> Microsoft: invests 10 billion in company. Also Microsoft: here's the tools you need to DIY one of the premium features the company we just invested 10 billion in for free.

In my mind, MSFT spent that money to acquire a head start on getting LLM-style capabilities into MS’s profitable product portfolio. This is money well spent:

1. MSFT can and will make money on these capabilities.

2. If MSFT didn’t do this, they would take the substantial risk of someone else pulling it off and attacking their moat.

I can’t really imagine today’s Google pulling this off with Google Docs. Adobe doesn’t target MS’s market directly enough to be an immediate risk. Apple doesn’t seem interested in competing with MS. Meta is doing its own thing in the corner. But someone really could attack MS with something amazing and make short-term sales, which could turn into a long term loss for MS. (Salesforce? They don’t seem able make things that normal people want to use.). But MS is now ahead of the curve, and they didn’t really spend that much money to get there.

Keep in mind that LibreOffice is not vastly less capable than Office 365, and Teams is not exactly an insurmountably strong piece of technology.