Khaberni - Three years after the launch of "ChatGPT" which shook the technology world and posed a direct challenge to Google, it seems that the balance of power has started to tilt in favor of the other American giant. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, announced an internal "serious" emergency, raising the company's alert level to "Red Code," the highest warning level indicating existential threats, in an unprecedented move aimed at countering the rapid progress of Google's "Gemini 3" model.
The "Wall Street Journal" revealed that Altman issued strict directives to employees to stop working on revenue-generating projects such as advertising, AI shopping agents, smart healthcare assistants, and personal plus ChatGPT assistant, and to shift all resources to improving the speed, reliability, and customizability of the model, in an effort to enhance user experience and make it easier and more private.
This shift comes at a time when OpenAI is facing fierce competition from Google, which saw its Gemini user base grow from 450 million active users monthly in July to 650 million in October. Similarweb analytics have also shown that users are spending more time with Gemini compared to ChatGPT, even though OpenAI claims it has 800 million weekly users.
Google's supremacy in this context is not only in user numbers but also includes an integrated infrastructure that allows it to train artificial intelligence models on custom chips at a low cost and deploy them directly into its products such as Search, YouTube, and Gmail, with integration with more than 3 billion Android devices. In contrast, OpenAI relies on an expensive cloud infrastructure from Microsoft and Nvidia chips, which increases operating costs and limits its ability to compete.
The rise of Gemini 3 has also led to widespread effects in the technology market. Nvidia's stock fell by more than 6%, causing a market value loss estimated at $250 billion, after reports that companies like Meta Platforms are opting to buy TPU chips from Google instead of Nvidia's graphics processing units.
The financial and strategic pressure on OpenAI is escalating, especially with the need to achieve annual revenues of $200 billion by 2030 to ensure profitability, amid spending billions of dollars every three months on computing and capabilities. Conversely, Google has annual revenues of $120 billion and nearly $100 billion in cash reserves, giving it enormous competitive power without worry about costs.
Despite these challenges, Altman tried to reassure his employees that the new model to be launched soon will outperform Gemini 3, reaffirming his commitment to leadership and not considering moving to other companies. However, the emergency decision to cancel revenue-generating projects reveals deep concerns about OpenAI's ability to maintain its leading position against the technology giant now operating at full strength.
