain of chatbots and image generators), but about increasing productivity and completing multi-step, complex tasks on behalf of the user. Although the term is not clearly defined in the tech world, AI agents are seen as a step beyond chatbots as they are often designed for specific business functions and can be customized on large AI models . Think of Jarvis, Tony Stark’s all-purpose artificial intelligence assistant in the Marvel Universe.
Grace Isford, a partner at venture capital firm Lux Capital, told CNBC in June that there has been a “dramatic increase” in tech investor interest in startups focused on building artificial intelligence agents. Together they have raised hundreds of millions of dollars and seen their valuations climb as the broader generative AI market grows.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said on an earnings call earlier this year that he wanted to deliver an artificial intelligence agent that could do more tasks on behalf of users, although “there’s a lot more to do.” . Meta and Google executives have also touted their work in driving AI agents to be more productive.
Anthropic competes with OpenAI on multiple fronts
Anthropic has become one of the hottest AI startups since releasing the first version of Claude in March 2023, a product that competes directly with OpenAI’s ChatGPT in the enterprise and consumer markets without any consumer access or fanfare. Supporters include Google, Salesforce and Amazon, which since January have launched iOS and Android apps, an enterprise teams program and international expansion into Europe.
“[We’re]moving toward a world where these models will behave more like virtual collaborators than virtual assistants,” Anthropic product manager Scott White told CNBC in September.
Anthropic’s announcement Tuesday is the latest step in its long-term strategy to build virtual collaborators, or agents.
Last month, Anthropic launched Claude Enterprise, its largest new product since the debut of chatbots, designed for businesses looking to integrate Anthropic’s artificial intelligence. Beta testers and early customers of the enterprise product include GitLab, Midjourney and Menlo Ventures, according to the company.
Claude Enterprise allows customers to upload relevant documents using a larger contextual window than before, equivalent to 100 30-minute sales conversations, 100,000 lines of code or 15 complete financial reports, according to Anthropic. The program also allows for “live feedback” from power users within the company to show AI newbies how others are using the technology, White said.
The launch of Claude Enterprise follows Anthropic’s first launch of the more powerful Claude 3.5 Sonnet in June and its “Teams” plan for small businesses in May.
In June, Anthropic also announced “Artifacts,” which it says will allow users to ask its Claude chatbot to generate text files or code and then open the results in a dedicated window.
White told CNBC in September that the artifacts, or “workspaces,” allow users to “view, edit and build on Claude’s creations on the fly,” which will allow Anthropic’s enterprise customers to create marketing calendars, enter sales data, produce dashboards or forecasts, Draft functional code, write legal documents, summarize complex contracts, automate legal tasks, and more.
Shortly after Anthropic first launched Teams in May, Mike Krieger, co-founder and former chief technology officer of Meta-owned Instagram, joined the company as chief product officer. Under Krieger’s leadership, the platform has grown to 1 billion users and its engineering team to more than 450 people, according to a press release. Jan Leike, OpenAI’s former head of security, joined the company that same month.
About The Author
