AI: Weekly Summary. RTZ #507

1. OpenAI’s ‘Losses’ to Scale AI & Microsoft partnerships: Debate post OpenAI’s landmark funding continues on their eventual path to profitability, and the timing. Comparisons to Uber and other models are being discussed. The company of course is focused on ramping up its products and AI infrastructure to go from hundreds of millions to billions of users over the next five years. Also in the news is OpenAI charting AI data centers in Texas independent of Microsoft, with Oracle. OpenAI continues to expand its product roadmap, while ramping on its infrastructure needs ahead. More here and here.

   

2. Meta’s Wall Street Win: Meta continues to win kudos on wall street on its AI strategies, with the stock seeing all-time highs. And while there are some cautionary voices on the enthusiasm, the general momentum continues to hold with the company’s recently successful Connect conference and AI Wearables strategy unveiled over a week ago. And of course the overall financial and operating metrics at Meta. The company also continues to be focused on monetizing its AI initiatives with advertisers ahead of its peers. Meta also continues to be positioned well vs the LLM AI peers with its open-source Llama models, across the size spectrum. More here.

   

3. Microsoft CEO Nadella in ‘Founder Mode’: Notable profile on Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s operating style, driving the company’s AI strategy broad and deep across the company’s businesses. It’s notable that the company has doubled revenues since taking the job in 2014, when the company was under a $100 billion in revenues. It’s now approaching $250 billion. The $100 billion is of course a reported revenue target in five years by 2029, for its partner OpenAI. The unique partnership between the two companies, along with Microsoft’s own AI roadmap, will continue to shape Satya Nadella’s legacy going forward. More here.

   

4. Google’s ‘Break up’ Blues: Google is facing upcoming legislative events to determine the next steps in its antitrust judgments and cases. At issue of course is the possibility of a Google breakup in its historic antitrust case. While the process and appeals will likely stretch out the possibilities in time, the initiatives themselves are likely to shape how Google navigates going forward. There are pros and cons to the DOJ case, with a fair bit of complexity in the resolution phase. At stake though is Google’s flexibility in its AI initiatives and partnerships. Investors are mostly in a ‘wait and see’ mode, but this remains an area to keep a keen eye on. More here.

   

5. Tesla Robotaxi Day: Tesla’s Elon Musk showed off its ‘cybercab’ and drinks serving Optimus robots at its long-awaited ‘Robotaxi Day’. It ended up being a ‘Robotaxi Rides night and ‘party’, with a focus on marketing these planned products. Reactions were muted, given the history of the company’s execution vs projections to date. It remains notable of course given that full self driving (FSD) remains a key elusive AI Application. Company still plans to have these ‘cybercabs’ roll out by 2027 with price points of $30,000. There were no other substantive details presented. More here.

   

Other AI Readings for weekend:

1. AI gets Nobel Prizes in Physics and Chemistry. Broader context here and here.

   

2. Noteworthy piece on TSMC’s energy use in Taiwan up to 9%, and the country’s limited energy options with political closure of nuclear plants. TSM makes over 60% of the world’s semiconductor chips. More here on broader AI Power needs.

   

Up next, the Sunday ‘The Bigger Picture’ tomorrow. Stay tuned. 

(NOTE: The discussions here are for information purposes only, and not meant as investment advice at any time. Thanks for joining us here)