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

Photo via Getty

How Trump Volatility Is Freezing Business Decisions

By Martin Peers · Mar 4, 2025 5:00pm PST

There’s an old joke that if you’re unhappy about the weather in San Francisco, you only have to wait a few minutes until it changes. That line is beginning to seem applicable to the Trump administration’s tariff plans. Late Tuesday afternoon—after the stock market closed on the second successive sell-off sparked by President Donald Trump’s... There’s an old joke that if you’re unhappy about the weather in San Francisco, you only have to...

CoreWeave CEO Michael Intrator, left, and Weights & Biases CEO Lukas Biewald. Photos by Getty

CoreWeave in Talks to Buy AI Startup Weights & Biases For Around $1.7 Billion

By Stephanie Palazzolo, Anissa Gardizy and Natasha Mascarenhas · Mar 4, 2025 3:53pm PST · 3 comments

CoreWeave, which provides cloud servers to large companies developing artificial intelligence, is in talks to acquire Weights & Biases, a startup that helps developers build AI applications, for around $1.7 billion, according to two people who spoke to executives at Weights & Biases. The deal could help CoreWeave diversify its base of customers... CoreWeave, which provides cloud servers to large companies developing artificial intelligence, is...

Plaid co-founder Zach Perret. Photo via Getty

Plaid’s Valuation Haircut, CoreWeave’s Good Timing

By Cory Weinberg · Mar 4, 2025 3:32pm PST

Two very different startups, Plaid and CoreWeave, have been preening themselves in recent weeks to raise money. Their diverging fortunes show how timing, luck and fast-changing tech trends can create and destroy value quickly. Plaid is a victim of circumstance. The fintech startup is working on a secondary share sale, led by mutual fund... Two very different startups, Plaid and CoreWeave, have been preening themselves in recent weeks...

Passes founder Lucy Guo. Photo via Flickr/Fortune.

Passes Goes on the Defensive

By Kaya Yurieff · Mar 4, 2025 3:18pm PST

Passes founder Lucy Guo. Photo via Flickr/Fortune.

Creator Economy

Passes Goes on the Defensive

By Kaya Yurieff · Mar 4, 2025 3:18pm PST

A lawsuit alleging creator membership site Passes hosted child porn is causing quite the stir among creators, founders and talent managers. The complaint, filed by OnlyFans creator Alice Rosenblum in the Southern District of Florida last week, claims that Passes recruited Rosenblum to create pornography before she turned 18 and distributed... A lawsuit alleging creator membership site Passes hosted child porn is causing quite the stir...

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. Photo by Getty.

DeepSeek Spurs Black Market Demand for Nvidia Gaming Chips in China

By Qianer Liu · Mar 4, 2025 10:24am PST

When DeepSeek’s success in developing competitive artificial intelligence models at a low cost prompted a $750 billion sell-off in Nvidia shares in late January, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang wasn’t worried. He told some employees a few days later that DeepSeek had just become Nvidia’s most important customer in China, since any progress in AI will... When DeepSeek’s success in developing competitive artificial intelligence models at a low cost...

Art by Mike Sullivan

Meta Plans New Push for Business Chatbots

By Kalley Huang · Mar 4, 2025 10:00am PST

Meta Platforms is preparing a new push to woo businesses to set up and run artificial intelligence chatbots on Messenger and WhatsApp, according to a current employee.As a newcomer in a crowded market, Meta has pitched its business chatbots as tools to provide customer support, plus information and recommendations that will lead to sales, the... Meta Platforms is preparing a new push to woo businesses to set up and run artificial...

Figure's Helix AI demonstration

Humanoid Robotics Firm ‘Figure’ Attracts $39 Billion Valuation—and Questions

By Rocket Drew · Mar 4, 2025 7:00am PST

Figure AI is the talk of the robotics town these days.The three-year-old startup, which designs humanoid robots for work in factories and homes, is planning to raise $1 billion to $2 billion in equity financing at a $38.5 billion pre-money valuation. That’s a staggering 15 times its valuation from a year ago. However, the venture funds... Figure AI is the talk of the robotics town these days.The three-year-old startup, which designs...

