Meta’s Llama AI Models Adopted by Major Companies

By Katie Paul

NEW YORK – Meta (NASDAQ:META) has announced that its Llama artificial intelligence models are being utilized by major companies, including Goldman Sachs and AT&T (NYSE:T), for various business tasks such as customer service, document review, and code generation.

The mostly free Llama models have seen nearly 350 million downloads since their public release last year, up from 300 million reported when the latest Llama 3 model was launched in late July.

Usage through cloud providers, including Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) Web Services and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Azure, has also surged, more than doubling between May and July this year, according to Meta.

This announcement arrives as Meta and other tech firms invest billions in AI while facing scrutiny from investors regarding the technology’s widespread adoption and the potential returns on their expenditures.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg stated that the strategy of developing advanced AI models and making them freely available will prevent the company from being limited by competitors’ proprietary technologies. “The path for Llama to become the industry standard is by being consistently competitive, efficient, and open generation after generation,” he wrote last month.

Despite large language models like Llama being praised for their human-like text generation abilities, they still encounter challenges with logical tasks and are prone to factual inaccuracies, which can hinder their business adoption.

Nevertheless, Meta cited several large enterprises using Llama as proof of its utility and competitiveness compared to paid alternatives, such as models from industry leader OpenAI. Other companies using Llama include Japanese bank Nomura Holdings (NYSE:NMR), food delivery service DoorDash (NASDAQ:DASH), and professional services provider Accenture (NYSE:ACN).