In April this year, reports surfaced that running ChatGPT costs OpenAI a whopping USD 700,000 (Rs 5 crore approx) every day. Not only this, reports had also revealed that Sam Altman’s company’s losses doubled to USD 540 million ever since the launch of ChatGPT. The viral AI chatbot, that was launched in November 2022, is being widely used across the world but looks like the company behind it isn’t in a great position. As per a recent report, OpenAI might even go bankrupt by 2024 due to ChatGPT’s mammoth operational expense, and other factors.
OpenAI to go bankrupt by 2024: report
According to Analytics India Magazine, ChatGPT saw a decline in its userbase in June. And the next month, the number of people using ChatGPT dropped even more. While 1.7 billion people were using the viral AI chatbot in June, the numbers declined by 12 per cent in July with 1.5 billion active users. The report then highlights that a user on Twitter (X), says that one of the reasons behind the decline might be ‘API cannibalisation’. Most workplaces are prohibiting the use of ChatGPT by their employees. They, however, are using ChatGPT’s API to come up with their own LLMs and are encouraging employees to use them.
ChatGPT 5 on the way?
Earlier this month, a Windows Latest report said that OpenAI has applied for a trademark that hints at the upcoming GPT-5. The US trademark application spotted by the publication dates back to July 18, and suggests that OpenAI might be planning to unveil another large language model soon.
“OpenAI has filed a new trademark application with USPTO for ‘GPT-5’, a ‘downloadable computer software for using language model’,” says the Windows Latest report.
The report adds that while filing for trademark of GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 too, OpenAI had used similar terms in the application. Both were described as ‘downloadable computer software for using language model’. This time, the mention of GPT-5 suggests that OpenAI might be up to creating an even more powerful version of ChatGPT. However, no further details have been divulged and it isn’t necessary that OpenAI decides to launch GPT-5 this year.