If all of this is true, and there's no way to tell at this point, Groq could pose a threat to Nvidia's dominance. Ross is cautious when discussing this. “Truly I say to you, they are Goliath and we are David,” he says. “It would be very foolish for NVIDIA to say they're worried about us.” But Nvidia's quick response when asked about Groq means the startup is certainly getting noticed. It shows that His PR team at Goliath has been sending me statements at a rate close to Groq's indicating that the benefits of Nvidia's AI are not just in chips, but in the other services it provides to its customers. Things like AI software, memory, networking, and other great products. “AI computing in data centers is a complex challenge that requires a full-stack solution,” the company said, hinting that an unnamed competitor may be challenging the stack.
In any case, Ross says it's not competing with Nvidia and offering a different experience, not just in terms of speed. He is tasked with ensuring that Groq delivers fair results, untainted by pressure from political viewpoints or commercial interests. “Groq is never involved in advertising,” he says. “Because it affects people. AI should always be neutral and never tell you what to think. Groq exists to be accessible to everyone. It helps you make your own decisions, it doesn't help you make decisions.'' That's a nice sentiment, but when I asked about nascent idealism, even the Groq chatbot didn't say anything like that. I'm skeptical of such claims. “The pressure to make a profit and scale can lead even well-intentioned founders to compromise their ideals,” the company quickly responded.
one more. You may have heard that Elon Musk named his LLM, created by his AI company, “Grok.” Ross said he trademarked the name when he founded the company in 2016, and was surprised by this because he believed it covered the phonetically identical original term. . “We called dibs,” he says. “He can't do that. We sent a cease-and-desist letter.” So far, there has been no response from Mr. Musk.
When I asked Groq about the name controversy, he first cautioned that he was not providing a legal opinion. “However, we can provide some background that may help you better understand the situation,” the company said. Bot explained the term as follows: Grok has been used in the industry for decades, so Mr. Musk would have the right to use it. On the other hand, if Groq trademarks the term, it may have exclusive rights. Everything is accurate and to the point, everything you would expect from a modern LLM. What was unexpected was that the response appeared within a second of him.
time travel
In my book about Google, In the Plex, I discuss how Google and its co-founder Larry Page have prioritized speed, ensuring that faster products are not only used more often, but also for different purposes. I explained how I was aware of this. It became an obsession within Google.
Engineers working at Page quickly learned that: [his speed] priority. “I've been known to sometimes count when people are demonstrating and moving slowly,” he says. “One thousand minutes, two thousand minutes. That tends to get people's attention.” The truth is, if you can measure your product in seconds, you've already failed. Paul Buchheit remembers an early demo of his Gmail in Larry's office. Paige frowned and said it was too late. Mr. Buchheit objected, but Mr. Page repeated his own complaint, claiming that the reload took at least 600 milliseconds. (That's his 6 seconds of his 10.) Buchheit thought, “I don't know that,” but he went back to his office and checked the server logs. 600 milliseconds. “He's been brilliantly successful,” Buchheit says.
