Microsoft MAI-1 AI Model With 500 Billion Parameters Could Soon Be Unveiled: Report

As per the report, the MAI-1 AI model project is headed by Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI.

Written by Akash Dutta, Edited by Siddharth Suvarna | Updated: 7 May 2024 14:19 IST

Photo Credit: Reuters

Microsoft’s Copilot is currently powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4 AI models

Highlights

Reportedly, the purpose of the AI model has not been decided yet
Microsoft recently launched the Phi-3-mini AI model
The company will hold its Microsoft Build event on May 21

Microsoft is reportedly working on a new artificial intelligence (AI) model dubbed MAI-1, which could be its largest in-house model to date. The company recently created its AI division, which is now headed by Mustafa Suleyman, co-founder of Google DeepMind and former CEO of Inflection AI. It is said that Suleyman is heading the development of the large language model and it can be unveiled soon. Notably, Microsoft launched its open-source small language model (SLM) Phi-3-mini last month as a successor to the Phi-2 model.

According to a report by The Information, the MAI-1 AI model is in its advanced stages of development. However, it is said that its purpose has not been determined yet, and it will depend on its final capabilities. Citing unnamed Microsoft employees familiar with the matter, the report also highlighted that the project is being headed by Suleyman. It is believed that the tech giant could preview the AI model during its annual developer-focused event Microsoft Build which will be held starting May 21.

The MAI-1 AI model reportedly contains 500 billion parameters, which makes it the largest LLM created by the company so far. For comparison, the Phi-3-mini model contained 3.8 billion parameters, whereas GPT-4 comes with one trillion parameters. The larger the number of parameters, the wider the knowledge base of an AI model. It also helps in improving the contextual knowledge window of the chatbot. Since MAI-3 has not been released, no benchmark scores are available to judge its performance compared to the top models.

[Sponsored] Samsung Galaxy S24: The Ultimate Camera Phone With Smarter On-Device AI

As per the report, Microsoft did not bring this AI model from Inflection AI and instead built it from scratch in-house. However, it might have been trained using data from the startup. It is unclear if the MAI-1 AI model will also be open-sourced like Phi-3-mini, or will require a subscription fee for access. The tech giant could also use it for its own AI products. These details will likely be shared during the company's Build event later this month.

Separately, OpenAI is reportedly working on its ChatGPT-powered search engine and has already created a domain and SSL certificate for its first-ever search product. Some rumours have suggested that the search engine could be launched on May 9.

Is the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 the best foldable phone you can buy in India right now? We discuss the company's new clamshell-style foldable handset on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated - see our ethics statement for details.

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.

Further reading: Microsoft, AI, Artificial Intelligence, Chatbots, AI models

Akash Dutta Email Akash Dutta

Akash Dutta is a Senior Sub Editor at Gadgets 360. He is particularly interested in the social impact of technological developments and loves reading about emerging fields such as AI, metaverse, and fediverse. In his free time, he can be seen supporting his favourite football club - Chelsea, watching movies and anime, and sharing passionate opinions on food. More