This week, AI funding, product launches, and revenue growth show the technology becoming more embedded across organizations.

📢 AI Radar: Hugging Face raises $235M to expand its AI model tools and community, OpenAI launches ChatGPT Enterprise for customized enterprise AI, Google makes major AI advancements across its cloud platform and apps at Next 2023, and OpenAI is projected to hit $1B in revenue as demand for its AI tech grows.

🔍 AI in Action: We take a look at how Instacart is leveraging AI capabilities from ChatGPT and custom models to enhance personalized recommendations, streamline operations, and ready itself for its upcoming IPO.

Here’s what we have today:

📢 AI Radar

1. Hugging Face has raised $235 million in a Series D funding round led by investors including Salesforce and Nvidia. This values the company at $4.5 billion, double its previous valuation from May 2022. Hugging Face provides tools for developing and hosting AI models, with over 1 million model repositories. The funding comes amid strong enterprise demand for AI, with many companies looking to increase investments in automation. Hugging Face plans to use the funding to expand its research efforts and hire more talent to support its community of users. (link)

2. OpenAI has launched ChatGPT Enterprise, an enterprise-focused version of ChatGPT with enhanced security, privacy, and capabilities. Key features include unlimited faster access to GPT-4, longer context windows, advanced data analysis, customization options, enterprise security and privacy controls like encryption and SOC 2 compliance. Early adopters include Block, Canva, Carlyle, Estée Lauder, PwC and others using it to accelerate workflows. ChatGPT Enterprise is now available and aims to provide businesses with a powerful customized AI assistant. (link)

3. Here are the key highlights from Google's Cloud Next 2023 conference last week:

   • Vertex AI platform upgraded with new models like Anthropic's Claude and Meta's LLaMa-2 and enhanced code generation capabilities.

   • Google's AI assistant Duet rolled out across Workspace apps like Gmail, Docs, Sheets for $30 per user monthly.

   • New AI features added to Workspace apps like Meet, Chat and Drive to summarize notes, generate images, auto-reply to emails etc.

   • 70% of generative AI unicorns and over 50% of funded AI startups are Google Cloud customers, showing its strength in AI infrastructure.

   • Other announcements include new TPUv5 chips for training generative models, SynthID to distinguish AI-generated images, and partnerships with GM, Fox Sports, Estee Lauder etc.

   Overall, Google made major AI advancements across its cloud platform and apps to catch up with rivals like Microsoft and Amazon. Checkout the quick video summary → (link)

4. OpenAI is projected to surpass $1 billion in revenue over the next year, far exceeding previous estimates, as demand for its AI products like ChatGPT grows rapidly. Big companies are increasingly adopting OpenAI technology, with the startup now generating over $80 million per month in revenue. OpenAI's meteoric growth reflects rising enterprise appetite for generative AI. (link)

🔍 AI in Action - The Role of AI in Powering Instacart's Journey to IPO

With its upcoming IPO, Instacart is strategically investing in AI - over 70% of customer purchases are driven by its recommendation algorithms, AI predicts grocery availability for 1.4 billion items every 2 hours, and the company has acquired multiple AI startups. Instacart has filed for a Nasdaq listing, set to be the first major tech IPO since the end of 2021. As the grocery delivery company prepares to go public, it has focused on leveraging AI to strengthen offerings and operations.

Empowering Internal Teams

Internally, Instacart uses generative AI to accelerate workflows. This includes automating coding tasks, improving documentation discovery, and optimizing data systems. By removing repetitive work, data scientists can focus on higher-impact projects and research.

Personalized Meal Inspiration

Leveraging capabilities from OpenAI's ChatGPT and their own models, Instacart launched "Ask Instacart". This AI-powered search tool assists customers with grocery and meal planning questions customized to their preferences and history. It provides personalized recommendations and inspiration spanning menu ideas, cooking info, dietary needs, and more.

Frictionless Shopping with ChatGPT

Instacart's plugin for ChatGPT lets users get shopping list suggestions and add ingredients to their Instacart cart through conversational queries like "what's an easy healthy dinner I can make tonight?". The integration combines ChatGPT's conversational ability with Instacart's massive product catalog for effortless meal planning and shopping.

Streamlining Retailer Support

Instacart receives high volumes of daily support tickets from retailer partners. By using language models to summarize and label these requests, Instacart can identify patterns, group similar issues, and prioritize efficiently. This enables faster responses and avoids duplication of efforts.

Instacart's IPO filing highlights its growing focus on AI. By leveraging leading-edge technology across its business, Instacart aims to unlock growth and enhance services as it embarks on its next chapter as a public company.

That's all for today! If you’re looking to accelerate your business growth with AI:

Don't forget to keep an eye on this newsletter for more cool stories about how companies like Instacart use AI.