Meet The AI Leaders Reshaping Technology And Business

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A year ago, AI was something that many people talked about. Today, AI is a force in the business world. It’s increasing business productivity and capability. It’s being integrated into a wide variety of workplace technology applications: from allowing administrative staff to perform more efficiently, to helping customers navigate questions about orders and services, to ensuring manufacturing runs smoothly, to assisting in design ideas and execution. And companies in this space are making tools for chatting, designing and creating available to both enterprises and individuals.

Forbes’ sixth annual AI 50, launched today, recognizes AI companies that hold the most promise. They represent a wide range of sectors, from chatbot titan OpenAI to legal research tool Harvey to protein designer Cradle. All together, they have raised $34.7 billion—though nearly a third of that comes from OpenAI’s $10 billion investment from Microsoft. Their valuations are much more than that. OpenAI is worth $86 billion, Databricks checks in at $43 billion, and Anthropic is worth $18.4 billion. The companies on the list have customers ranging from governments to top consulting firms and corporations.

The companies on the Forbes AI 50 show how generative AI is being adapted to a wide variety of industries, as well as the direction that the technology may continue. Tech experts often say that generative AI is a revolution that will dramatically change the way business is done, much like the personal computer was 40 years ago. We’re at the beginning of that revolution now, and some of the players on the list are likely to make as many contributions to the world of tomorrow as early computing pioneers did.

Forbes staff writers have spotlighted two of the companies on this year’s Forbes AI 50 list: Productivity software company Notion and AI-powered search engine Perplexity. There’s more about those companies later in this newsletter.

POLICY + REGULATIONS

The current Congress may end up doing more on tech regulation than pushing for the sale or ban of TikTok. Over the weekend, a draft of legislation known as the American Privacy Rights Act was released by bipartisan committee chairs from both the House of Representatives and Senate. This legislation would create a national standard that gives people some control over their data. It would restrict the data that companies collect, keep and use to what they “actually need to provide products and services.” It would also stop companies from using personal information to discriminate against users, and allow users to opt out of targeted advertising. Under the bill, users would need to be notified if their data is transferred to foreign adversaries, they could stop companies from using their data if companies change their privacy policies, and could sue if their privacy rights are violated.

Legislation to create a federal framework for online privacy protection has been negotiated for years, but all sides have been unable to come to an agreement. This bill will have to pass both chambers of Congress, and ranking committee members have said they may want some things changed—Democrats favor adding more protections for children’s privacy, and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) opposes any bill that “strengthens Big Tech by imposing crushing new regulatory costs on upstart competitors or gives unprecedented power to the FTC to become referees of internet speech and DEI compliance.”

One piece of legislation that is having difficulty passing Congress is the reauthorization of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, which failed in the House of Representatives with a 193-228 vote on Wednesday. This law, which has always been controversial, allows intelligence officials to conduct “targeted surveillance” of non-U.S. citizens overseas using an FBI database. Privacy of the people caught in FISA surveillance has long been a concern, but Wednesday’s vote—which included 19 Republicans voting against it—may have had less to do with privacy fears and more to do with politics. Former President Donald Trump, who is running for re-election, implored members to “KILL FISA” on Truth Social, incorrectly claiming that the law up for reauthorization “was illegally used against” him to spy on his 2016 campaign and its links to Russia.

FROM THE HEADLINES

Google has seen its value surge recently, with parent company Alphabet’s stock price reaching an all-time high of $159.89 per share on Tuesday. That boosted the company’s market value to $1.95 trillion, and analysts expect the company will exceed $2 trillion in the near future. Alphabet had reached a $2 trillion valuation for a few minutes in 2021, but not since. The only other companies to have reached this peak are Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia and Saudi Aramco.

What’s helped Google get to this point is hype around AI. The company, which is developing an AI chatbot called Gemini, is working to integrate AI into its namesake search engine. Forbes senior contributor David Phelan talked to Hema Budaraju, Google’s senior director of product, about the company’s AI search initiatives. She said that the company’s purpose is helping the user understand information, and it’s pulling on generative AI to assist in complex information-seeking journeys. For example, responding to a search question asking when is the best time to plant daffodil bulbs with advice on that topic, plus providing in depth gardening information and websites to visit to learn more. Google is working to refine its AI search results in order to be the most useful and easy to navigate, and Budajaru said they are currently experimenting with different models in the U.S. (However, it’s important to note the search results and information provided through Google’s AI are turning out different than traditional results.)

