Google has officially launched its generative AI video model, Veo, in private preview, making it available to businesses for integration into their content creation pipelines. This move marks a significant milestone, as Veo has beaten its competitor, OpenAI's Sora, to market. Veo was first unveiled in May, and its capabilities have been impressive, generating high-quality 1080p resolution videos in various visual and cinematic styles from text or image-based prompts.

The latest version of Veo is capable of producing videos that are nearly indistinguishable from those created by humans. The model's ability to maintain consistency in details such as fur patterns and collars in generated clips is particularly noteworthy. While Google hasn't specified length restrictions for the preview release, the generated clips are reportedly "beyond a minute" in length.

In addition to Veo, Google is also making its latest Imagen 3 text-to-image generator available to all Google Cloud customers via Vertex, starting next week. This expansion follows the initial US release on Google's AI Test Kitchen in August. Users on Google's allow list will also gain access to new features, including prompt-based photo editing and the ability to infuse their own brand, style, logo, subject, or product features into generated images.

Notably, Veo and Imagen 3 come with built-in safeguards to prevent the generation of harmful content or copyright violations. However, it's worth mentioning that these safeguards have been bypassed in the past. To address misinformation and misattribution concerns, everything produced by Veo and Imagen 3 is embedded with DeepMind's SynthID technology, a digital watermark similar to Adobe's Content Credentials system.

The launch of Veo puts pressure on OpenAI, which is still working on releasing its Sora product. With AI-generated content already appearing in ads, such as Coca-Cola's recent holiday campaign, companies have a strong incentive to adopt these technologies. According to Google, 86 percent of organizations using generative AI are seeing an increase in revenue, making it an attractive solution for businesses looking to stay competitive.

The implications of Veo's release are far-reaching, with potential applications in various industries, including entertainment, marketing, and education. As the technology continues to evolve, it will be interesting to see how businesses and individuals alike leverage its capabilities. For now, Google has taken a significant lead in the generative AI video model space, and it remains to be seen how OpenAI will respond.