[reppap]

One thing I like to think about is: If these models were so powerful why would they ever sell access? They could just build endless products to sell, likely outcompeting anyone else who needs to employ humans. And if not building their own products they could be the highest value contractor ever.

If you had midas touch would you rent it out?

[atleastoptimal]

Well there are models that Anthropic, OpenAI and co. have access to that they haven't provided public API's for, due to both safety, and what you've cited as the competitive advantage factor. (like Openai's IMO model, though it's debatable if it represented an early version of GPT 5.1/2/3 or something else)

https://sequoiacap.com/podcast/training-data-openai-imo/

The thing however is the labs are all in competition with each other. Even if OpenAI had some special model that could give them the ability to make their own Saas and products, it is more worth it for them to sell access to the API and use the profit to scale, because otherwise their competitors will pocket that money and scale faster.

This holds as long as the money from API access to the models is worth more than the comparative advantage a lab retains from not sharing it. Because there are multiple competing labs, the comparative advantage is small (if OpenAI kept GPT-5.X to themselves, people would just use Claude and Anthropic would become bigger, same with Google).

This however may not hold forever, it is just a phenomena of labs focusing more on heavily on their models with marginal product efforts.

[gbnwl]

They need to generate revenue to continue to raise money to continue to invest in compute. Even if they have the Midas Touch it needs to be continously improved because there are three other competing Midas Touch companies working on new and improved Midas Touch's that will make their's obsolete and worthless if they stay still even for a second.

[reppap]

But most of their funding comes from speculative investment, not selling their services. Also, wouldn't selling their own products/services generate revenue?

[paulryanrogers]

Arguably because the parts the AI can't do (yet?) still need a lot of human attention. Stuff like developing business models, finding market fit, selling, interacting with prospects and customers, etc.