SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA - NOVEMBER 06: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman smiles during the OpenAI DevDay event ... [+] on November 06, 2023 in San Francisco, California. Altman delivered the keynote address at the first-ever Open AI DevDay conference.(Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)Getty ImagesOpenAI has always been great at grabbing attention in the news. Their announcements often come with big, bold claims. For example, they announced GPT-2 but said it was too dangerous to release. Or their 12 Days of Christmas campaign, where they showcased a new product every day for 12 days.Now, Sam Altman has shared his thoughts on last year, focusing on the dramatic boardroom soap opera around his firing and return. He also made a bold prediction:"We now know how to build AGI as its usually understood. In 2025, we think AI agents will join the workforce and change how companies work."AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) means creating an AI thats as smart and general as a human. Unlike narrow AI, which is built for specific tasks like translating languages, playing chess, or recognizing faces, AGI can handle any intellectual task and adapt across different areas. While I dont think AGI is near, I do believe AI will join the workforce but maybe not in the way Altman imagines.Is AGI Near? No, At least Not The AGI We (or Sam) ImagineThe arrival of AGI in 2025 seems very unlikely. Todays AI, like ChatGPT, works by recognizing patterns and making predictions not by truly understanding. For example, completing the phrase Life is like a box of with chocolates relies on probabilities, not reasoning.I dont believe AGI will happen by 2025, and many experts agree. Demis Hassabis, who I worked with at Google, predicts AGI could arrive around 2035. Ray Kurzweil estimates 2032, and Jrgen Schmidhuber, director of IDSIA, suggests closer to 2050. The skeptics are many, and the timeline remains uncertain.MORE FOR YOUDoes It Matter When? AI Is Already Powerful.Maybe it doesnt matter exactly when AGI will arrive. Even Sam Altman recently downplayed the G in AGI, saying:"My guess is we will hit AGI sooner than most people think, and it will matter much less."I agree with this to some extent. AI already has impressive capabilities. For example, Netflixs AI knows your movie preferences better than your partner. TikToks algorithms have even been joked about for recognizing someones sexual orientation before they did. AI excels at pattern recognitionand in many cases, its better at it than humans.Sam Altman Sees That AI Join The WorkforceThe more important point in Sams memo is his belief that AI will join the workforce. I completely agree this is going to happen. As I wrote in my AI agent update, for AI to succeed in the workplace, it needs two key things: (1) access to tools and (2) access to data. These are the building blocks for making AI truly effective in enterprise settings. However, even though Sam often links this idea to AGI, it might not be OpenAI leading the charge to provide these AI workforce solutions.Microsofts Pole Position Access To UsersWho has the workforce tools? Microsoft. Microsoft. Microsoft. They are in pole position. Most people already use Microsoft products whether they like it or not and AI is becoming deeply integrated into these tools, with Copilots appearing everywhere.In 2023 and 2024, many startups launched impressive AI services for office jobs, only to be quickly overshadowed by giants like Microsoft and Google, which have direct access to customers. Take Jasper.ai, for example a once-celebrated AI tool for drafting text. As I pointed out in this LinkedIn post, similar features are now built directly into Google and Microsoft products, making it increasingly difficult for smaller players to compete.The Power Of Data AccessAI needs data to be truly effective. If youre looking for answers about a companys internal processes or insights from documents, general tools like ChatGPT wont cut it. What we need are tools that can read and summarize company documents, tailored specifically for enterprise use. As Ive said before, 2025 will be the year of SEARCH especially enterprise search. Tools that can answer questions, summarize content, and help users navigate complex information will be game-changers.Who has access to this kind of data? Microsoft is a big player, but theyre not alone. Salesforce, for instance, holds an enormous trove of valuable data customer interactions, discussions, process documents, marketing strategies, and more. Does Salesforce want AI agents to help unlock this potential? Absolutely.Its no surprise that Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff recently took a jab at Microsoft. He called their AI assistant, Copilot, disappointing, saying, It just doesnt work, and it doesnt deliver any level of accuracy. He even dubbed it Clippy 2.0 the funniest insult Ive heard