Microsoft Azure OpenAI service now generally available, ChatGPT coming soon

San Francisco: Microsoft has announced the general availability of the Azure OpenAI service, which enables enterprises to power their apps with large-scale artificial intelligence models such as GPT-3.5, DALL-E 2, and Codex.

The company also said it will add OpenAI's artificial intelligence bot ChatGPT to its cloud-based Azure service soon.

"With Azure OpenAI Service now generally available, more businesses can apply for access to the most advanced AI models in the world -- including GPT-3.5, Codex, and DALL-E 2 -- backed by the trusted enterprise-grade capabilities and AI-optimised infrastructure of Microsoft Azure, to create cutting-edge applications," Microsoft said in a blogpost.

"Customers will also be able to access ChatGPT -- a fine-tuned version of GPT-3.5 that has been trained and runs inference on Azure AI infrastructure -- through Azure OpenAI Service soon," it added.

Moreover, Satya Nadella, Chairman & CEO of Microsoft, also tweeted the announcement, "ChatGPT is coming soon to the Azure Open AI Service, which is now generally available, as we help customers apply the world's most advanced AI models to their own business imperatives".

The software giant debuted the Azure OpenAI Service in November 2021 to enable customers to tap into the power of large-scale generative AI models.

Meanwhile, reports surfaced that Microsoft is planning to infuse $10 billion into OpenAI, which will value the company at nearly $29 billion.

News portal Semafor reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that it is still unclear if the deal has been finalised but "documents sent to prospective investors in recent weeks outlining its terms indicated a targeted close by the end of 2022".

The tech giant had invested $1 billion in OpenAI in 2019.