ChatGPT App Store targets Apple; progress has been slow so far

Last year, OpenAI unveiled an ambitious plan to allow companies such as Spotify Technology SA and Booking Holdings Inc. to launch mini-apps inside ChatGPT, enabling users to access their services without leaving the chatbot. This move was reminiscent of Apple’s App Store debut and was seen as a key step in OpenAI’s effort to turn ChatGPT into a one-stop platform.

Six months later, interviews with application developers show that the rollout has gotten off to a slow start. Although more than 300 app integrations are available as of now, the entry points are hard to find, and the functionality is constrained by partner businesses—these companies are unwilling to hand over customer relationships and payment flows to OpenAI. Developers also complain that the app review process is cumbersome, the coding system has vulnerabilities, and there is a lack of usage data.

This underwhelming start has also added another item to OpenAI’s list of products that have yet to deliver a return. In March, the company announced it would shut down its Sora video generator, which is part of its plan to streamline its product lineup ahead of a potential first public offering later this year. OpenAI is also committed to integrating its recently launched browser into a desktop app that includes a chatbot and programming tools. The browser, called Atlas, also ran into some problems during its early development stage.

The push to promote ChatGPT applications could intensify competition with Apple and steer consumers toward an entirely new ecosystem of apps and services outside the App Store. In November last year, Apple took steps to restrict it by introducing a “mini-apps” policy requiring so-called “super apps” to give up 15% of in-app purchase revenue from paid apps.

As OpenAI faces increasingly fierce competition from Anthropic PBC and Google, a unit of Alphabet, third-party integrations will also become a key way to attract more users. This also helps OpenAI achieve its ultimate goal—embedding software integrations into consumer devices. (After OpenAI acquired a hardware startup founded by former Apple executive Jony Ive for nearly $6.5 billion last year, OpenAI is working with him to develop a series of products.)

StubHub Holdings Inc. and Booking currently have not viewed ChatGPT applications as a major marketing driver. Booking’s CEO Glen Fogel(Glenn Fogel) said in an interview, “It’s easier to search for listings on Booking.com,” and added that the recommendation traffic coming from ChatGPT is still “very small.” He said that compared with their investment in OpenAI’s chatbot, their spending on Google ads remains “very substantial.”

OpenAI says its app platform is at the core of its product strategy. “We’re still in the early stages of building the platform, and we realize that in some respects the developer experience needs to be improved,” a spokesperson said, adding that the company is committed to making the platform “more reliable, more predictable, and easier to develop on over time.”

Reactions to OpenAI’s app plan have been mixed, which has also tempered Wall Street’s enthusiasm and concerns about the technology. Many early partners, including Figma Inc., Expedia Group Inc., and Target Corp.(Target Corp.), saw their share prices surge after the initial announcement, because these partnerships provide a new way to reach users in the AI era rather than being overtaken by AI.

Some consumer companies believe it is necessary to partner with AI chatbots because they see them as an emerging search channel, much like Google. But AI assistants are not the only way consumers learn about brands, and these chatbots have by no means replaced the search giant.

A spokesperson for DoorDash said the company has also found that whether it’s the ChatGPT, Google, or Yelp Inc. ordering button, no single partner integration can “monopolize customer attention.”

During a recent earnings call, executives from Airbnb, Booking, Expedia, DoorDash, and eBay Inc. emphasized that their superior payment systems, 24/7 customer support, user identity verification, and review mechanisms are precisely why these platforms won’t be replaced by AI-driven tools.

“AI models currently do not have the ability to provide better services,” said Jefferies(Jefferies) analyst John Colantuoni(John Colantuoni), “which creates a ‘chicken-and-egg’ dilemma—unless services are better or cheaper, consumers won’t turn to AI, and businesses have no incentive to support middlemen.”

Very few applications offer options that let users complete payments without leaving the OpenAI chatbot. For example, with Uber, users must first type “@Uber” to start the experience, and only after they tell the chatbot the pickup and drop-off locations can they view an estimated fare range. Passengers can only complete bookings in the Uber app, whose entire process is faster. Instacart is an exception—its payment function is integrated more deeply with the chatbot.

Ticket resale platform StubHub allows ChatGPT users to search for concerts, events, and available seats based on preferences such as budget or perspective. But users still need to visit the website to complete the purchase, and even simply enlarging the seat map requires a redirect to the website.

StubHub’s president and chief product officer Nayaab Islam(Nayaab Islam) said that consumers currently do not see chatbots as the “main way” to shop, adding that consumers are concerned about sharing credit card information with AI assistants.

However, he said that given that chatbot applications have tens of billions of users, it would be “unwise” not to participate. “For companies like ours, having more options is a good thing,” he said.

Very few apps offer checkout options that let users complete payment without leaving the OpenAI chatbot, but Instacart is an exception

If consumers feel uneasy about AI, they are not alone: a new report released in March by ad tech company Criteo shows that among more than 6,000 surveyed consumers worldwide, 55% are “extra cautious about sharing payment information with AI.” The company noted in its report that shoppers are trying to use AI as an assistant, but “have not yet handed over control to AI.”

The research also found that 96% of consumers who frequently use AI chatbots also use other channels during shopping, such as social media, traditional search, and retailer websites.

Not only consumers have not fully embraced the ChatGPT app store. Developers also find the app development process frustrating.

Fractal is a startup that builds chatbot application tools for people who are not programmers. Its CEO Hanh Nguyen said that for some developers, publishing an app to the app store is a long and difficult process. She pointed out that some of the cases rejected include “error signals” flagged by OpenAI’s AI-assisted review system, and only with the company’s in-house support staff intervening can the issues be resolved.

OpenAI says its review speed has been significantly accelerated because the process has been simplified and developers have resolved the problems that were previously found. According to Elliott Garreffa(Elliot Garreffa), a co-founder of a third-party platform that tracks ChatGPT apps and tests their performance, the company approved nearly 70 apps last week, whereas previously it approved only 3 to 5 per day. (OpenAI declined to disclose specific numbers.)

Some developers still run into problems even after the app is approved. Garreffa said that because OpenAI defines chatbot prompts as private data, programmers find that the app performance analytics data they receive is “very limited,” leaving them “almost blindly running” in terms of user engagement.

“The pain points we keep hearing from companies are, ‘My app is already live, but I have no idea if it’s failing. I don’t know if it’s stable running,’ or whether it can be pushed to the right users,” Garreffa added. Because the platform is still new, there is currently no effective way to influence app visibility, unlike iOS app developers who can test various methods to improve rankings.

As OpenAI begins to add ads into chatbots, concerns about app discoverability may grow, meaning partner apps will increasingly compete with sponsored content for users’ attention.

At the same time, developers also have to deal with vulnerabilities in development tools—vulnerabilities that make their work more difficult.

“Apps in development break, and we can only wonder, ‘Oh, why is that?’, then we have to check what they did, only to find that they made some changes before the announcement went out,” said Max Ockner(Max Ockner), CTO of Fractal. Although OpenAI maintains update logs for its app framework, the relevant documentation has not kept up with the vulnerabilities that users report on its public developer forum.

“The gates aren’t open yet,” Ockner said, “and we’re actually still waiting for that moment to arrive.” Editor/Chen Jiajing

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