Summary
What This Article Covers: A comprehensive roundup of the most significant AI developments from December 2024, including OpenAI’s o3 model launch, Google’s Gemini 2.0, major funding rounds, new product releases, and regulatory updates that will shape AI in 2025.
Who This Is For: Business leaders, AI enthusiasts, developers, and professionals who need to stay informed about rapid AI developments and understand their practical implications.
Reading Time: 10 minutes
CallGPT Relevance: As new AI models launch (like o3 and Gemini 2.0), CallGPT 6X users get immediate access to the latest capabilities through platform updates—without needing separate subscriptions to each provider.
TLDR
December 2024’s Biggest AI Stories:
- OpenAI o3: New reasoning model scoring 96.7% on math benchmarks and 71.7% on ARC-AGI, approaching human-level performance
- Google Gemini 2.0: Launched with native multimodal capabilities and agentic AI features
- Apple iOS 18.2: ChatGPT integration in Siri, AI-generated emojis (Genmoji), and enhanced Visual Intelligence
- DeepSeek V3: Chinese AI achieves top-tier performance at fraction of Western training costs
- Major Funding: Databricks raises $10 billion (largest VC round of 2024), xAI raises $6 billion
- Regulatory: EU AI Act enforcement begins, Brazil passes first AI regulation bill
Key Insight: December 2024 marked a turning point from experimental AI to practical, business-ready systems. The “agentic era” of AI—where models can take actions and coordinate tasks autonomously—has officially begun.
OpenAI’s “12 Days of Shipmas”
From December 5-20, OpenAI conducted a daily product launch event they called “12 Days of Shipmas,” culminating in the announcement of their o3 reasoning model.
Major Announcements
December 5: Reinforcement Fine-Tuning Program OpenAI expanded its research program allowing developers and researchers to fine-tune models for domain-specific tasks. The program improves model accuracy by incorporating user feedback to refine reasoning capabilities.
December 9: Sora Turbo Launch OpenAI released Sora Turbo, their advanced text-to-video generation model capable of creating complex video scenes from natural language prompts. Available to ChatGPT Plus and Pro users in the U.S., with features including:
- Up to 50 videos per month
- Storyboard tool for frame-by-frame generation
- Explore page for community creations
- Faster generation than original Sora
December 10: Canvas Goes Global Canvas, OpenAI’s interactive workspace for writing and coding, rolled out to all web users. Key features include:
- Integrated into GPT-4o by default
- Python code execution
- Project management capabilities
- Custom GPT integration
December 17: ChatGPT Pro Launch New $200/month professional tier offering:
- Unlimited access to OpenAI o1 reasoning model
- Enhanced o1 pro mode for complex reasoning
- Unlimited GPT-4o and Advanced Voice
- Priority processing during peak times
December 20: OpenAI o3 Model Announcement
The headline announcement: OpenAI’s o3 reasoning model achieves breakthrough performance:
Benchmark Results:
- AIME Math: 96.7% (vs. o1’s 83%)
- ARC-AGI: 71.7% on semi-private evaluation (87.5% with high compute)
- Codeforces: Competitive programming at expert level
- SWE-bench Verified: Strong coding performance
What Makes o3 Different:
- Extended reasoning time for complex problems
- Better at multi-step logic and planning
- Approaching human-level performance on challenging tasks
- Available for safety testing with public launch expected January 2025
Business Impact: o3 represents a leap toward AI systems that can handle complex strategic and analytical tasks previously requiring senior-level human expertise.
Google Gemini 2.0: The Agentic Era Begins
On December 11, Google launched Gemini 2.0, positioning it as the foundation model for the “agentic era” of AI.
