Computing giant Google today announced it will be releasing previews of three new AI features, including AI compositing for Google Workspace, developer prototyping and coding through PaLM and MakerSuite, and validated models for its Vertex AI service.
Workspace features are currently focused on Docs and Gmail. Users can use Google’s AI to rewrite emails in a particular style or tone, or even generate documents from whole material. Simply asking the system to “generate a sales pitch” or something similar creates a simple document that users can then edit to suit their needs. The AI can also help re-draft documents to give them a more formal tone, shorten them, and so on.
According to Sid Nag, vice president of Gartner, this functionality builds on features that Google has had for a while.
“They’ve always composed smartly — that’s all part of the language model capacity,” he said. “Now they’re taking it to the next level where they’re applying the generative AI functionality on top.”
PaLM API allows connection to major language models
The other two major announcements focus more on developers and business users. The first is a PaLM API that, according to the company’s official blog, is designed as an easy entry point to use Google’s large language models for everything from content generation and chat to analytics for more general purposes. That API interacts with a tool called MakerSuite, which can be used to create sample code for developers.
“It essentially allows you to quickly prototype ideas for rapid engineering and fine-tuning of custom models,” said Nag.
The latest big piece Google announced today is the new functionality for Vertex AI, which aims to let companies use Google’s proprietary technology to create and customize their own AI applications. The Generative AI App Builder allows users to use preset templates to automatically generate bots, custom search engines, and even digital assistants very quickly, while the generative AI support coming to Vertex allows them to build in a more granular way and adapt.
“Google’s launch of the preview of its generative AI offerings is an important step in the advancement of the Vertex platform,” said Rowan Curran, a Forrester analyst. “The AI/ML platform market is rapidly evolving to adopt generative AI capabilities and Google’s announced functionality is comparable to what we’ve seen from the other major players in the space.”
Google said it will make the new capabilities available to “trusted testers” throughout the year before a public rollout.
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