The Briefing by Martin Peers, Jessica E. Lessin and the team at The Information

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The Briefing

By Martin Peers, Jessica E. Lessin and the team at The Information

Get smarter about the day’s news in tech, media and finance by following Silicon Valley’s most-read executive newsletter.

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Recent Editions

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk and a GE Vernova gas turbine part. Photos via Getty Images.

AI Infrastructure

Exclusive: SpaceX Lays Groundwork For Turbine-Blade Factory to Solve Data Center Power Crunch

By Ann Davis Vaughan · Aug 29, 2026 11:21am PDT · 2 comments

Elon Musk intends to bypass the power supply chain for AI data centers in a way others assumed was impossible, by making highly complex components himself. It’s a move no one else has been bold enough to attempt. Elon Musk intends to bypass the power supply chain for AI data centers in a way others assumed...

Art: Clark Miller

The Hugging Face Hack’s Chilling Postmortem

By Abram Brown · Aug 29, 2026 8:00am PDT

• The Big Read: Notion makes an all-in bet on AI • How ‘tax alpha’ mania took over Silicon Valley • Plus, Recommendations—our weekly pop culture picks: “The Flood,” “Crossing the Wine-Dark Sea” and “American Doctor”A group of hippos is called a bloat. Multiple pandas form an embarrassment. (Yes, really.) And what about 1,200 rogue AIs... • The Big Read: Notion makes an all-in bet on AI • How ‘tax alpha’ mania took over Silicon...

Art: Clark Miller

Why ‘Tax Alpha’ Is Silicon Valley’s New Obsession

By Eli Rosenberg · Aug 29, 2026 7:39am PDT

Brent Sullivan, a Seattle-based author of an influential newsletter on taxes and personal finance for the wealthy, got an urgent call last month from a longtime SpaceX employee. The employee was sitting on a tidy nest egg from their newly public SpaceX stock and thinking about how to liquidate tens of millions of dollars in shares without... Brent Sullivan, a Seattle-based author of an influential newsletter on taxes and personal finance...

Art: Clark Miller (photo: Getty Images)

Notion Plans Hiring Binge as CEO Makes All-In Bet on AI

By Julia Hornstein · Aug 28, 2026 7:56am PDT · 2 comments

Art: Clark Miller (photo: Getty Images)

Notion Plans Hiring Binge as CEO Makes All-In Bet on AI

By Julia Hornstein · Aug 28, 2026 7:56am PDT · 2 comments

As AI has reordered Silicon Valley, it has ushered in an adapt-or-die reckoning for quite a few members of tech’s older generations. That’s true even for 13-year-old Notion, which shot to popularity in the 2010s with a slick note-taking app. In recent years, the company has found itself in an awkward middle ground. By some measures, it remains a... As AI has reordered Silicon Valley, it has ushered in an adapt-or-die reckoning for quite a few...

Art by Mike Sullivan

Trump Administration Working on AI Rule to Curb China’s Remote Access to Chips

By Leo Schwartz and Qianer Liu · Aug 28, 2026 6:00am PDT

Soon after President Donald Trump began his second term in office in 2025, the White House announced it would undo export controls the Biden administration had imposed on advanced AI chips to slow the technical progress of geopolitical rivals like China. In recent weeks, a small group within the Department of Commerce has been working on a... Soon after President Donald Trump began his second term in office in 2025, the White House...

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. Getty Images.

Wall Street Learns to Love Software, Again

By Martin Peers · Aug 27, 2026 5:00pm PDT

Forget the SaaSpocalypse! It's a SaaS renaissance (SaaSaissance, anyone?). Shares of Salesforce rocketed 23% on Thursday, leading a recovery for many of the most beaten-down software stocks, including ServiceNow, Figma and Asana, after Salesforce reported upbeat July-quarter earnings on Wednesday night. The rally signaled a striking change in... Forget the SaaSpocalypse! It's a SaaS renaissance (SaaSaissance, anyone?). Shares of Salesforce...

