Virtual employees could join workforces this year and transform how companies work, according to the chief executive of OpenAI.
The first artificial intelligence agents may start working for organisations this year, wrote Sam Altman, as AI firms push for uses that generate returns on substantial investment in the technology.
Microsoft, the biggest backer of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has already announced the introduction of AI agents.
In a blog post published on Monday, Altman wrote: 鈥淲e believe that, in 2025, we may see the first AI agents 鈥榡oin the workforce鈥� and materially change the output of companies.鈥�
Before making the agent prediction, Altman also wrote in his blog that OpenAI knows how to build artificial general intelligence (AGI), a theoretical term that he has referred to in the past as 鈥淎I systems that are generally smarter than humans鈥�.
He also confirmed his expectation that Elon Musk would continue his legal battle with OpenAI, after Musk dropped an initial lawsuit against the firm in June 2024, which he then amended to a new complaint which had been expanded to include Microsoft.聽
Musk, who co-founded OpenAI with Altman in 2015, left in 2018 after a reported internal power struggle.
OpenAI is reportedly planning to launch an AI agent codenamed 鈥極perator鈥� this month, which will use a computer to take actions on a user鈥檚 behalf, such as writing code or booking travel.
Last year, Microsoft鈥檚 head of AI, Mustafa Suleyman, indicated the company is moving towards agents that can make purchasing decisions, saying he had seen 鈥渟tunning demos鈥� where the agent carries out transactions independently, although there have also been 鈥渃ar crash moments鈥� in development. However, an agent with these capabilities will emerge 鈥渋n quarters, not years鈥�, Suleyman said.
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