Art by Clark Miller.

Microsoft, Amazon, and Google Race to Use AI to Drive Sales Gains

By Aaron Holmes · Mar 4, 2025 6:00am PST · 1 comment

Art by Clark Miller.

Microsoft, Amazon, and Google Race to Use AI to Drive Sales Gains

By Aaron Holmes · Mar 4, 2025 6:00am PST · 1 comment

The role of salespeople is already changing in the era of artificial intelligence—and big tech companies are notching benefits from using these tools, which could be a leading indicator of how the broader industry is set to transform. At Microsoft, for instance, executives have been touting evidence that custom-built AI tools automating... The role of salespeople is already changing in the era of artificial intelligence—and big...

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange today. Photo via Getty

Trump’s Stock Sell-Off; Coreweave's IPO Filing

By Martin Peers · Mar 3, 2025 5:00pm PST

This year is really turning into a dud for tech stocks. Monday’s big market sell-off slammed the tech sector across the board, particularly chip companies like Nvidia and Broadcom that have wide exposure to China. That made it a somewhat inauspicious day for CoreWeave, a young cloud company operating data centers for artificial intelligence... This year is really turning into a dud for tech stocks. Monday’s big market sell-off slammed the...

CoreWeave CEO Michael Intrator. Photo via Getty.

CoreWeave Founders Cashed Out Nearly $500 Million Before IPO

By Cory Weinberg · Mar 3, 2025 4:00pm PST · 3 comments

The three founders of CoreWeave will spend the next few weeks trying to sell investors on the cloud provider’s future. What might make that job harder: They’ve already cashed out nearly a half-billion dollars from their stakes, between them. The founders—former commodities traders Mike Intrator, Brian Venturo and Brannin McBee—have... The three founders of CoreWeave will spend the next few weeks trying to sell investors on the...

Poolside co-founder Jason Warner. Photo via Getty.

OpenAI’s GPT-4.5 Underwhelms; Is Poolside Worth $5 Billion?

By Stephanie Palazzolo, Aaron Holmes and Sri Muppidi · Mar 3, 2025 7:00am PST · 1 comment

I enjoyed meeting many of you at AI Agenda Live in San Francisco last week! Thank you for coming. Next up is our April 28 event in New York on how the AI boom is being financed. Right on cue, my colleagues just published articles about the tens of billions of dollars that SoftBank and CoreWeave are hoping to borrow to develop artificial... I enjoyed meeting many of you at AI Agenda Live in San Francisco last week! Thank you for coming....

Art by Mike Sullivan

YouTube Tries Again to Compete With Amazon to Become All-Video Hub

By Sahil Patel · Mar 3, 2025 6:00am PST

Art by Mike Sullivan

YouTube Tries Again to Compete With Amazon to Become All-Video Hub

By Sahil Patel · Mar 3, 2025 6:00am PST

It should have been easy. YouTube in late 2022 began including in its app video-streaming services operated by other media companies, such as Paramount Global’s Paramount+ and Warner Bros. Discovery’s Max. People could sign up for the services directly from the YouTube app—YouTube would get a cut—and watch without toggling around on... It should have been easy. YouTube in late 2022 began including in its app video-streaming...

Ionic Minerals will use halloysite mined in these hills in Utah to make silicon anodes. Photo: Courtesy Ionic.

The Electric: Four New EV Battery Startups That Are Ignoring the Gloom Around Them

By Steve LeVine · Mar 3, 2025 4:30am PST

A bloodbath is happening in the electric vehicle battery industry: Most of the next-generation Western startups that gained favor in 2020 and 2021 are struggling to survive, and some have either filed for bankruptcy or shut down. But a new wave of battery startups, unfazed by the rubble around them, has raised millions of dollars from venture... A bloodbath is happening in the electric vehicle battery industry: Most of the next-generation...

