"Pitch Your New Product Idea" Contest... ChatGPT Dominates Humans

Wharton School MBA Brutally Defeated by AI
Suggests Paradigm Shift in Creativity and Innovation Methods

The generative artificial intelligence (AI) ChatGPT's business idea generation ability surpassed that of top-tier business school students worldwide.

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 9th (local time) that after analyzing the results of a task given to both students of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and ChatGPT4 to propose new products or services priced under $50 (about 66,000 KRW), they reached this conclusion.

ChatGPT image.
Photo by AP Yonhap News

WSJ randomly selected 200 new business ideas presented by the human representatives, Wharton students, and first instructed ChatGPT to generate 100 ideas, then trained it on past successful cases and asked it to propose 100 more ideas.

ChatGPT produced new business ideas such as foldable laundry baskets and dormitory cooking kits in about just one hour under human supervision.

The judging panel evaluated the performances of both sides based on three criteria: quantity of ideas, average quality of ideas, and number of outstanding ideas.

In terms of quantity of ideas, considering that humans typically take several days to produce 200 ideas, AI achieved a decisive victory.

The quality of ideas was assessed through an online survey. When asked if they would be willing to purchase the product or service if implemented, the average purchase probability for human-generated proposals was calculated at 40%, while ChatGPT's was 47%.

Simply having good ideas does not guarantee business success. To correct for errors that may arise from emphasizing averages, WSJ also compared how many exceptionally excellent ideas there were. Among the top 10% of business plans, 40 in total, 35 were created by ChatGPT.

In other words, AI achieved a sweeping victory across all areas in creating businesses that could succeed in the actual market.

WSJ analyzed that although humans lost to AI in the innovative business idea generation contest, it is not a very bleak message.

WSJ stated, "Humans will ultimately be the decision-makers responsible for conducting consumer research and testing and selecting based on AI's opinions," adding, "Better products and services will be launched through human-machine collaboration. In future society, if necessary, better solutions will emerge for anything."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.