The AI arms race continues as Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) rolls out the Bard chatbot. Bard, driven by artificial intelligence, looks to cement Google—and, by extension, Alphabet—as a provider of search queries and answers, along with opportunities to advertise. Alphabet investors are quite happy with the advance, as they drove up share prices in Tuesday afternoon’s trading.
The Bard chatbot, seen as an answer to Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and OpenAI’s ChapGPT, will be opened up, but only to a few users that have already signed up for a waitlist. Only users in the U.S. and the UK will have access first, and then, Google will roll out the platform to users in other countries as well. Further, Google means to limit the potential for widely-publicized faux pas like those seen with Microsoft’s entry, such as the doxxing and the death threats?
Not that Bard is exactly a hundred percent itself. Bard answered a question wrong previously at a press event, and ultimately cost Alphabet about $100 billion in market cap value. Google reps later explained that Bard works best on questions where there’s no one right answer. These are called “NORA Queries,” apparently. Further, Google has prepared disclaimers to protect itself, noting that “Bard may display inaccurate or offensive information that doesn’t represent Google’s views.”
Analysts don’t appear to care one way or the next. Unanimously, analyst consensus calls Alphabet stock a Strong Buy. Further, with an average price target of $123.78, it comes with 17.27% upside potential.