Art by Clark Miller; Intrator image via Getty.

CoreWeave Had Soaring Revenues and Capex Ahead of Planned IPO

By Cory Weinberg · Mar 2, 2025 3:30pm PST

CoreWeave, the Nvidia-backed startup cloud provider that is preparing one of the most anticipated initial public offerings of the year, grew revenue exponentially while pouring cash into capital expenditures last year, two people familiar with the matter said. The company is expected to publish its IPO prospectus this week and go public this... CoreWeave, the Nvidia-backed startup cloud provider that is preparing one of the most anticipated...

Masayoshi Son. Photo by Getty; art by Mike Sullivan

SoftBank’s Son Goes on a New Borrowing Binge to Fund AI

By Juro Osawa and Cory Weinberg · Mar 1, 2025 8:00am PST · 2 comments

The biggest risk-taker in tech investing is back to his old playbook, loading up on debt to fund his latest obsession: artificial intelligence. SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son is planning to borrow $16 billion to invest in AI, his company’s executives told banks last week, according to a person with direct knowledge of the discussions. The... The biggest risk-taker in tech investing is back to his old playbook, loading up on debt to fund...

Art by Clark Miller

Anthropic's Secret Trick for Measuring Claude

By Abram Brown · Mar 1, 2025 7:00am PST

Art by Clark Miller

Anthropic's Secret Trick for Measuring Claude

By Abram Brown · Mar 1, 2025 7:00am PST

Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:• The Big Read: Why Runway thinks it can outrun OpenAI and Google• Artificial Intelligence: AI.com is up for sale. Asking price? $100 million• The Top 5: The very best sleep and health tech for kids • Plus, our Recommendations: A father confesses his darkest secrets; how a financial scheme fueled a... Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:• The Big Read: Why Runway thinks it can outrun OpenAI...

Art by Clark Miller

The Very Best Sleep and Health Tech for Kids

By Paris Martineau · Mar 1, 2025 6:00am PST · 1 comment

The last decade brought the beginning of the biohacking era, prompting American adults to fill their homes with trackers and smart devices to better study and fine tune their health. It was perhaps inevitable that the same interest would lead to a mound of similar technology aimed at a different target market: kids. In a recently published... The last decade brought the beginning of the biohacking era, prompting American adults to fill...

Art by Clark Miller

Artificial Intelligence

AI.com Is for Sale. Asking Price? $100 Million

By Akash Pasricha · Mar 1, 2025 6:00am PST · 7 comments

Deep in Queens, New York, out near John F. Kennedy Airport, Larry Fischer was distraught. One of his favorite Italian joints—Don Peppe, the place where he lunched with Facebook’s lawyers after selling them Messenger.com in 2014—had closed for vacation this past week. It had seemed like a fitting place for our conversation about... Deep in Queens, New York, out near John F. Kennedy Airport, Larry Fischer was distraught. One of...

Sergey Brin. Photo via Getty

Why Sergey Brin Should Push Harder to Shake Up Google

By Martin Peers · Feb 28, 2025 3:00pm PST

When I last checked, Google co-founder Sergey Brin was still one of the two people who between them control the massive tech company. As of last year, at least, Brin had a 25% voting stake, while his co-founder, Larry Page, had a tad more. So why on earth is Brin suggesting people on Google’s Gemini team come into the office every day and in... When I last checked, Google co-founder Sergey Brin was still one of the two people who between...

Meta’s Data Center Bet, Instagram Reels & The Future of Content

By Jessica E. Lessin · Feb 28, 2025 1:06pm PST

Meta’s Data Center Bet, Instagram Reels & The Future of Content

By Jessica E. Lessin · Feb 28, 2025 1:06pm PST

This week on More or Less: On the ground at the Upfront Summit, Instagram’s new idea, and what’s coming for consumer. Apple Spotify This week on More or Less: On the ground at the Upfront Summit, Instagram’s new idea, and...