Why did OpenAI Just Acquire AI design studio Global Illumination?

Is this an acqui-hire or something else?

Friends,

OpenAI is in a race to build viable revenue generating products that aren’t just ChatGPT. They just made their first acquisition. So what can we learn from this?

OpenAI has made its first acquisition, snatching up the digital product company Global Illumination for an undisclosed sum. It’s OpenAI’s first public acquisition in its roughly seven-year history. The pedigree at this startup is also rather high including a key Instagram Engineer.

• Global Illumination, a company founded by Thomas Dimson, Taylor Gordon, and Joey Flynn. The entire team has joined OpenAI to work on our core products including ChatGPT.

• Global Illumination is a company that has been leveraging AI to build creative tools, infrastructure, and digital experiences. The team previously designed and built products early on at Instagram and Facebook and have also made significant contributions at YouTube, Google, Pixar, Riot Games, and other notable companies. We’re very excited for the impact they’ll have here at OpenAI.

This might mean OpenAI has ambitions to get into using GPT-4 for creative activities, tools, infrastructure and digital experiences. In other words, gaming. Generative A.I. has a very high ceiling eventually in boosting how games are created and increasing their time to market, the speed of game development and eventually the quality of user experiences.