Exclusive: Yahoo launches AI tools for NBA fans and investors

Yahoo is launching two products powered by its AI answer engine Yahoo Scout for its sports and finance verticals, CEO Jim Lanzone announced Wednesday at Axios' AI+ NY Summit.

Why it matters: As more people turn to ChatGPT, Gemini and other AI assistants for information, Yahoo is betting on its trust and expertise, and building new experiences to make it more accessible.

What they're saying: "Today, we're announcing two new products that are the first in what we'll call Scout as a service, which is where we're taking the Scout answer engine technology and then bringing it to every Yahoo property," Lanzone told Axios' Madison Mills onstage.

• "We're not just building a technology to give great answers," he said. "Ours is very different. It's trained on our information, and so it was always part of the vision for it that we would bring it to all of our other properties and help make them better as well."

Zoom in: Released for the NBA Draft, Yahoo Sports' "Ask Kevin O'Connor" feature lets people ask questions and receive AI-generated responses based on O'Connor's analysis and written voice.

• The responses pull from his NBA Draft Guide, coverage and show along with player and team stats. O'Connor joined Yahoo Sports as NBA senior analyst in 2024 and has covered the league since 2013. Unrelated questions are redirected to Scout.
• The feature is designed as a limited-time experience. Yahoo plans to keep it live for several days after the draft to help fans research drafted and undrafted players before sunsetting it by the end of June.
• Yahoo Finance's "Ask Yahoo Scout" provides answers to questions about stocks, markets and companies using the site's news coverage and data, plus other trusted online sources.

Catch up quick: Yahoo announced Scout in January as a standalone site and app. MyScout, a personalized homepage, launched in March.

• Yahoo ranks as the third-largest U.S. web property with 250 million monthly users in the U.S. and 75% of its impressions are logged-in users, Lanzone said.

Zoom out: Publishers have been creating AI-powered interfaces that help readers engage more with their reporting.

• Time last year launched an AI agent trained on its 102-year archive that lets users ask questions, generate summaries and listen to audio briefs.
• The Financial Times created "Ask FT," a chatbot trained on its reporting.
• Forbes released a generative AI search tool called Adelaide in 2023.

What to watch: Lanzone dodged a question on AI usage costs, noting the company has the benefit of being private. Apollo Global Management acquired Yahoo in 2021.

• "The plan is not to stay private forever," Lanzone said. "We still have some things that we want to accomplish internally before we would start to really think about pushing forward on that. ... I don't think it's too far off."

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