The combined fortune of Google's co-founders has increased by more than $18 billion after the company announced a search engine powered by artificial intelligence (AI).

Larry Page's net worth rose $9.4 billion to $106.9 billion, while Sergey Brin's net worth rose $8.9 billion to $102.1 billion this week, their biggest weekly gains since February 2021, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

At its annual developer event on May 10, Google said it would begin testing a more conversational search engine and make AI-powered chatbots more widely available.

The upgrade will help the tech giant assert its dominance in the increasingly competitive field of AI. Shares of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, rose nearly 1% on Friday after rising 8.6% over the previous two days.

Google's two co-founders are among the top earners of 2023. They have each added more than $22 billion to their fortunes so far this year, and are now ranked eighth and ninth on Bloomberg's list of the world's richest billionaires.

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt is another beneficiary of the AI ​​boom, investing in startups in the field despite calls to slow down research amid concerns over China’s technological rise.

The bulk of his $23.6 billion fortune is still tied to Alphabet, where he is the third-largest individual shareholder. His net worth also increased by $1.8 billion this week.

Google was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin in 1998. Although the two men no longer hold executive roles at Google, they still serve on the board of directors and have significant influence on the company's decision-making with approximately 85.8% of Class B shares, equivalent to 51.2% of Google's voting power .

Nguyen Tuyet (According to Bloomberg, History Computer)