Google denies it copied ChatGPT to train its own AI chatbot Bard

New Delhi, March 30 (IANS) Google has denied the reports that it is copying Microsoft-owned OpenAI's ChatGPT to train its AI chatbot called Bard.

A report in The Information claimed that OpenAI's success "has forced the two AI research teams within Google's parent, Alphabet, to overcome years of intense rivalry to work together".

According to the report, citing sources, software engineers at Google's Brain AI group are working with employees at DeepMind, which is a sibling company within Alphabet to develop software to compete with OpenAI.

"Known internally as Gemini, the joint effort began in recent weeks, after Google stumbled with Bard, its first attempt to compete with OpenAI's chatbot," the report claimed.

However, a Google spokesperson told The Verge that "Bard is not trained on any data from ShareGPT or ChatGPT".

Meanwhile, Google has announced it is opening up access to its ChatGPT competitor "Bard" as an early experiment for users to collaborate with generative AI.

Early access to Bard has rolled out in the US and the UK, and the company said it will expand the access over time to more countries and languages.

Bard, like OpenAI's ChatGPT and Microsoft's Bing chatbot, is based on a large language model (LLM), specifically a lightweight and optimised version of LaMDA, which the tech giant said will be updated with newer, more capable models in the future.

Users can interact with Bard by asking questions and refining their responses with follow-up questions.