Most Recent Emails from The Information
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The Information US •The Briefing: The Cynic’s Guide to OpenAI’s MegaroundSam Altman should organize a celebration dinner for the men behind the largest venture capital funding round ever. I’d love to overhear SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son give advice to Thrive’s Joshua Kushner on how to avoid giving too much money to charismatic tech founders. Imagine seeing Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella fight over the dinner check to thank Altman for creating the product that boosted their own companies’ fortunes. Tiger Global Management’s Chase Coleman and Altimeter Capital’s Brad Gerstner could also swap war stories over the last, pre–artificial intelligence startup bubble.
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The Information US •The Briefing: Snapchat’s Safety StruggleSnap likes to cast its Snapchat app as “an antidote to social media.” Unlike its rival social media apps, Snapchat was “designed to be safe” for kids, the company claims. But designing something to be safe and actually making it safe aren’t the same things.
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The Information US •The Briefing: AI Startups: Always Be FundraisingIf you’re like me, you’re getting political fundraising text messages roughly every 15 minutes these days. But political candidates aren’t the only people raising money aggressively right now. There are also AI startup executives, most obviously the folks at OpenAI. Today we scooped the news that SoftBank is putting $500 million into OpenAI, which is expected to raise $6.5 billion at a $150 billion valuation.
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The Information US •Editor's Pick: OpenAI’s Leadership Crisis Exposes Deeper IssuesGoogle has been racing to catch up with OpenAI in AI, but its latest conversational AI model, Gemini, seems to be falling short for developers. Despite improvements, developers report that using Gemini is far more complicated and time-consuming than using OpenAI. Greetings, This week, Stephanie Palazzolo, Erin Woo, and Amir Efrati took a deep dive into the leadership turnover at OpenAI, one of the most influential AI companies today. Their piece, Behind OpenAI’s Staff Churn: Turf Wars, Burnout, Compensation Demands, reveals the internal struggles th...
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The Information US •Meta’s Anti-Apple RealityMark Zuckerberg has become a watch nerd. In his appearance at Connect on Wednesday, he was flashing a timepiece identified by Redditors as this one costing tens of thousands of dollars, at least the third such ultrapricey watch he has sported lately. It’s all part of a recent style makeover that also includes gold chains and loud shirts. It’s smart: The watches, in particular, set Zuckerberg apart from his counterparts at Apple, who invariably wear more utilitarian Apple Watches while in public.
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The Information US •This Week's Most Popular StoriesYou’re reading This Week's Most Popular Stories newsletter, a curation of our most popular stories from this week Don't Miss This Week's Popular Stories --> Take a look at the most-read articles from this week. Get unlimited access to our journalism, plus Org Charts, subscriber-only conversations, and more by subscribing today for 25% off. ...
Promo and Sales Emails from The Information
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The Information US •Editor’s pick: biggest winners from Wiz’s potential sale to GoogleNvidia CEO Jensen Huang is taking aggressive measures to avoid the downfall of other onetime hardware giants like Cisco and Sun Microsystems. Greetings, Our stories are tailored to the professional needs of our readers, and when I see a story that’s certain to have a broader impact, I take notice. Kate Clark, Natasha Mascarenhas, and Aaron Holmes look at the biggest winners if Google’s proposed $23 billion acquisition of ...
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The Information US •The Briefing: Cheddar ‘No Money Down’ Sale Suggests Way of FutureHere’s a private equity firm you may hear more about next year: Regent. It appears to have developed a specialty in acquiring distressed assets, as financiers call businesses that are struggling to survive, without paying anything for them upfront. Regent has struck a series of deals this year in which it has taken a weak business off the hands of a bigger company on deferred payment terms. Regent doesn’t have to write a check to get control, but the seller may get money over time—or not, depending on how the business performs.
The Information Email Archive
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The Information US •Behind OpenAI ExodusTalk about staying above the fray. Even as the latest rash of senior executive departures from OpenAI sparks a fresh round of questions about the company’s management, CEO Sam Altman was in Turin, Italy, appearing at an event to do what he does best: talk about the future.
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The Information US •Meta's AI News Overshadowed By OpenAI TurmoilSam Altman may have Elon Musk beat for the ability to pull off impressive technological achievements despite near-constant corporate drama. Wednesday’s news that OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati is leaving comes after numerous other high-profile exits in recent months (or in the case of President Greg Brockman, a leave of absence.) You have to wonder—what is going on with this company?
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The Information US •The Briefing: Private Equity's Proof of LifePrivate equity dealmakers are getting busy. The latest evidence of that was today’s news that Blackstone and Vista Equity Partners will buy Smartsheet, which sells software that helps workers plan projects, for $8.4 billion. As falling interest rates are likely at least part of the reason for the deal revival, we can expect even more acquisitions in the coming months. Score one for those deal-starved bankers out there.
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The Information US •Qualcomm-Intel Would Pose Quandary for BidenMerger activity is alive! Well, maybe. Friday’s news that Qualcomm had made a friendly takeover overture to Intel has given a shot of adrenaline to deal junkies everywhere. This would be a big deal. Despite Intel’s travails—its revenue this year is expected to be less than in 2013, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence—the company still had a market capitalization on Friday of around $93 billion.