Bitkub, Thailand's leading cryptocurrency exchange, will invest in the newly-established ThaiGPT as part of the company's strategy to expand the business to the research and development of artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
Sakolkorn Sakavee, founder and chairman of Bitkub Capital Group Holdings, announced on Facebook that the joint investment, which will see Bitkub invest in ThaiGPT together with partners to co-build a platform.
"Bitkub will be an early use-case solution [of ThaiGPT]. Anyone who has any ideas about ThaiGPT who would like to meet or contact me about this business, please let me know," Mr Sakolkorn noted on his Facebook page.
Established last month by IT developer Panutat Techasen and blockchain developer Dom Charoenyos -- the founder of Tokenine -- ThaiGPT aims to be an AI research and development company, especially in the field of large language models and generative AI. The firm aims to cash in on the popularity of the open AI platform ChatGPT.
"When there is new technology, I'm always excited and want to jump into it. With generative AI, I am more excited than ever," Mr Panutat said.
"I'm interested in a type of AI called transformative AI. By using AI to prioritise human-generated content, this affects people's decisions in terms of interests, sales, and political outcomes. If I'm not jumping in now, it would be a shame because it will be a technology that will change the world for sure."
Globally, electric carmaker Tesla's co-founder and chief executive Elon Musk is among the business leaders who are investing in AI. Musk, also the billionaire owner of Twitter, has reached out to Igor Babuschkin, a researcher who recently left Alphabet's DeepMind AI at Google, to ask for help in developing a new chatbot to challenge ChatGPT.
In 2015, Musk was one of the co-founders of OpenAI, joining Silicon Valley investor Sam Altman in the nonprofit startup. However, he left the firm in 2018 without participating in chatbot development such as ChatGPT.
Recent reports stated that Musk and Babuschkin have discussed teaming up to develop a new AI project, but the project is still in its infancy without any concrete plans yet.
ChatGPT is a language generator software trained in using huge amounts of online data to create limitless interactions. It can answer difficult questions from users. It has been available to the public for free since November 2022.