in a while before rolling out Salesforces own AI solution, Agent Forces.OpenAI Is just The Smartest Tool?OpenAI doesnt have the same level of data access or consumer reach as Microsoft, nor does it have Salesforces treasure trove of business data. So, whats their angle? They claim to be the smartest tool on the block and they probably are, although I personally find Anthropics Claude 3.5 currently better than OpenAIs GPT-4.OpenAI is betting on their ability to outperform everyone else with superior technology. Thats why Sam Altman confidently claims well see AGI. Whats behind that bold claim? Reasoning or, as OpenAI calls it, Reasoning.OpenAI and ReasoningOpenAI recently launched o1, a model designed to showcase advanced reasoning capabilities through an iterative, self-calling process:Iteration and Reflection: The model generates an output, evaluates or critiques it, and refines it in a new round of reasoning.Feedback Loop: This creates a feedback loop where the model revisits its outputs, critiques them, and improves them further.In essence, GPT with o1 doesnt just provide answers it plans, critiques the plan, and continuously improves it.Whats especially noteworthy is the paradigm shift this represents. Instead of simply releasing a bigger model like GPT-5, the next generation of AI models is focused on "thinking longer" during inference. This ability to process iteratively may be what Sam Altman refers to when he says, We now know how to build AGI.Reasoning Is Enough of a Reason?But does "reasoning" alone get OpenAI into the game? OpenAI still needs access to data and a strong user presence, similar to Salesforce or Microsoft. To address this, OpenAI launched the ChatGPT desktop app for macOS. This app can now read code directly from developer-focused tools like VS Code, Xcode, TextEdit, Terminal, and iTerm2. This means developers no longer need to copy and paste their code into ChatGPTa common workaround until now. Its a really useful tool and a smart move to integrate deeper into the developer workflow.Chatting With Large Language Models Costs MoneyEvery call to a large language model (LLM) costs money. For heavy ChatGPT users, the $20 subscription might not even cover the cost of their usage. OpenAI recently raised $6.6 billion in a Series E funding rounda much-needed boost to sustain their operations. While Agentforce generates solid revenue from its customers, and Microsoft enjoys a massive financial war chest, OpenAI is still in the early stages of getting businesses and users to pay enough to offset the steep costs of developing cutting-edge AI.Their $200-per-month premium tier, which includes the expanded version of O1, is a move in this direction. But is it worth the price? Perhaps this is why AGI keeps being part of the conversationit helps justify the premium positioning. However, the race to create superior models is far from over. Even O1 could soon be outpaced by open-source alternatives, as weve seen before with Metas Llama.Speaking of Meta, Im confident well see their attempts to monetize AI models in 2025. Ultimately, the biggest challenge for these players remains clear: justifying enormous costs without securing a steady and reliable revenue stream.Sam is right: AI Agents Will Be In The WorkforceIn 2025, well see more AI agents entering the workforce, transforming workflows by simplifying, enhancing, and automating tasks across industries. These wont be all-encompassing AGI models but smaller, specialized models designed for dedicated workflows. AI will scale and improve processes one step at a time, combining traditional AI, context retrieval, and robust user design to tackle challenges like security, hallucinations, and user control.Success will hinge on delivering value through well-integrated, user-friendly, and ethically designed solutions, as outlined in my framework for building enterprise-ready AI tools. For Sam Altman, the key strategic question wont be about achieving AGI but about how to price OpenAIs base models for enterprise customers like Microsoft or Salesforceespecially if OpenAI ends up competing directly with them.But How Will We Work With Those New AI Colleagues?Enterprises will emerge as the winners in the race for better models, better data, and better integrations. Their main focus should be on training employees and customers to work effectively with their new AI colleagues. In my eCornell certificate course on AI solutions, I saw firsthand how productivity soared once students learned to communicate with an AI co-pilot. Initially, many struggled to achieve results, but a step-by-step guide on interacting with AI made a significant difference.Why? Because even with reasoning and planning capabilities, AI isnt truly general yet, no matter how much hype Sam Altman creates. Students had to learn when to rely on the AI and when to apply human judgment. I believe 2025 will be the year companies realize this need and invest heavily in AI education.