Comment by echelon

Comment by echelon 3 days ago

4 replies

None of that has reached the market yet. If it was up to the sciences alone, AI couldn't bear the weight of its own costs.

It also needs to be vertically integrated to make money, otherwise it's a handout to the materials science company. I can't see any of the AI companies stretching themselves that thin. So they give it away for goodwill or good PR.

tim333 2 days ago

Science in general tends to be subsidised and given away because as basic understanding of the world is hard to monopolise. I'm not sure how Einstein would have done a general relativity startup.

That said Deepmind are doing a spin-off making drugs https://www.isomorphiclabs.com/

bayindirh 2 days ago

> None of that has reached the market yet.

AI for science is not "marketed". It silently evolves under the wraps and changes our lives step by step.

There are many AI systems already monitoring our ecosystem and predicting things as you read this comment.

incognito124 3 days ago

That's not really true. Commercial weather prediction has reached the market, and a drug (sorry, can't find the new s link) that was found by AI-accelerated drug discovery is now in clinical testing

  • aoeusnth1 3 days ago

    The reason why vertical integration is important for AI investment is that if AI is commoditized, then that AI-acceleration will costs pennies for drugs that are worth billions.

    I don't see how OpenAI or Google can profit from drug discovery. It's nearly pure consumer surplus (where the drug companies and patients are the consumers).