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Virtual assistants can perform tasks with greater autonomy

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Can take action on your behalf, with supervision, CEO says

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Piggybacks on already popular applications

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Google trying to reclaim lead in AI tech field

By Kenrick Cai

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec 11 - Alphabet's Google on

Wednesday released the second generation of its artificial

intelligence model Gemini and teased a slate of new ways to use

AI beyond chatbots, including through a pair of eyeglasses.

CEO Sundar Pichai in a blog post dubbed the moment as the

start of a "new agentic era," referring to virtual assistants

that can perform tasks with greater autonomy.

"They can understand more about the world around you, think

multiple steps ahead, and take action on your behalf, with your

supervision."

The releases underscore the methods by which Google is

aiming to reclaim the lead in the race to dominate the emerging

technology. Microsoft ( MSFT )-backed OpenAI captured global

attention when it released chatbot ChatGPT in November 2022.

Google unveiled Gemini in December 2023 and now offers

four versions.

On Wednesday, it released an update to Flash, its second

cheapest model, with improved performance and added features to

process images and audio. Other models will come next year.

OpenAI has in recent days announced a flurry of new

offerings to diversify its prospects including a $200-a-month

ChatGPT subscription for advanced research use and the

availability of its text-to-video model Sora.

Google's play involves injecting its AI advances into

applications that already enjoy widespread adoption. Search,

Android and YouTube are among seven products that the company

says are used by more than 2 billion people monthly.

That user base is a significant advantage over challenger

startups such as search startup Perplexity, which is seeking a

$9 billion valuation, and newer research labs like OpenAI,

Anthropic or Elon Musk's xAI.

The Gemini 2.0 Flash model will power applications including

AI Overviews in its search engine.

Alphabet's biggest bet is AI for search, Ruth Porat, the

president and chief investment officer, said at the Reuters NEXT

conference in New York on Tuesday.

Google also showed reporters new capabilities for Project

Astra, a prototype universal agent which can talk to users about

anything captured on their smartphone camera in real time.

The tool can now hold a conversation spoken in a mix of

languages, as well as process information from Maps and image

recognition tool Lens, DeepMind group product manager Bibo Xu

told reporters.

And Astra will also be tested on prototype eyeglasses, the

company's first return to the product area since the failure of

Google Glasses. Others have since entered the market including

Meta which in September unveiled an AR glasses prototype.

Google also showed reporters Project Mariner, a Chrome

web browser extension which can automate keystrokes and mouse

clicks in the vein of rival lab Anthropic's "computer use"

feature, a feature to improve software coding called Jules, and

a tool to assist consumers in making decisions like what to do

or which items to buy in video games.