At the HumanX conference, everyone was talking about Claude

At the HumanX AI conference in San Francisco this week, thousands of techies descended upon the city’s Moscone Center, where discussion focused on the ways agentic AI is changing the business. Agents, which automate business and coding tasks, have begun to be deployed across industries — largely through enterprise and consumer-focused chatbots.

Naturally, I wanted to know which chatbot was the most popular, and I consistently heard one name most often: Claude.

Anthropic got shoutouts in many of the panels held throughout the week, but it also was a topic of discussion with the vendors I spoke to while perusing the convention room floor. The chatbot I didn’t hear a lot about? ChatGPT. One of the vendors I spoke to made a point of telling me that he and his team used Claude a lot, while he felt ChatGPT and OpenAI had gone downhill — or, as the internet likes to say, “fell off.”

Lately, that does not appear to be a particularly unique take. Indeed, it’s not clear what will cure the perception that, despite a recent $122 billion funding round and its upcoming IPO, OpenAI has lost its footing—or, at the very least, seems increasingly unsure of what the next step is.

Part of the problem may be a perception that the company lacks focus. Last month, OpenAI abandoned a number of long simmering side-quests (including its AI video generator Sora and a troubled plan to launch a “sexy” version of ChatGPT), locking in instead on the focuses of business and coding services. In the meantime, a number of developments, including a recent New Yorker piece that questioned whether the company’s CEO, Sam Altman, was trustworthy or not, have spurred a certain amount of negative buzz around the company. The company’s work with the Trump administration hasn’t won it any friends either, nor has its decision to inject advertising into ChatGPT.

During one of HumanX’s discussions, Sierra co-founder and CEO Bret Taylor (who is also the chairman of the board of OpenAI) defended Altman when asked by Alex Heath about the New Yorker profile. “I think Sam is one of the most visible leaders and executives in the world,” said Taylor. “If you want to seek out detractors for him, you’ll find them, and they’ll be very vocal about it,” he said, adding: “I think Sam’s remarkable. I think he’s a remarkable leader of AI, and I really trust his character as someone who’s worked with him.”

The controversies and vacillations can make OpenAI’s seem reactive rather than strategic, as if it’s simply responding to events rather than shaping them. That said, when it comes to prominence and revenue, OpenAI and Anthropic are neck and neck — or at least, that’s how it looks, with some data suggesting that Anthropic is catching up among business users. The Wall Street Journal recently analyzed their finances, showing that the two companies were “the fastest-growing businesses in the history of tech.” In that sense, perhaps “falling off” for OpenAI just means it’s not the undisputed champ anymore. It has competition — which, in most industries, is normal.

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