New Delhi: Zoho Corporation, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company based in Chennai, has announced its plans to develop a large language model (LLM) in an effort to compete with Google and OpenAI. Led by Zoho's founder and CEO, Sridhar Vembu, the LLM is currently in development and aims to rival Google's PaLM 2 and OpenAI's GPT models. While an exact timeline for completion has not been disclosed, Zoho's India-based R&D team is actively working on the project.

Zoho, which has been involved in AI for a decade, recently integrated 13 of its applications with ChatGPT to enhance customer service. Now, the company is focused on building its own LLM that will possess the capabilities of summarizing, paraphrasing, and adapting to new tasks, according to Praval Singh, Zoho's VP of Marketing.

Zoho's decision to develop its own LLM is partly motivated by controversial comments made by OpenAI's Sam Altman during his visit to India. Altman's remarks seemingly belittled India's AI capabilities and suggested that startups with $10 million funding had no hope of building LLMs. In response, the Indian business community and government have taken up his challenge by supporting Zoho's initiative.

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In addition to its AI endeavors, Zoho recently launched a cross-platform web browser called Ulaa, positioning it as a competitor to Google Chrome, Firefox, and Microsoft Edge. Built on the Chromium platform, Ulaa prioritizes user privacy by adopting DuckDuckGo as its default search engine. The browser is available for major operating systems and includes features such as a built-in ad-blocker and cross-platform syncing.

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Zoho's business performance has been impressive, particularly in the Indian market. The company has achieved a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 65% in the mid-market and enterprise segments. These segments currently contribute more than half of Zoho's annual recurring revenue (ARR) in India. Globally, Zoho has also experienced significant growth with a CAGR of 65% in the mid-market and enterprise categories.

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Zoho's growth in India is driven by six key sectors: manufacturing, retail, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), pharmaceuticals, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), and IT.