Art by Mike Sullivan

There’s a ‘Large Opportunity’ in China, Says VC firm Dimension

By Valida Pau · Aug 27, 2026 4:52pm PDT

China hasn’t held the same opportunities for U.S. venture capitalists it once did, given a crackdown by both countries on cross-border tech investments. But U.S. VCs are still hungry for insights into the country’s tech startups, whose fast growth holds clues to the future of U.S. AI companies. In one sign of their interest, a group of... China hasn’t held the same opportunities for U.S. venture capitalists it once did, given a...

Cognition CEO Scott Wu. Photo via Getty

Inside Cognition’s Booming Growth, High Cash Burn

By Amir Efrati and Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 27, 2026 2:48pm PDT

Cognition CEO Scott Wu. Photo via Getty

Inside Cognition’s Booming Growth, High Cash Burn

By Amir Efrati and Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 27, 2026 2:48pm PDT

Revenue is surging at Cognition and several other AI application providers, previously unreported data show, offering some reassurance to investors and hardware suppliers that startups can thrive despite competition from Anthropic and OpenAI. Cognition, which makes the Devin coding assistant, is generating around $900 million in annualized... Revenue is surging at Cognition and several other AI application providers, previously unreported...

Art by Mike Sullivan; Getty Images

Visa Says Its AI ‘Harness’ Makes Anthropic Cheaper to Use For Cyber Defense

By Laura Bratton · Aug 27, 2026 1:31pm PDT

Anthropic’s AI is pricey, but customers are finding they can use it more efficiently by adding software known as a harness to control the way AI models operate.Visa in April developed a harness that reduces the cost of and time it takes for Anthropic’s Mythos AI to find and fix cybersecurity vulnerabilities in its codebases significantly, the... Anthropic’s AI is pricey, but customers are finding they can use it more efficiently by adding...

Scene from an Anthropic event in May. Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg via Getty Images.

Anthropic Considers Letting Shareholders Sell In IPO, Departing from SpaceX Playbook

By Cory Weinberg and Valida Pau · Aug 27, 2026 11:12am PDT

Anthropic has been working on a plan to let existing shareholders sell some stock in its blockbuster initial public offering while also considering longer-than-usual lockup periods for sales after it’s public, people familiar with the process said. Allowing secondary stock sales in the IPO would distinguish Anthropic from this year’s other big... Anthropic has been working on a plan to let existing shareholders sell some stock in its...

U.S. President Donald Trump signs a document during a White House ceremony in March. Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images

Trump Administration Executive Order for New AI Regulator Stalls

By Leo Schwartz · Aug 27, 2026 9:11am PDT

The Trump administration has internally circulated a draft executive order in recent weeks, calling for the creation of a self-regulatory organization for AI companies that produce state-of-the-art models, according to two people who have viewed a draft. Drafting of the order represents a significant step toward creation of such a regulator,... The Trump administration has internally circulated a draft executive order in recent weeks,...

Art by Mike Sullivan.

The Buzz at This Year's Hot Chips Conference: AI Is Supercharging Chip Design

By Phoebe Liu · Aug 27, 2026 7:01am PDT

Art by Mike Sullivan.

The Buzz at This Year's Hot Chips Conference: AI Is Supercharging Chip Design

By Phoebe Liu · Aug 27, 2026 7:01am PDT

AI is speeding up chip design. That was a key theme in conversations I had this week with engineers, researchers and a handful of startups pitching AI-driven design help at the annual Hot Chips semiconductor conference in Palo Alto, Calif. OpenAI’s Jalapeño chip, which it claims is better than Nvidia’s Blackwell chips at AI inference, is... AI is speeding up chip design. That was a key theme in conversations I had this week with...

A Polymarket pop-up in Washington D.C. in March. Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images.

Polymarket Woos Sports Leagues For High-Speed Data Amid Regulatory Questions

By Michael Roddan · Aug 27, 2026 5:00am PDT

Polymarket has inked a fresh deal to get access to high-speed data and streaming video content for more than 20 sporting associations, a sign that leagues are warming to prediction markets even as their legal status in the U.S. remains contested. An expanded partnership with Nasdaq-listed data provider Sportradar will bring official feeds to a... Polymarket has inked a fresh deal to get access to high-speed data and streaming video content...

