OpenAI revealed that its services, among which are the ChatGPT assistant, the Sora video generator, and its programming interface for developers, have recovered completely. The outage happened on Wednesday when the services experienced a long downtime of over four hours, leaving users without the popular services. The company confirmed the restoration of its services early Thursday morning by posting on X, which is formerly known as Twitter.
The outage comes on the same day as Apple’s roll out of new software for iPhones, iPads, and Macs that features ChatGPT in their operating systems. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman earlier in early December highlighted that ChatGPT had seen massive growth so far, pointing to the platform being used by 300 million active users weekly. Incorporating this with the offerings of Apple will see its expansion exponentially.
The impact of OpenAI on the tech industry is significant despite the disruption. This company was valued at $157 billion in a funding round that took place last October, having rapidly risen to prominence since the launch of ChatGPT in late 2022. Participating in this funding round were Microsoft and Nvidia, underlining the growing importance of OpenAI’s technology in the industry.
This is the second major outage experienced by OpenAI in a period of two months. Last month, the platform experienced an outage that lasted more than five hours in June. However, the company emphasized its commitment to the prompt resolution of technical issues for increased service reliability to the ever-increasing user base.
In addition to the fact that it dealt with the outage, Altman provided an update on Sora video generator, made available to users in the United States and in many countries of the world, on Monday. He accepted that by Tuesday, the demand for Sora was more than he ever anticipated and would take more time before reaching all those interested in access. As OpenAI continues to expand its offerings and integrate with major platforms like Apple, the company’s services remain central to the evolving landscape of AI-driven applications and tools. Despite occasional technical challenges, OpenAI’s influence in the tech industry is only expected to grow.
