Google Wants 500 Million Gemini AI Users by Year’s End

Google CEO Sundar Pichai reportedly thinks his company’s artificial intelligence model, Gemini, has surpassed its competitors’ abilities.

Now, Pichai wants to get Google’s chatbot to be used by 500 million people before the end of the year, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday (Jan. 16), citing unnamed sources.

Google was caught off guard when OpenAI’s ChatGPT launched in 2022, despite having spent years pioneering AI and building similar chatbots, the report said. Since then, the tech giant has scrambled to keep up, with Gemini at the center of its effort to remain at the forefront of AI.

While Google hasn’t said how many people are using Gemini, it was the 54th most downloaded free app on iPhones Wednesday (Jan. 15), according to the report. ChatGPT, which has 300 million weekly users, occupied the No. 4 spot on the list.

ChatGPT’s mobile app has been downloaded about 465 million times on Android and iOS devices, versus 106 million for Gemini, with most of those downloads happening on Android devices, the report said.

Google is looking for new business lines, such as subscriptions, as growth in search advertising has waned, per the report. The company offers a premium edition of Gemini with added features for $20 a month.

Google also announced this week that it phased out its $20 monthly fee for AI features on its Workspace products. Subscribers to its Workspace Business and Enterprise plans will now get Gemini features at no added cost. However, the company plans to increase the prices of its Workspace Business and Enterprise plans starting Thursday.

Meanwhile, PYMNTS wrote earlier this week about artificial general intelligence (AGI) for business, noting that while AI can perform many tasks, there are still limits to how it can help a company.

“AGI would change the game completely,” PYMNTS wrote Monday (Jan. 13). “It would possess human-like general problem-solving abilities and cognitive flexibility. Just as a human who learns to cook can apply those organizational and timing skills to project management, an AGI system could take lessons from one domain and apply them to completely different challenges. This adaptability is what makes AGI such a transformative concept for business.”

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