OpenAI to use FT content for training AI models in latest media tie-up

(This April 29 story has been corrected to remove reference to Associated Press in paragraph 2)

(Reuters) - The Financial Times has signed a deal with OpenAI to license its content for the development of AI models and allow ChatGPT to answer queries with summaries attributable to the newspaper, the latest media tie-up for the Microsoft-backed startup.

Financial terms of the agreement, announced on Monday, were not disclosed. It follows similar deals by OpenAI over the past few months with global news publisher Axel Springer, France's Le Monde and Spain-based Prisa Media.

The latest deal will help the startup enhance the ChatGPT chatbot with archived content from the FT and the firms will work together to develop new AI products and features for FT readers, the newspaper and OpenAI said in a statement.

The summaries generated by ChatGPT off FT content will also link back to the newspaper, according to the companies.

"We're keen to explore the practical outcomes regarding news sources and AI through this partnership," said FT Group CEO John Ridding.

ChatGPT, which kickstarted the GenAI boom in late 2022, can mimic human conversation and perform tasks such as creating summaries of long text, writing poems and even generating ideas for a theme party.

Some outlets are already using generative AI for their content. BuzzFeed has said it will use AI to power personality quizzes on its site, and the New York Times used ChatGPT to create a Valentine's Day message-generator last year.

(Reporting by Angela Christy, Devika Nair and Aditya Soni in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich, Sherry Jacob-Phillips and Shailesh Kuber)