Google's Sundar Pichai takes a veiled dig at fellow Indian-American CEO Satya Nadella for his ‘dance' comment
Google CEO Sundar Pichai just took a veiled dig at his counterpart in Microsoft, Satya Nadella. During a podcast appearance with David Friedberg, Pichai opened up about the AI race, his major competitors, and then took a lighthearted dig at his fellow Indian-American executive Satya Nadella for his 2023 remarks on making Google 'dance'.
Gemini, formerly known as Bard, is a generative artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Google. It is one of several AI chatbots in a market where several companies are vying for the top spot.
Friedberg, an American entrepreneur, asked Google's Sundar Pichai on his views about competition on the All-In Podcast.
'Your competitors out there have active founders. OpenAI has Sam [Altman], xAI has Musk, Meta has Zuckerberg, and Microsoft has Satya [Nadella]. Are you willing to share your perspectives on those four competitors - both the companies and the leaders?' the CEO of Google was asked.
Pichai kept his answer diplomatic, praising his rivals. However, before wrapping up, he couldn't resist a dig at Satya Nadella.
'Obviously, by definition, it's a very impressive group. I think you're talking about some of the best companies, some of the best entrepreneurs. It shows how much progress we are going to see, because you're basically talking about many people who are working hard to drive that progress,' replied Sundar Pichai.
'Look, each of them, they're different people. I am fortunate to know all of them,' he added, before saying: 'I think maybe only one of them has invited me to a dance, not the others.'
His remark earned a puzzled look from podcast host Friedberg even as Pichai continued to talk about the time he spent discussing future technologies with Elon Musk.
Nadella, who, like Pichai, is an India-born techie who rose through the ranks to lead one of the world's largest tech companies, never actually asked his counterpart at Google to a dance. Pichai was likely referring to Nadella's 2023 remarks about making Google dance amid the AI race.
In 2023, Satya Nadella welcomed the announcement of AI-aided search engine Bing.
'Today's announcement is all about rethinking the largest software category there is: search,' Nadella said in an interview with The Verge.
'At the end of the day, [Google is] the 800-pound gorilla in this,' Nadella said. 'I hope that, with our innovation, they will definitely want to come out and show that they can dance. And I want people to know that we made them dance.'
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