Twitter Competition, Amazon decline, AI Importance and many more: Big Tech Companies Predictions for 2023

Big Tech Predictions 2023: A Twitter competitor, Amazon slowing down, Google’s AI waking up, Microsoft’s serious game, cloud bills, and DTC collapse

The decade of great technology ended this year, and the unfortunate adjustments will be handled throughout the sector in 2023. Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter sums up the larger picture. At $44 billion, the debt-fueled transaction was swiftly ended at prices derived from the booming tech bull market of 2021.

Musk has been laying off employees and pitching pricey projects and features to keep his social network company afloat since the recession began to bite shortly after.

Larger tech businesses are more resilient and are still tremendously successful, but they are experiencing change. Numerous employees were let go by Amazon and Meta.

To encourage staff to be more productive, Google is imposing stricter performance reviews. Microsoft made a few job cuts. The only corporate titan that has so far escaped harm is Apple. We’ll see in 2023 how long that continues.

The Big Tech reporters at Insider will work arduously to cover the sector fairly, and we won’t be afraid to expose malfeasance and errors when they inevitably arise. What they recommend watching in 2023 is listed below.

Social media journalist Kali Hays

It seems that Twitter is beginning to fall apart slowly under Musk. Lots of erotica-verified bots (pardon me, Twitter Blue users), broken or missing functionality, and Musk’s relentless attention-seeking are all present. Of course, there are still users on the platform, and there will be for some time.

Some people have devoted ten years to developing a presence or personal brand on the site. The majority, however, seems to be prepared for a suitable substitute to occur. Options already exist. Mastodon has seen significant growth in users, reaching more than 5 million accounts since Musk acquired Twitter. Then there are the 1.5 million-user Hive and the ad-free, privacy-focused True.

The newest option, Post, seems to have the most functionality in common with Twitter. It hastened the test launch of its product so that it can join any journey of Twitter users. With over 600,000 people on the waitlist, it has more than 300,000 users.

None of these apps is a perfect replacement for Twitter, and none of them has attracted enough users to go viral and seriously compete with it.

When Twitter first went public, there were 100 million active users every day. Today, there are about 245 million. These new services are unlikely to be absorbed by Big Tech due to increasing antitrust scrutiny in the technology sector. 2023 may be the ideal year for a unique platform to become highly successful, with a huge chance for growth and customers eager to try something new.

Microsoft reporter Ashley Stewart

The $69 billion acquisition of the video game business Activision Blizzard by Microsoft, which would be the largest tech transaction in history, would be Microsoft’s first momentous battle of 2023. According to Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, the judgement will create a powerful precedent for mergers and investments throughout the industry.

The Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit to stop the transaction because it would prevent Microsoft’s Xbox rivals from offering popular game titles like “Call of Duty” to their customers.

According to Microsoft President Brad Smith, the corporation is open to making concessions and has offered to make “Call of Duty” available on competing systems for the ensuing ten years.

The agreement would position Microsoft as the third-largest video game developer and strengthen its fledgling cloud gaming business. Ives stated that he thought Microsoft will win its legal dispute with the FTC.

Reporter on clouds Ellen Thomas

Startups like Cirrus Nexus, Yotascale, Ternary, and Cast AI that aim to lower cloud costs might do well in 2023. Big businesses that have made the switch have discovered that renting storage, computing power, and other services can get expensive. The cloud was envisioned as the ultimate cost-saving solution.

To reduce costs overall, chief financial officers are closely examining expensive cloud bills after becoming alarmed by the unstable economic climate. This might be the first time for some people. This could benefit FinOps and the burgeoning cottage industry of businesses that promise to assist cloud customers in lowering and managing cloud spending in 2023.

Amazon reporter Eugene Kim

In 2023, Amazon should continue to slow down. The economy is struggling, which is slowing down Amazon’s three key businesses: retail, Amazon Web Services, and Prime.

A portion of the early Amazon customers is now returning to other retailers, which is undermining Amazon’s retail growth. Customers of AWS are frantically trying to find ways to minimise prices on their cloud bills.

Amazon’s largest market in the US, the Prime membership programme, is also getting close to saturation. Amazon’s economists appear to concur: a recent internal estimate revealed that the company’s growth often halted when it concentrated on cost savings and profitability, as it is doing right now.

Reporter Hugh Langley for ChatGPT and DALL-

The kind of excitement that has been created this year shows that so-called generative artificial intelligence has advanced to a critical point, even though it may not immediately threaten Google’s company or our creativity.

Expect to see IT companies demonstrate in 2023 that they have the capabilities to provide applications and demos of the AI they are presently working on that are just as remarkable, if not more so. As the enthusiasm around other technologies, such as cryptocurrency, wanes, early-stage investors will pour even more money into firms that focus on generative AI.

As millions of users gain access to these potent tools, there will be an increase in discussions about guardrails and responsible AI in sectors ranging from education to journalism.

E-commerce reporter Madeline Stone

The classic direct-to-consumer approach, which entails launching a company without using retail intermediaries, is expected to fail in 2023. A variety of difficulties are being faced by online merchants, including changes in data protection, inflation, and supply-chain instability.

They will therefore need to approach e-commerce in novel ways using tools like AI and machine learning. Online marketplaces might once again flourish as they expose brands to potential clients.

Edited by Prakriti Arora