Key Features & Capabilities
Native Multimodality:
- Processes text, images, video, and audio natively
- Generates images and audio outputs (not just text)
- Better understanding of context across modalities
Agentic Capabilities: Gemini 2.0 can take actions on your behalf:
- Use Google Search, Maps, and Lens
- Navigate applications and websites
- Execute multi-step tasks with supervision
- Coordinate between different tools and services
Deep Research Feature: New capability in Gemini Advanced that acts as a research assistant:
- Explores complex topics autonomously
- Compiles comprehensive reports
- Provides sourced analysis
- Handles multi-stage research projects
Performance Improvements:
- 2x faster than Gemini 1.5 Pro
- Better reasoning capabilities
- Enhanced coding performance
- Improved long-context understanding
Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking
Google also released an experimental “thinking” model that shows its reasoning process:
- Visible chain-of-thought reasoning
- Better at complex problem-solving
- Transparent decision-making process
- Available in Gemini Advanced
Strategic Positioning: Google is betting on agentic AI—systems that can complete tasks independently rather than just answering questions—as the next phase of AI development.
Major Funding Rounds and Investments
December 2024 saw record-breaking AI investment activity:
Databricks: $10 Billion (Largest VC Round of 2024)
On December 17, data and AI platform Databricks raised $10 billion in Series J funding:
- Post-money valuation: $62 billion
- What they do: Unified data and AI platform for enterprises
- Strategic significance: Largest venture capital round of 2024
- Business impact: Validates enterprise demand for AI infrastructure
xAI: $6 Billion Series C
Elon Musk’s xAI raised an additional $6 billion in November-December:
- Total raised in 2024: $12 billion across two rounds
- Post-money valuation: $50 billion
- What they’re building: Grok AI models and infrastructure
- Strategic move: Competing directly with OpenAI and Anthropic
OpenAI: $6.6 Billion Series B (October)
Though announced in October, OpenAI’s funding round continued to impact December developments:
- Post-money valuation: $157 billion
- Funding enables: o3 development and infrastructure expansion
- Investor confidence: AI capabilities reaching practical business value
Investment Trend: Total AI funding in 2024 exceeded $50 billion, signaling massive institutional confidence in AI’s business applications.
Apple iOS 18.2 AI Features Launch
December 11 marked Apple’s major AI feature rollout with iOS 18.2:
Genmoji: AI-Generated Emojis
Create custom emojis from text descriptions:
- “Cat playing piano”
- “Tired office worker on Friday”
- Personalized expressions beyond standard emoji set
Siri-ChatGPT Integration
Siri now hands off complex queries to ChatGPT:
- Seamless transition for difficult questions
- Uses ChatGPT’s knowledge base
- Maintains Apple’s privacy standards
- Available without ChatGPT subscription
Visual Intelligence Enhancements
Camera Control feature now offers:
- Real-time object identification
- Translation of text in images
- Shopping information from photos
- Restaurant and business details
Mail Categorization
AI-powered email organization:
- Automatic sorting into Primary, Transactions, Updates, Promotions
- Priority message detection
- Smart summary generation
Business Impact: Apple’s AI integration makes advanced AI accessible to 1+ billion iPhone users, dramatically expanding AI adoption beyond tech enthusiasts.
Open-Source AI Breakthroughs
December 2024 proved that open-source AI is catching up to proprietary models:
DeepSeek V3: Chinese AI Breakthrough
Released in mid-December, DeepSeek V3 challenges Western AI dominance:
Performance:
- Matches GPT-4 and Claude on many benchmarks
- Strong coding and reasoning capabilities
- 671 billion parameters with Mixture-of-Experts architecture
Cost Efficiency:
- Training cost: $5.6 million
- 15-20x cheaper than comparable Western models
- Efficient inference at scale
Strategic Significance:
- Demonstrates China’s AI capabilities
- Proves high performance possible at lower costs
- Challenges assumption that only massive budgets yield top models
Qwen QvQ-72B-Preview: Multimodal Vision
Alibaba’s Qwen team released a vision-language model:
- Integrates visual and language processing
- High scores on multimodal benchmarks
- Surpasses competitors in visual reasoning
- Open-source availability
Open-Source Trend: The gap between open-source and proprietary AI is narrowing rapidly, giving businesses more deployment options.
