PwC Becomes OpenAI’s Largest Customer for Enterprise Tier
OpenAI’s ChatGPT has revolutionized the way people interact with AI, and the company recently announced a significant enterprise customer that could have a profound impact on the world of work. PwC, the renowned management consulting firm, has become OpenAI’s biggest customer to date, signing on for the enterprise tier and covering 100,000 users. Additionally, PwC will serve as OpenAI’s first partner for selling the enterprise edition to other businesses.
The launch of the enterprise tier in August 2023 marked OpenAI’s ambitious move to monetize its generative AI products. With the support of billions of dollars in funding and an $80 billion valuation, OpenAI aims to provide faster and unlimited interactions, increased customization options, and advanced analytics tools through the enterprise tier.
However, convincing companies to transition from sporadic usage or small-scale pilots to full-scale integration of this unique enterprise software presents a challenge for OpenAI. Richard Hasslacher, OpenAI’s Global Head of Alliances and Partnerships, stated that PwC is their first partner to resell ChatGPT enterprise. This partnership not only establishes PwC as OpenAI’s largest customer but also enables them to penetrate industry verticals and offer a comprehensive range of services in a new solution category.
In a recent TechCrunch interview, Hasslacher revealed that the enterprise tier of ChatGPT already boasts approximately 600,000 users, including 93% of Fortune 500 companies. Although engagement time across this user base was not provided, PwC’s inclusion of its 100,000 employees in the United States, United Kingdom, and the Middle East represents a significant increase. Furthermore, if PwC expands usage to its global footprint, an additional 328,000 employees could potentially join the platform.
For PwC, this partnership signifies the company’s belief in its own evolving business model and highlights a promising growth opportunity for its consulting services. PwC’s Generative AI Leader, Bret Greenstein, dismissed concerns that adopting ChatGPT or any generative AI assistant would threaten jobs. Instead, PwC hopes to leverage ChatGPT to expand its business using its existing employee base, eliminating the need for additional hires.
Greenstein emphasized the importance of this partnership for PwC, highlighting their early adoption of ChatGPT and the seamless transition to the enterprise tier as their engagement increased. As the technology stack improves, PwC aims to focus on outcomes, transformation, workflow, use cases, and business processes rather than developing tooling around the product itself. Although daily usage statistics for generative AI products were not disclosed, Greenstein mentioned that their education tools designed to train individuals have achieved an impressive 90% engagement rate.
Moreover, generative AI presents an exciting avenue for consulting companies like PwC to gain new business opportunities, particularly in the realm of digital transformation. PwC plans to leverage generative AI as part of a broader pitch centered around digital transformation, which has become a significant theme in the IT industry.
While pricing details were not disclosed, ChatGPT’s self-service version costs $30 per user, and the consumer edition costs $20 per user. OpenAI’s customer success team currently supports customers in deploying their generative AI solutions, but with limited capacity. Hence, OpenAI is exploring a partner ecosystem to supplement their services. PwC is currently the reselling partner, but Hasslacher hinted at the possibility of additional partnerships in the future.