A 1X Neo humanoid robot. Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images

SoftBank in Talks to Buy Majority Stake in Humanoid Maker 1X at $6 Billion Valuation

By Rocket Drew, Valida Pau and Amir Efrati · Aug 26, 2026 6:36pm PDT

SoftBank is in talks to buy a majority stake in 1X Technologies, an OpenAI-backed humanoid robot developer, in a deal that would value the startup at about $6 billion, according to people with knowledge of the deal. The investment would buttress SoftBank’s robotics ambition. The investment would also give 1X more runway to put its soft-bodied... SoftBank is in talks to buy a majority stake in 1X Technologies, an OpenAI-backed humanoid robot...

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang via Getty

Nvidia Agrees to Buy Open Source AI Platform Hugging Face For $12.9 Billion

By Amir Efrati, Valida Pau and Phoebe Liu · Aug 26, 2026 6:26pm PDT

Nvidia has agreed to buy Hugging Face, a company known for its GitHub-like repository of open-source AI models, for $12.9 billion, according to a person with knowledge of the agreement. The move will put Nvidia in charge of a strategic asset in the race among open-source model developers to catch up to closed-source AI models from Anthropic and... Nvidia has agreed to buy Hugging Face, a company known for its GitHub-like repository of...

Getty Images.

Bill Gates’ AI Warning and Nvidia’s Boffo Quarter

By Martin Peers · Aug 26, 2026 5:01pm PDT · 1 comment

Getty Images.

Bill Gates’ AI Warning and Nvidia’s Boffo Quarter

By Martin Peers · Aug 26, 2026 5:01pm PDT · 1 comment

You couldn’t miss the disconnect in the AI discussion among major tech figures on Wednesday. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates warned in a lengthy essay about the dangers posed by the technology, noting that he would support a global slowdown in AI advances if someone had a “credible plan” for doing so. Then Nvidia, the dominant seller of AI... You couldn’t miss the disconnect in the AI discussion among major tech figures on Wednesday....

Left: Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Center: Demonstrators outside of Meta’s trial. Right: Head of Instagram Adam Mosseri and team leaving the courthouse. Photos: Getty Images. Art: Shane Burke.

Meta’s Settlement Ends One Big Battle But the Wider Legal War Looms

By Jyoti Mann and Aaron Holmes · Aug 26, 2026 3:40pm PDT

Meta Platforms has fought one of its biggest court battles to an expensive draw. But lawyers scrutinizing Wednesday’s $18 billion settlement agreement with states said it won’t likely help the social media giant in its wider legal war over claims that its products harm underage users. The landmark agreement, pending approval by a judge, would... Meta Platforms has fought one of its biggest court battles to an expensive draw. But lawyers...

In Coreshell Technologies' San Leandro, Calif. plant. Photo: Courtesy Coreshell.

Pushing Back on China, the Trump Administration Doubles Down on Silicon Anodes

By Steve LeVine · Aug 26, 2026 2:01pm PDT

For the second time in a month, the Trump administration has made an investment aimed at reducing the U.S.’s reliance on Chinese-made graphite, a key ingredient in batteries that Beijing has weaponized in a battle over China’s access to high-end chips. For the second time in a month, the Trump administration has made an investment aimed at reducing...

Art via Getty.

The Information Finance

Where Investors Are Going to Escape AI

By Meredith Mazzilli · Aug 26, 2026 12:40pm PDT

Investors have been hunting for anything but AI. That search has sent bursts of billions of dollars into typically ho-hum parts of the market like insurers and small-cap stocks, where they can have an outsize impact. One place that trade is showing up is in an index Goldman Sachs launched in February that strips “AI enablers” out of the... Investors have been hunting for anything but AI. That search has sent bursts of billions of...

Art by Mike Sullivan

How Companies Are Using Old-School Software to Grade AI Agents

By Rocket Drew · Aug 26, 2026 7:00am PDT

Art by Mike Sullivan

How Companies Are Using Old-School Software to Grade AI Agents

By Rocket Drew · Aug 26, 2026 7:00am PDT

Measuring the quality of an AI model’s work can be tricky, especially when it comes to AI agents that can take a broad range of actions to autonomously solve a task. As businesses turn to agents to automate longer and more important tasks, they are getting savvier about how to evaluate the performance of those agents.“Enterprises are getting... Measuring the quality of an AI model’s work can be tricky, especially when it comes to AI agents...