But Google also has been focusing on making its other services and segments the most valuable to users. Forbes senior contributor Tony Bradley wrote a feature on Google Cloud’s Office of the CISO, which features a variety of liaisons working with companies using cloud services, helping them get the most out of what Google offers.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

While AI’s ability to revolutionize a variety of industries and make positive change is often spotlighted, examples of AI being misused are also common. In the last week, Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center released a report detailing how entities affiliated with China are using deceptive social media accounts to gather information on how to disrupt the U.S. election in November, and deploying AI-generated content to try to sway public opinion. The effectiveness of these efforts has been limited so far, Microsoft found. However, social media companies are looking at their AI policies. Facebook, Instagram and Threads owner Meta said it is tightening its AI-generated and manipulated content policies, requiring a prominent label with information and context on AI-generated and digitally altered images, audio and video.

U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he was “deeply troubled” by a report from Israeli news outlets indicating that Israel has been using an AI program called “Lavender” to identify potential targets in Gaza to fight its war against Hamas. Israel has been criticized for civilian deaths in the conflict, including a group of World Central Kitchen aid workers killed this month. The U.S. has not verified the report, but Guterres said “life and death decisions” should not be “delegated to the cold calculation of algorithms.”

DEEP DIVE

A Look At Forbes AI 50 Honorees Perplexity And Notion

Aravind Srinivas and Denis Yarats began their journey to develop what is now AI-powered search engine Perplexity by impressing several tech VIPs with personalized demos in 2022. They approached Meta AI chief Yann LeCun, Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean, former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, OpenAI cofounder Andrej Karpathy and prominent angel investor Elad Giln with what their model could do that Google could not—like find the accounts that most often responded to tweets. These leaders contributed $3.1 million to the company’s September 2022 seed round, which got Srinavas, Yarats and fellow cofounders Andrew Konwinski and Johnny Ho on the path to develop the search engine. Today, writes Forbes’ Rashi Shrivastava, about 15 million people use Perplexity to source and summarize all kinds of information, condensed into succinct four-to-five-sentence answers with citations and links to sources.

“It’s almost like Wikipedia and ChatGPT had a kid,” Srinivas, who is Perplexity’s CEO, told Shrivastava.

The company is now valued at $1 billion, with $102 million in venture capital raised. And while Perplexity has financial support and fans from the upper ranks of today’s tech world, Google is still the behemoth in search. Srinivas remains optimistic because he doesn’t see Perplexity as a direct competitor to Google. There are tasks that Perplexity can do better, like summarizing long news articles or retrieving instructions on how to renew a passport. But, Srinivas said, people can easily use both search engines.

Notion, the AI-powered productivity app, also seems to be angling for Google in a competitive sense. The company, which has added more and more functions over time—it has editors for software, text, spreadsheets, databases and calendars—and provides many customization options. Last November, it added an AI bot that can rapidly surface anything stored inside Notion, allowing users to simply query pieces of information—like the takeaways from a meeting the previous week—and quickly have them returned. Forbes’ Kenrick Cai wrote about the company, which has roughly 100 million users and, by Forbes estimates, is profitable.

Notion cofounder Ivan Zhao started his company with a simple concept: A user should be able to do everything with a word processor that they can with a piece of paper. As the programming improved, it caught on largely through word of mouth. Today, Notion is poised to take on Google and Microsoft in the productivity suite market, 99% of which currently is controlled by those two giants.

“Our competitor is the entire industry,” Zhao told Cai. “If you’re building Legos, are you competing with a toy airplane or toy car company? It’s both.”

FACTS + COMMENTS

Apple sent threat notifications to some users on Wednesday, informing them they may be targets of “mercenary spyware attacks.”

92: Countries of users who received the notifications, reportedly including India, a week before the start of general elections

150+: Countries to which similar notifications have been sent since 2021

‘Some of the most advanced digital threats in existence today’: Apple’s description of mercenary spyware attacks

VIDEO

What The 2024 AI 50 List Says About The Artificial Intelligence Industry

STRATEGIES + ADVICE

Technology, including generative AI, can go far to make your company more innovative. However, human creativity is vital to make the company succeed. Here are ways to bring both of them together.

All leaders don’t need to be extroverts. There are benefits for your company from the “quiet leadership” of introverts.

QUIZ

Congress sent Elon Musk an inquiry to learn more about an escalating public feud with a country’s Supreme Court over his X social media platform. This country’s top court has reportedly asked X to ban certain accounts, which Musk has refused to do. Which country is it?

A. Nigeria

B. Brazil

C. India

D. The Philippines

See if you got the answer right here.