The project, details of which have not been previously reported, comes as the Microsoft-backed startup races to demonstrate that the types of models it offers are capable of delivering advanced reasoning capabilities.
According to media reports, teams inside OpenAI are working on Strawberry, based on a recent internal OpenAI document.
Reports could not determine the exact date of the document, which outlines a plan for how OpenAI intends to use Strawberry to conduct research.
The source described the plan to private media as a work in progress. The news media could not determine how close Strawberry is to being publicly available. How Strawberry works is a closely guarded secret even within OpenAI, the person said.
The document outlines a project that uses Strawberry models with the goal of enabling the company’s AI to not only generate answers to queries but also to plan ahead sufficiently to navigate the internet autonomously and reliably, performing what OpenAI calls “deep research,” according to the source.
This is something that has eluded AI models to date, according to interviews with over a dozen AI researchers.
When asked about Strawberry and the details reported in this story, an OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement: “We want our AI models to see and understand the world more like we do. Continuous research into new AI capabilities is common practice in the industry, with a shared belief that these systems will improve in reasoning over time.”
The spokesperson did not directly respond to questions about Strawberry. The Strawberry project, previously known as Q*, was reported by media last year to have already been viewed within the company as a breakthrough.
Other reports earlier this year described witnessing what OpenAI staff referred to as Q* demos, capable of answering complex science and math questions beyond the capabilities of today’s commercially-available models.
