OpenAI wants to buy Google Chrome

An OpenAI executive has claimed that if Google were forced to sell its Chrome browser, it would be first in line to buy it. Google is already under antitrust investigation over its massive tech holdings — but selling Google Chrome to OpenAI would be even worse.

Why should Google sell Chrome?

In short, the Google antitrust trial is moving into the damages and penalties phase, and there's a strong belief that Google Chrome is on the docket. The Justice Department has yet to specify what penalties it will impose, but being forced to sell Chrome would certainly be one of the harshest.

This is not impossible, given Google 's dominance of the global browser market and Internet search, both of which are under investigation. The Justice Department believes that Chrome is central to Google's dominance, which is why its name keeps popping up alongside words like "monopoly" and "anti-competitive."

OpenAI wants to buy Google Chrome

OpenAI is now partnering with Microsoft. While Microsoft's Bing search is pretty good, it's not a patch on Google Search. And that's what OpenAI ultimately wants: Better real-world data for its upcoming AI models, and better results for its built-in web search capabilities.

'We believe that having more partners, especially Google's API, will allow us to deliver a better product to our users,' Nick Turley, ChatGPT product manager at OpenAI, told Ars Technica .

So while the DOJ's investigation is not yet complete, it's likely that there will be some changes to Google's core products.

OpenAI Buying Chrome Would Be Bad and Unreasonable

With 4 billion Chrome users, it's no surprise that OpenAI is keen to buy the browser. That's an unprecedented number of pre-installs just waiting for someone to mine the data, more than Google and its advertising partners have mined that data.

But the DOJ's attempt to break up Google, only to sell Chrome to another tech giant deeply invested in data collection and exploitation, is absurd. For users, it's like jumping out of a watermelon rind and into a coconut shell; there's no benefit to it. Why bother breaking up a monopoly, only to give a boost to a company that's on the same path?

This will almost certainly have a direct negative impact on Chromium, the open source project that powers not only Google Chrome but also Microsoft Edge, Opera, Brave, Vivaldi, Arc, and many others. Will Chromium maintain its independence?

And furthermore, how much do people really want AI to be fully integrated into their browsing experience? Google's AI Overviews directly contributed to many websites losing traffic, many popular websites losing writers, and cutting content. Who really wants a website where the only content is AI-written?

Furthermore, after trying to use ChatGPT Search instead of Google , many people were dissatisfied.

Turley also said that if OpenAI buys Google Chrome, the company would 'have the ability to introduce users to what an AI-first experience might look like .' What that AI-first experience might look like remains to be seen, but if it's anything like Google's AI Overviews, the future of the internet could be bleaker than we think.