Salesforce, the leading CRM and cloud software company, has announced its ambitious vision to achieve artificial general intelligence (AGI) for business, according to its founder, CEO and chairman Marc Benioff. Benioff shared his views on the future of AI and its impact on the enterprise world at the company’s annual Dreamforce conference, which he claimed to be the world’s largest AI event.
What is AGI and why does it matter?
AGI is the ability of a machine or a system to perform any intellectual task that a human can do, such as reasoning, learning, planning, creativity, and problem-solving. Unlike artificial narrow intelligence (ANI), which is focused on specific domains or tasks, AGI can generalize across different domains and adapt to new situations. AGI is considered to be the ultimate goal of AI research and development, as it would enable machines to surpass human intelligence and capabilities.
AGI has enormous potential for transforming various industries and sectors, such as healthcare, education, entertainment, finance, and manufacturing. However, it also poses significant challenges and risks, such as ethical, social, legal, and security issues. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure that AGI is aligned with human values and goals, and that it is used for good purposes.
How is Salesforce building toward AGI for business?
Salesforce is one of the pioneers and leaders in applying AI to business applications. The company launched its AI platform, Salesforce Einstein, in 2016, which provides predictive and prescriptive insights across its sales, service, marketing, and commerce software. Since then, Salesforce has been expanding its AI capabilities and offerings, such as Einstein Voice Assistant, Einstein Vision, Einstein Bots, Einstein Prediction Builder, and Einstein Discovery.
At Dreamforce 2023, Salesforce announced Einstein Copilot, a new feature that will help its 20 million global “trailblazers” build AI-infused apps for their own businesses without code. Einstein Copilot will leverage generative AI models to create natural language interfaces, chatbots, workflows, dashboards, and reports based on user inputs and data sources. It will also provide explanations and recommendations for improving the apps’ performance and outcomes.
However, Salesforce’s ambitions go beyond ANI and generative AI. Benioff revealed that Salesforce’s platform would soon be “autonomous with agents and soon to be AGI.” Agents are intelligent automations driven by AI to accomplish tasks, communicate information, make decisions, or learn new things. AGI is artificial general intelligence—human-level or better cognition—which experts aren’t unanimously certain is possible.
Benioff said that AI will change everything and that everything will shift. He also said that Salesforce understands the burden that must be on them as they are trying to take this forward.
What are the challenges and opportunities for Salesforce in pursuing AGI for business?
One of the main challenges that Salesforce faces in pursuing AGI for business is ensuring trust and responsibility. Benioff emphasized that trust is the most important thing they are doing in AI and that customers are both intrigued and concerned by the technology’s potential.
Benioff shared an anecdote of a recent dinner meeting with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, one of the faces of the current generative AI wave. Altman demonstrated a newer, unpublished OpenAI model that simulated Benioff giving a 1960s speech from John F. Kennedy based on just a few seconds of Benioff’s recorded voice. Benioff was impressed by the model’s accuracy but also worried about where his voice data was stored and how it was secured. Altman told him that because it was input into the model it no longer could be located or extracted.
This raised a concern for Benioff if a CEO of a bank needed to know where his data was for compliance reasons. He argued that Salesforce would need more protections—a “trust layer” bridging corporate users to the model providers on the other end—without permanently sharing data.
To stay ahead of the curve and gain an edge in the market Salesforce has also been investing in AI startups and initiatives. The company has invested in two foundation model challengers to OpenAI so far: Anthropic and Cohere. It has also launched a $500 million fund to invest in startups working on generative AI technologies.
Salesforce has a unique opportunity to leverage its existing customer base and ecosystem to drive adoption and innovation in AGI for business. The company has more than 150 thousand customers across various industries and regions who use its cloud software solutions. It also has a large community of developers, partners, and enthusiasts who create and share apps, integrations, and best practices on its platform. By providing them with easy-to-use and powerful AI tools and services, Salesforce can enable them to solve their business problems and achieve their goals with AGI.
