OpenAI unveils customizable ChatGPT at Developer Day conference

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman delivers the keynote address at a developer event. [Photo by AFP]

OpenAI Inc., the company behind ChatGPT, on Monday unveiled GPT Builder, a service that allows users that are not familiar with coding to create their own personalized artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots.

“GPTs are a new way for anyone to create a tailored version of ChatGPT to be more helpful in their daily life, at specific tasks, at work, or at home—and then share that creation with others,” OpenAI said in a blog post after hosting a developer event in San Francisco. “Anyone can easily build their own GPT—no coding is required.”

Industry insiders viewed OpenAI’s announcement as a move to establish an ecosystem, similar to Apple’s App Store or Google Play.

OpenAi, which has driven the momentum for generative AI with ChatGPT, is now believed to be unveiling a strategy to build a strong developer ecosystem and raise the entry barrier.

On the same day, the company also unveiled a new large language model (LLM) called GPT-4 Turbo, which can handle up to 128,000 tokens, or character units, simultaneously and also uses fresh information up to April 2023.

GPT-4 Turbo can input a much larger amount of information and summarize an entire 300-page book. This strategy aims to outperform competitors with a new service.

Meta, formerly Facebook, is also actively involved in ecosystem development, recently open sourcing its Llama 2 model.

But other competitors have yet to venture into ecosystem development. Google LLC has unveiled Bard 2 but the launch of Gemini, its answer to Open AI, has been delayed.

Anthropic, which received investments from Amazon and Google, has not unveiled the latest model yet since announcing Claude 2 in July.