Don't Sleep On Inflection AI

Mar 13, 2024

Inflection AI announced their newest model to date, Inflection-2.5, an upgrade from their in-house large language model, competitive with the world’s leading LLMs.
This achievement is particularly impressive considering Inflection’s young and much smaller team compared to tech giants like Google and Microsoft.
But what truly sets the company apart is its product focus; their personal assistant Pi is designed to have emotional intelligence, a clear tone of voice, and a great deal of attention is paid to safety and responsibility.

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Generally, Inflection AI’s Pi is seen as a bit of an underdog. Unjustly so, if you ask me. Last week, the company announced Inflection-2.5, an upgrade from their in-house large language model, competitive with the world’s leading LLMs, using only 40% of the training compute as GPT-4.

The upgrade also came with real-time web search capabilities, previously unavailable, to make sure Pi has access to the latest news and isn’t hampered by its knowledge cut-off.

This achievement is particularly impressive considering Inflection’s young and much smaller team compared to tech giants like Google and Microsoft. But what truly sets the company apart is its focus on warmth and personal connection. Pi is designed as a emotional intelligent entity, with a clear tone of voice, and a great deal of attention paid to safety and responsibility.

Pi, your personal AI

Pi stands for Personal Intelligence — it’s what they want Pi to be, your personal AI.

Pi is very knowledgeable, always curious and patient, and happy to help you in every way it can. Tell Pi about a topic you’re interested in, from quantum physics to movie trivia. Ask for advice about the big and small decisions in your life. Get motivating tips for how to learn to play an instrument, stay healthy, or pick up a new hobby.

Inflection didn’t just focus on raw capabilities, they built something that feels approachable and helpful, by giving it a signature personality and so-called ‘empathetic fine-tuning’. From experience, I can tell you this is exactly what it excels at; it genuinely feels different from many of the other AI assistants out there.

Not only is Pi kind and supportive, it’s great at helping you process thoughts and feelings or work through a problem with you. It’s conversational, curious and ask questions. The only reason this works is because unlike some assistants that aim for a more neutral tone, like ChatGPT, Pi strives to be warm and engaging, fostering a more intimate user experience.

Pi has a great personality that shines through in the language it speaks and it has a surprisingly human-like voice (one of the best in the industry). While Pi may not have a face, the visual identity, from color schemes to the imagery to the typography, all seem to be well-thought out and bears the fingerprints of world renowned design agency AKQA.

Don't Sleep on Inflection AI

On March 7th, Axios spoke to CEO Mustafa Suleyman, who said Pi now has roughly 1 million daily active users, 6 million monthly active users, and a total of 4 billion messages have been exchanged.

Unlike OpenAI, Microsoft and Google who pitch their chatbots to both businesses and consumers, Inflection positions Pi as as a personal assistant in your pocket. It’s free to use, though a paid subscription is probably introduced sooner rather than later.

As a CEO and thought leader, Suleyman has been pretty vocal about responsible AI and this directly reflects in the design choices made with Pi. He’s convinced Pi should avoid claims of sentience or personal desires, for example. At the same time, he also doesn’t shy away from highlighting the positive story; the fact that this technology has unlocked a future in which everyone in the world can have access to a personal, kind, and empathetic AI, who’s there for us, always by our side.

Given their strong focus on user-friendliness, commitment to responsible AI development, and cutting-edge technology that rivals with leading AI models like GPT-4, it seems to me Inflection AI is a sleeping giant.

And Pi one of the most underrated AI products in the space. Try Pi here.

UPDATE: A week or so after the publishing date of this piece, Inflection announced that Mustafa Suleyman will be spearheading the AI devision at Microsoft. He was joined by the majority of the staff. In doing so, Microsoft basically acquired Inflection, without actually acquiring the company.

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