On Tuesday, database king Oracle (ORCL -0.67%), hardly for the first time, was an outperformer on the stock market. The company's shares ticked nearly 3% higher on the day, thanks to a report of a potentially major tie-up in the artificial intelligence (AI) field with a top tech sector peer. That rise topped the nearly 1% gain of the S&P 500 index on the day.
OpenAI and Oracle apparently in discussions for AI hardware
According to a report from tech industry news site The Information, leading AI solutions developer OpenAI is discussing a deal with Oracle. Citing an unnamed "person who heard the remarks," the former company's management told certain employees that OpenAI "would play a greater role in lining up data centers and AI chips" to advance the technology, rather than depending entirely on its partner Microsoft to do so.
The article stated that OpenAI is dissatisfied with the speed at which Microsoft is supplying it with servers. AI is resource-intensive, and requires significant amounts of processing power and storage. Microsoft is a major investor in OpenAI, having poured billions of dollars into the company.
Neither Oracle nor Microsoft or OpenAI has yet officially commented on this report.
It's only speculation at this point
If the article is accurate, Oracle stands in front of an exciting and potentially very lucrative business opportunity with OpenAI (developer of the most high-profile commercial AI program, ChatGPT). If these discussions are occurring, they are at an early stage, however, and investors should not pile into Oracle stock on that basis alone.
