Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)-backed OpenAI has temporarily paused subscriptions for the premium version of its popular artificial intelligence (AI) tool, ChatGPT Plus. The move comes after the company witnessed a substantial spike in the tool’s usage following OpenAI’s first developer conference, OpenAI DevDay, held on November 6.
At the conference, OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, disclosed additional capabilities for the subscription service, including allowing users to build custom versions of ChatGPT for specific use cases. It would be reasonable to say that the new features caused users to rush to the AI platform.
Earlier, the company revealed that about 100 million people use OpenAI’s services every week, and over 90% of Fortune 500 businesses are building tools on its platform. So, the halt on premium sign-ups may be a solution to avoid the service outages that occurred about a week ago for both ChatGPT and its API.
It is worth mentioning that the company is actively seeking strategies to counter the growing competition in the AI space, particularly from tech giants like Alphabet (GOOGL). In March 2023, OpenAI partnered with a startup company, Humane, to create an AI hardware device, AI Pin, which was released last week. AI Pin is a wearable pin-style device that allows users to interact with a virtual AI assistant by simply tapping and speaking.
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