Regulatory and Policy Developments
December 2024 brought significant regulatory clarity:
Brazil AI Regulation Bill
Brazil’s Senate passed Bill No. 2338/2024 in December:
- First comprehensive AI regulation in South America
- Covers algorithm design and technical standards
- Follows EU AI Act principles
- Requires transparency in AI decision-making
EU AI Act Enforcement Begins
The EU AI Act officially began phased enforcement:
- High-risk AI systems face strict requirements
- Transparency obligations for general-purpose AI
- Prohibited AI applications banned
- Fines up to €35 million or 7% of global revenue
U.S. State-Level Activity
While no federal AI regulation passed, state activity increased:
- 24 U.S. states introduced AI bills in 2024
- Focus on AI transparency and bias prevention
- Varied approaches across states
- Business compliance complexity increasing
Regulatory Trend: Global regulatory landscape is fragmenting, requiring businesses to navigate different rules across jurisdictions.
Other Notable December Developments
Harvard’s Free AI Training Dataset
Harvard University, with support from OpenAI and Microsoft, released:
- Nearly 1 million public-domain books for AI training
- High-quality curated dataset
- Diverse genres, eras, and languages
- Democratizing AI development for startups
Meta’s Metaverse AI Tools
Meta announced AI improvements for virtual environments:
- Meta Motivo: Improves digital avatar movements
- Large Concept Model (LCM): Enhanced language reasoning
- Better immersive experiences in Metaverse
- AI-driven virtual interactions
NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super
NVIDIA released palm-sized AI supercomputer for $249:
- 67 TOPS of neural processing power
- 70% increase over original Nano
- Makes AI development more accessible
- Enables edge AI applications
What December 2024 AI News Means for Businesses
1. Agentic AI is Here
Both OpenAI and Google are pushing toward AI that can complete tasks independently. This means:
- Opportunity: Automate complex multi-step workflows
- Challenge: Managing AI agents safely and effectively
- Action: Start planning which tasks could be delegated to AI agents
2. Model Performance Reaches Practical Thresholds
o3’s 96.7% math performance and DeepSeek’s competitive results signal:
- AI can now handle expert-level analytical tasks
- Cost of high-performance AI is decreasing
- More businesses can justify AI investments
3. Open-Source Options Improve
DeepSeek V3 and Qwen’s advances mean:
- Lower costs: Don’t need proprietary APIs for all tasks
- More control: Deploy models on your infrastructure
- Flexibility: Customize models for specific needs
4. Regulatory Compliance Becomes Critical
With EU AI Act enforcement and Brazil’s regulations:
- Risk: Non-compliance penalties are severe
- Opportunity: Compliance becomes competitive advantage
- Action: Audit AI systems for regulatory requirements now
5. Multi-Model Access Becomes Essential
With rapid model releases and improvements:
- No single model leads in all tasks
- Access to multiple models provides competitive advantage
- Platforms like CallGPT 6X offering multi-model access gain value
How CallGPT 6X Keeps You Current
As AI models evolve rapidly, having a single subscription to one provider creates risk. CallGPT 6X addresses this by:
Immediate Access to New Models
When OpenAI releases o3 or Google updates Gemini:
- CallGPT 6X updates platform integration
- You get access without new subscriptions
- Compare new models against existing ones
- Choose the best tool for each task
Model Comparison in Real-Time
As models improve, you can:
- Test o3 vs. Gemini 2.0 vs. Claude on your actual tasks
- Measure quality differences
- Optimize for cost vs. performance
- Switch models based on results
Future-Proofing Your AI Strategy
Rather than betting on one provider:
- Access 6 AI providers in one platform
- Benefit from competition between vendors
- Avoid lock-in to single ecosystem
- Adapt as AI landscape evolves
Strategic Value: In a rapidly changing AI landscape, flexibility and access matter more than commitment to a single provider.
Looking Ahead to 2025
Based on December’s announcements, expect in 2025:
Q1 2025
- OpenAI o3 public release
- More agentic AI applications launch
- Increased AI agent adoption in enterprises
- Regulatory enforcement cases begin
H1 2025
- GPT-5 likely announcement
- Gemini 2.1 or 3.0 expected
- Claude 4.0 potential release
- More open-source models reach competitive performance
Full Year 2025
- AI agent marketplaces emerge
- Cross-platform AI coordination improves
- Regulatory clarity in more countries
- Cost per AI task drops 50%+
Bottom Line: The AI industry is accelerating, not slowing down. Staying informed and maintaining flexible access to multiple AI systems will be critical for business competitiveness.
