Microsoft's Satya Nadella says every company should build its own AI model

The Microsoft CEO, in a moment of what can only be described as vendor-assisted altruism, declared there should be 'as many models in the world as firms in the world.' But hey, each one will be perfectly tailored to its company's mission statement, so the hallucinations will at least be on-brand.

Of course, this is coming from the man whose company is currently licensing GPT technology from OpenAI while simultaneously pushing its own small language models through Azure. The message is clear: build model, buy model, rent model — just make sure Microsoft gets its cut. The sheer computational and talent cost of building even a modest custom model is staggering, but Nadella frames it as simple business hygiene, like having a website. 'My simple thing,' he says, as if simplicity is the operative word here. Meanwhile, the rest of the industry is struggling to keep one frontier model safe, while Nadella proposes a Cambrian explosion of corporate AI — each one a potential security incident waiting to happen.

One almost admires the audacity. After all, if every company builds its own model, then every company will need to buy cloud compute, AI development tools, and probably consulting services — all conveniently sold by Microsoft. It's the ultimate platform play: make AI so ubiquitous that the infrastructure becomes mandatory. Never mind the environmental cost, the talent drain, or the inevitable wave of lawsuits when a bespoke model for a plumbing supply company accidentally recommends discrimination. The future is bespoke, baby. And it's going to be a beautiful, expensive, catastrophic mess.