On May 20th local time, Microsoft held a new product launch event. At this press conference, Microsoft announced the launch of a new personal computer (PC) with Copilot functionality, which can handle more artificial intelligence tasks without the need for cloud data centers, known as the "Copilot+PC.". Intel, Qualcomm, AMD, Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, and Samsung will all be members of the Copilot+PC ecosystem. On the same day, Lenovo and other computer manufacturers jointly announced the upcoming launch of Copilot+PC.
Zhu Keli, Executive Director of the China Information Association and Founding Dean of the National Research Institute of New Economy, stated in an interview with Financial Investment News that this integration will not only enhance the user experience of Copilot, but also further promote the application and development of AI technology in various fields.
Copilot+PC computing power surpasses Apple's new product
AIPC is not a new concept. Unlike traditional AIPC, according to Microsoft's definition, to be called a Copilot+PC, it requires at least 40 TOPS of computing power (meaning it can perform 40 trillion operations per second).
It is worth mentioning that the M4 chip released by Apple this month has an NPU computing power of 38TOPS, while the latest chips from Intel and AMD can only provide computing power of up to 20TOPS.
The core goal of Microsoft's new product is to challenge Apple's MacBook Air. At the press conference, Microsoft's Consumer Marketing Director, Mehdi, also emphasized that the new generation Copilot+PC is 58% faster than Apple's M3 version of the MacBook Air.
Specifically, compared to traditional AIPC, Copilot+PC has richer functionalities. At the press conference, Microsoft showcased a new PC feature called "recall": with the support of GPT-4o, Copilot+PC can recall and capture all the content that has appeared on the screen.
Meanwhile, Copilot+PC has sufficient real-time interaction capabilities. When demonstrating the game Minecraft at Microsoft's press conference, AI provided players with almost the same information as the game strategy, including how to build items, avoid zombies, and so on.
The high demand for computing power is not Microsoft's only trump card. At the press conference, Microsoft also announced that the latest technology GPT-4o, just launched by OpenAI last week, will soon be available to users as part of Microsoft Copilot.
Zhu Keli stated that Microsoft Copilot's integration of OpenAI's GPT-4o model will bring unprecedented experience improvement and performance optimization to users. As the latest flagship model of OpenAI, GPT-4o possesses powerful multimodal interaction capabilities and excellent reasoning abilities. After integrating it into Copilot, it will significantly improve the performance of Copilot in text generation, language understanding, image recognition, and other aspects.
"It can be said that the integration of GPT-4o will enable Copilot to perform excellently in innovative features such as real-time voice, language translation, real-time painting, text, and image generation. Users can interact with Copilot through natural language, obtaining a more natural and smooth conversation experience. At the same time, the excellent reasoning ability of GPT-4o will ensure that Copilot can provide accurate and useful information when answering user questions. This integration will not only improve the user experience of Copilot, but also further promote the application and development of AI technology in various fields." Zhu Keli said.
AIPC sector strengthens against the trend
Affected by this news, the AI concept rose against the trend on May 21st, with the AIPC sector leading the way. In terms of individual stocks, Yingli Shares "20cm" rose to the limit at 15.86 yuan/share; Siquan New Materials rose over 14% to 76.36 yuan per share; Fukui Electronics, Raytheon Technology, Chunqiu Electronics and others have hit the limit up.
Performance chart for some AIPC concept stocks on May 21st, Xue Lei
Zhu Keli's analysis suggests that the technological development of AIPC is entering a new stage, with the most significant trend being the rapid improvement of computing power and the deepening of intelligence. With the continuous advancement of chip technology, AIPC will have more powerful processing capabilities, making complex computing tasks easy. At the same time, the intelligence of AIPC will not be limited to speech recognition and image processing, but will delve into more advanced fields such as user behavior analysis and emotion recognition, providing users with more personalized services.
Zhukeli predicts that in the coming years, with the continuous advancement of technology and the increase in consumer demand, the AIPC market will maintain high-speed growth. Specifically, the shipment volume of AIPC will increase year by year, and its market share will continue to expand. Meanwhile, with the deepening of consumer awareness and increasing demand for AIPC, AIPC will become one of the mainstream products in the future personal computing field.
The well-known IT industry analysis firm Canalys predicts that by 2024, global AIPC shipments will reach 48 million units, accounting for 18% of total PC shipments; And this is only the beginning of market transformation. It is expected that by 2025, AIPC shipments will exceed 100 million units, accounting for 40% of the total PC shipments; By 2028, AIPC shipments will reach 205 million units, with a staggering compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 44% between 2024 and 2028.
In addition, Guodu Securities recently released a research report, stating that with the recent landing of multiple AIPC related products and chips, the AIPC industry is expected to accelerate development, drive the demand for industry chain replacement, and 2024 may be the "first year of AIPC". It is recommended to pay attention to chip and peripheral manufacturers in the PC industry chain, as well as AI application related targets.
Expert viewpoint
AI scene: Are you ready?
Yi Yong, an AI expert and president of Geely College of Industrial Internet Industry
Microsoft plans before taking action. For the emerging market of AIPC, the most important thing is to seize the market's cognitive window, and under the new wave of AI, Windows laptops may return to their peak. Microsoft held a press conference on Monday local time, symbolizing the beginning of the "Copilot+PC" era of AI computing power popularization.
As is well known, the earliest PC used the DOS operating system. People operated the computer by inputting line commands, which were complex and difficult to understand. At that time, PC operations were done by professionals. The first version of the Windows Windows operating system, launched by Microsoft in 1985, underwent continuous iteration. Its user-friendly graphical interface, WYSIWYG, made computer use much more convenient. However, the keyboard and mouse are still essential tools, and there is still a long way to go before they are fully popularized for the general public.
The new AIPC product launched by Microsoft will change this cognitive mode of thinking: using voice operations to make computers "say what you say" will greatly simplify and make them more user-friendly, helping PCs enter the homes of millions of ordinary people.
Sichuan has always attached great importance to artificial intelligence. Recently, there have been meetings proposing the implementation of cutting-edge scientific and technological breakthroughs, deploying six major scientific and technological projects, among which the first one is Sichuan's No.1 Innovation Project Artificial Intelligence this year. Specifically, in February 2024, the provincial government held its first special meeting to study the development of artificial intelligence; In March, a group of major projects and innovative platforms in the field of artificial intelligence were densely laid out; In April, Sichuan Institute of Artificial Intelligence unveiled its veil at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, marking another landmark development in the field of artificial intelligence in Sichuan.
From the information from this Microsoft press conference, it can be seen that valuing artificial intelligence has become a global consensus. We need to face the AI era directly and apply the thinking methods of the AI era in our work. In the future AI era, the combination of software and hardware will become increasingly apparent, and future innovation will come from data and application scenarios. Our way of thinking should also shift from the mobile era to the AI era.
