Amazon’s Nova AI: Joining Big Tech’s Losing Game Against OpenAI
Amazon just announced their most recent AI product. Set to "revolutionize" AI-generated content. Haven't we heard this before?
Amazon has officially entered the AI arena with its Nova suite of generative AI models, available through AWS’s Bedrock platform.
But as the tech giant joins the ranks of Google, Meta, and Microsoft in an increasingly desperate race to outpace OpenAI, one can’t help but wonder: is this just another futile attempt to catch the leader in a game Amazon never needed to play, or at least should be playing differently?
The AI Gold Rush
While investments into AI have slowed down in some industries Ai has investibly been the gold rush of the past five to ten years, and everyone from OpenAI to Google is staking their claim.
OpenAI’s GPT-4 remains the benchmark, with 100 million active users just two months after launch, making it the fastest-growing consumer app in history. Meanwhile, Google is touting its Gemini AI, and Meta has poured resources into Llama 3 to compete in the open-source sphere.
Amazon, with its Nova models, now joins this fray.
Nova Pro and Nova Lite aim to cover everything from text generation to multimodal capabilities (think images and videos), while Nova Premier, slated for 2025, promises to be the most sophisticated of the bunch.
The mistake I am seeing over and over is that nearly every tech giant is making the same pitch, and Nova doesn’t appear to offer a killer feature that truly sets it apart.
The OpenAI Problem
Amazon’s timing makes this even more puzzling. OpenAI is entrenched not just as a leader in innovation but as the AI of choice for millions. Its integration with Microsoft—through Azure’s cloud dominance and tools like Copilot for Office—has created a feedback loop that strengthens both companies. OpenAI is on track to generate $3.7 billion in revenue this year, and Microsoft’s early investment means it’s seeing outsized returns.
In contrast, Amazon’s Nova feels like it’s playing catch-up in a market that increasingly rewards first movers. Even Google, with all its resources, has struggled to convince users that Bard is better than ChatGPT.
Big Tech’s AI Obsession
Amazon is hardly alone in this misstep. Big Tech has become singularly obsessed with beating OpenAI, even at the expense of its core strengths.
Google, for example, has spent billions repositioning itself as an AI-first company, yet Bard’s adoption pales in comparison to ChatGPT. Meta’s Llama models have gained some ground in the open-source community, but they lack the polish to compete for enterprise dollars.
Amazon’s entry into this arms race shows us just how out of touch these companies can be with what actually drives value.
The Nova models, while technically competent, don’t integrate meaningfully with Amazon’s existing ecosystem—AWS, Marketplace, or even Alexa. This is a missed opportunity, especially considering that Alexa, once the face of consumer AI, has been bleeding money, with losses from Amazon’s devices division totaling over $10 billion in 2022.
The video above shows a small city made out of pasta which is the big video campaign amazon is pushing to show what Nova AI can do, and I’m not really impressed. Why does Amazon want consumers to generate a bunch of AI generated content? To post where? At what value?
Not to be the debby downer but I have been questioning a lot of the AI products big tech has been pushing for some time now. I was not impressed by meta’s Llama model, opensource or not, I think Meta has other issues at hand to resolve and shouldn’t add another item to its plate to further collect user data and profit. But at the end of the day, I am missing the value these products are aiming to put on the table. Who will actually use these products? How can this beat Runway or midjourney in terms of functionality and power?
Also who wants to see more AI-generated crap on their timeline?
The Missed Opportunity
Amazon’s real strength lies in infrastructure and commerce. AWS alone generated $22.14 billion in Q3 2024, accounting for more than two-thirds of Amazon’s operating income. Rather than building generic models to compete with OpenAI, why not focus on AI tools that directly enhance AWS offerings or optimize the seller experience on Amazon’s Marketplace? Imagine AI-driven product listing tools, dynamic pricing algorithms, or even better fraud detection systems.
Even Alexa, despite its struggles, could benefit from an AI overhaul. Nova’s multimodal capabilities could help better Alexa by enabling more natural interactions and personalized responses. But instead of doubling down on areas where it already has an edge, Amazon is chasing OpenAI into a fight it’s unlikely to win.
The Bottom Line
Amazon’s Nova launch feels less like a bold new frontier and more like a reluctant checkbox in Big Tech’s AI arms race. The models are capable, sure, but they’re entering an oversaturated market with no clear differentiator.
And let’s be honest, consumers and enterprises don’t need yet another general-purpose AI model. They need tools that solve specific problems, integrate seamlessly into existing workflows, and deliver real value. Right now, Nova feels like none of those things.