The biggest investment trend? AI stocks to watch in 2023

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been one of the most exciting areas of technology in recent years, and this trend is set to continue in 2023. 

As AI continues to transform industries and create new opportunities, the investing frenzy around artificial intelligence  has been strong. Here at SoFi, we have put together a list of companies in the space, ranking from the highest to the lowest market cap.

Microsoft (MSFT) 

• Market Capitalization at $2.34 trillion USD^

Microsoft is a major player in the AI space and has been very active. ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence chatbot launched in November last year by OpenAI, became so successful that “ChatGPT” has almost become a synonym for AI chatbot. Although Microsoft is not the developer behind ChatGPT, the company and OpenAI always maintain a tight collaboration. OpenAI relies on Microsoft Azure’s cloud computing services to support the computing, storage and networking requirements of ChatGPT. Microsoft has combined its Bing search engine with the GPT-4 chatbot.

More than being a supportive role, Microsoft self-developed its portfolio of artificial intelligence (AI) services called Azure AI, which is designed for developers and data scientists. Azure AI empowers businesses to build and deploy their AI solutions. The company also completed its acquisition of Nuance Communications Inc., a leader in conversational AI and ambient intelligence across industries including healthcare, financial services, retail and telecommunications in 2022. 

Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL)

• Market Capitalization at 1.56 trillion USD^

As the AI Arms Race heats up, tech giant Google launched Bard, a conversational generative artificial intelligence chatbot in March. Shortly after, Google announced new updates to Bard in May. Those updates include image capabilities, coding features and app integration. Google has expanded its access around the world and has made it available to over 180 countries. 

Google’s AI strategy is ambitious and way more than a chatbot – it could be a revolution that fundamentally changes how we work. Google describes it as  “A new era for AI and Google Workspace” in its Product Announcement. Teams at Google are using Generative AI to create better experiences and they are currently under testing across Workspace products such as Docs, Gmail, Sheets, Slides, Meet and Chat. Generative AI’s capability to create new text, images, videos or audio will soon be accessible to the public by integrating into its existing products and services. 

Some other worthy mentions are PaLM 2, Google’s next-generation large language model that builds on Google’s legacy of breakthrough research in machine learning and responsible AI and Studio Bot(available in the US only) which can help Android developers generate code, find relevant resources, and learn best practices.

Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN)

• Market Capitalization at 1.18 trillion USD^

Amazon focuses on using artificial intelligence to speed up deliveries by minimizing the distance between its products and customers. 

As AI quickly integrates into many enterprise environments, Amazon currently provides an array of solutions for AI and Machine Learning (ML) to meet customers’ business needs. With readily available AI services, businesses can add AI capabilities to direct applications with no ML experience required to address common business challenges. Their Language Understanding services cover AI for marketing, Chatbots & Virtual assistant and intelligent search. It also provides solutions for Dev & DevOps to accelerate ML workflows and improve insights. In April, the company announced the debut of Bedrock, which is a way to build and scale generative AI applications with Foundation Models (FMs). Bedrock accelerates the development of generative AI applications using FMs through an API, without managing infrastructure. It provides users with tools and capabilities to deploy scalable, reliable, and secure generative AI applications.

NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA)

• Market Capitalization at 758.95 billion USD^

NVIDIA well-positioned itself to benefit from the trend by providing a critical tool – chips that power many of the world’s AI applications. The chips play an important part in the AI development ecosystem. Big companies or even startups working on AI softwares require these kind of chips. It gains access to them by purchasing their own or from a cloud provider.

The Nvidia A100 GPU, for example, has been called the “workhorse” for AI applications by performing many simple calculations simultaneously which is essential for training and using neural network models. The company then outdid itself by creating, NVIDIA H100 Tensor Core GPU, NVIDIA’s ninth-generation data center GPU. Compared to the previous generation, A100 GPU, the H100 GPU provides an order-of-magnitude greater performance for large-scale AI. It has up to 4.5x more performance in the Offline scenario. 

Tesla (TSLA)

• Market Capitalization at 582.10 billion USD^

Tesla is not only a leader in the electric vehicle market but is also making significant strides in AI-powered autonomous driving technology. It develops and deploys autonomy at scale in vehicles, robots and more. It has an AI team focused on autonomy of current and new generations of vehicles. 

Moreover, the company’s focus on AI is expected to accelerate with the development of Tesla Bot, which is designed as a humanoid robot capable of performing unsafe, repetitive or boring tasks.

Adobe Inc (ADBE)

• Market Capitalization at 169.91 billion USD^

Adobe has entered the AI race by introducing the generative AI models called Firefly. Firefly is a family of creative generative AI models that bring generative AI into Adobe’s suite of apps and services. With the beta version of the first Firefly model, creators can use everyday language to generate new content from digital imaging and photography, illustration, artwork and graphic design and video. Adobe also promised to develop creative generative AI responsibly, with creators at the center to give creators every advantage.

Micron Technology Inc (MU)

• Market Capitalization at 72.24 billion USD^
  

Micron Technology, Inc. is an American producer of computer memory and computer data storage. Flexible memory and storage are foundational for efficient AI infrastructure. Micron’s technology powers a new generation of faster, more intelligent, global infrastructures that make mainstream AI possible. Their fast storage and high-performance, high-capacity memory and multi-chip packages power AI training and inference engines both in the cloud or embedded in mobile and edge devices. 

Baidu Inc (BIDU)

• Market Capitalization at 42.50 billion USD^

Chinese technology company Baidu is an early adopter of artificial intelligence. It launched its new-generation large language model (LLM) and generative AI product, Ernie Bot (文心一言) in March 2023 which supports Chinese. Powered by knowledge-enhanced cross-modal models, Ernie Bot is able to accurately understand the semantics and mapping relationships in language and images, integrating learning from cross-modal knowledge such as language and vision. Ernie Bot specializes in a range of areas, including understanding Chinese language and culture, generating literary and business writing, performing complex mathematical calculations, and producing multi-modal content. Baidu also offered access for enterprise clients to access Erine Bot API via Baidu AI Cloud to nurture the platform’s development.

The company is traded on the NASDAQ under the symbol “BIDU” and HKEX under “9888” (341.59 billion HKD Market capitalization)^.

C3.ai Inc (AI)

• Market Capitalization at 3.05 billion USD^

The market symbol says it all – C3.ai a public American technology company specializing in Artificial Intelligence. Although the topic of AI has gained much public attention in the last year, C3.ai was founded in 2009 and has been utilizing the technology since then. It has built and deployed a portfolio of AI software-as-a-service (SaaS) products that enable organizations to take advantage of the technology. C3.ai customers include big names such as the US Air Force, Bank of America BAC and Baker Hughes BKR. C3.ai AI recently reported strong preliminary results in Q4 earning updates and it performed above expectations. 

In conclusion, AI is a rapidly growing industry with many exciting opportunities for investors. These are just a few of the AI stocks to watch in 2023, but there are many other companies in the space. As with any investment, careful research and consideration should be undertaken before making any decisions. More importantly, make sure your investing platform is trustworthy and always provide you the information.