🏛️ OpenAI hires George Osborne to push “OpenAI for Countries”
OpenAI tapped former UK finance minister George Osborne to lead its “OpenAI for Countries” effort - basically taking the company’s government-facing playbook global.
It’s positioned as an overseas extension of the massive “Stargate” data center push, with plenty of talk about “democratic values” alongside local infrastructure and education. Big ambition, big politics… in the same sentence, with a little extra heat.
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🖼️ OpenAI rolls out a fresh image generation upgrade inside ChatGPT
OpenAI shipped a new image-gen update pitched as faster and better at following instructions - and it’s getting a more “creative studio” style entry point right in the sidebar.
They’re also leaning harder into visual answers with clearer sourcing for certain queries, which sounds obvious in the best way… and yet, still oddly rare in practice.
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💰 Databricks lands a $4B+ funding round at a $134B valuation
Databricks raised more than $4 billion in a round valuing it at $134 billion - another “AI infra wins again” moment, honestly.
The company says the cash lets it keep investing (and not get outpaced), with plans that include expansion, hiring, and more AI research focus - because of course it does. It’s a race where everyone’s sprinting in steel-toe boots.
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🧰 SEMI: chipmaking equipment sales set to climb on AI demand
SEMI forecasts wafer-fab equipment sales rising sharply, driven by expanded capacity for AI-heavy logic and memory chips - the pickaxes-and-shovels story just keeps feeding itself.
China, Taiwan, and South Korea are expected to remain the top markets, and the usual equipment giants are right in the middle of it.
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🎓 UK universities back the government’s AI for Science Strategy
A group of UK university reps published a joint statement supporting the ambition and actions in the government’s AI for Science Strategy.
It’s short, pretty straight-laced, and very “we’re aligned on objectives” - but the subtext is clear: universities want a real say in how AI gets wired into national research priorities.
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🎮 Larian’s CEO: we’re not cutting humans to “replace them with AI”
Larian’s Swen Vincke pushed back on the idea the studio is swapping people out for genAI, saying they’re not “trimming down” to replace staff - and that they’re not shipping games with AI-generated content.
He framed AI as early-ideation support (references, placeholders, rough composition exploration) while insisting artists and writers still do the real work. A little defensive? Sure. Also… fair, given how fast this topic turns into a bonfire.
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🧾 “AI promised a revolution” - businesses are still waiting for payoff
A familiar complaint is getting louder: lots of companies are spending on genAI, but many still aren’t seeing meaningful returns (yet), and models can weirdly faceplant on simple tasks while dazzling on hard ones.
One example was a wine-app “AI sommelier” that needed serious tuning just to stop being overly polite - which is funny, until you remember that’s a product timeline getting eaten alive.
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