SoftBank Group CEO Says Artificial General Intelligence to Be Achieved in Two to Three Years

By Peter Landers

TOKYO--SoftBank Group Chief Executive Masayoshi Son reiterated his bullish forecasts for artificial intelligence in a speech Thursday that stressed advances made by OpenAI.

OpenAI raised $6.6 billion in a recent round of new funding that included a $500 million investment by SoftBank, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Son said he believed artificial general intelligence, in which computers have human-level cognitive abilities, would be achieved in two to three years. He reiterated that he believes "artificial super intelligence," in which computers have 10,000 times the intelligence of humans, will be achieved within a decade.

"A gold rush of intelligence has arrived. The one who goes fastest will win," Son said at SoftBank World 2024, a conference organized by his company.

He praised OpenAI's recently introduced o1, a series of models designed to spend more time thinking before they respond. Such models "have developed the ability to think," Son said.

He said he got up early Monday morning and asked the AI program how to turn 10 million yen into 100 million yen. He said the program took 75 seconds to give an answer, but he didn't say what it was.

News Corp, owner of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires, has a content-licensing partnership with OpenAI.

Write to Peter Landers at peter.landers@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 02, 2024 22:16 ET (02:16 GMT)

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