Disclaimers
Information Currency: AI news moves rapidly. All information current as of December 5, 2024. Model capabilities, pricing, and availability subject to change. Verify details on official vendor websites for the most current information.
Benchmark Scores: AI benchmark performance varies based on testing methodology, version, and conditions. Scores mentioned (e.g., o3’s 96.7% on AIME) represent specific test conditions and may not reflect performance on all tasks.
Release Dates: Product launch dates are subject to change. “Expected January 2025” or similar timelines are based on announced plans and may be delayed.
Investment Figures: Funding amounts and valuations based on publicly disclosed information. Private deals may include terms not publicly disclosed.
Regulatory Status: Regulatory information represents status as of December 2024. Laws, enforcement priorities, and compliance requirements evolve. Consult legal counsel for regulatory guidance.
Model Access: Access to new AI models depends on vendor rollout schedules, geographic availability, and subscription tiers. Not all features available in all regions immediately.
FAQs
When will OpenAI o3 be available to the public?
OpenAI announced external safety testing for o3 in December 2024, with public launch expected in January 2025. Initially, it will likely be available to ChatGPT Plus and Pro users, with API access following. CallGPT 6X will integrate o3 access once it’s publicly available.
What’s the difference between Gemini 2.0 and previous versions?
Gemini 2.0 introduces native multimodal generation (can create images and audio, not just process them), agentic capabilities (can use tools and take actions), and significantly faster performance. It’s specifically designed for the “agentic era” where AI actively completes tasks rather than just answering questions.
Will ChatGPT integration in iOS 18.2 cost money?
Basic ChatGPT integration in Siri is free for all iOS 18.2 users. However, free tier has usage limits. ChatGPT Plus subscribers get higher limits and access to GPT-4 through Siri. Most casual users will find the free tier sufficient.
How does DeepSeek V3 compare to Western AI models?
DeepSeek V3 achieves competitive performance with GPT-4 and Claude on many benchmarks while costing 15-20x less to train. This challenges the assumption that only massive budgets produce top-tier models. However, Western models may still lead in certain specialized tasks and have broader ecosystem support.
Should businesses worry about AI regulation?
Yes, especially if operating in the EU or Brazil. The EU AI Act carries penalties up to €35 million or 7% of global revenue for non-compliance. Even in regions without specific AI laws, existing regulations (data privacy, consumer protection) apply to AI systems. Audit your AI use now and consult legal counsel.
How often should I update my AI tool stack?
Review quarterly at minimum. New models often deliver step-function improvements. However, don’t chase every release—evaluate if new capabilities address specific business needs. Platforms like CallGPT 6X simplify this by providing access to multiple models, so you can test new releases without changing your workflow.
What’s “agentic AI” and why does it matter?
Agentic AI refers to AI systems that can autonomously complete tasks by using tools, making decisions, and taking actions—not just answering questions. For example, instead of telling you how to schedule a meeting, an AI agent could coordinate with participants’ calendars and actually schedule it. This represents a fundamental shift toward AI as active assistant rather than passive Q&A tool.
Conclusion: Rapid Evolution Continues
December 2024 demonstrated that AI development is accelerating, not plateauing. OpenAI’s o3 model approaching human-level performance on complex reasoning, Google’s pivot to agentic AI, and open-source models reaching competitive performance all signal that 2025 will bring even more dramatic capabilities.
Key Takeaways:
- Model performance is reaching practical thresholds for expert-level work
- Agentic AI is transitioning from research to real-world applications
- Open-source is catching up to proprietary models in quality
- Regulatory requirements are solidifying globally
- Multi-model access provides strategic flexibility as landscape evolves
For businesses: The question is no longer “should we use AI?” but “how quickly can we adapt to increasingly capable AI systems?”
Stay informed with CallGPT 6X: Access the latest AI models as they launch—o3, Gemini 2.0, Claude 4.0, and more—all in one platform. Start your 7-day free trial and future-proof your AI strategy.
Internal Links
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