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

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The Briefing

By Martin Peers, Jessica 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

China's ADA Space plans to launch 2,800 of these satellites into space to make up a data center constellation. Photo: An Yuan/China News Service/Getty

The Electric: This Chinese Startup Has Already Put a Data Center In Space

By Steve LeVine · Feb 5, 2026 4:30am PST · 1 comment

With his $1.2 trillion merger of SpaceX with money-losing AI developer xAI, Elon Musk suggests he is in the vanguard of the next big thing—the establishment of AI data centers in space. Sorry, Elon, a Chinese startup got there first. With his $1.2 trillion merger of SpaceX with money-losing AI developer xAI, Elon Musk suggests he...

Art by Mike Sullivan

OpenAI Is Hiring Hundreds of AI Consultants to Boost Enterprise Sales

By Sri Muppidi · Feb 4, 2026 6:17pm PST · 2 comments

OpenAI is hiring hundreds of new staffers to expand a technical consulting team that helps large corporations develop custom AI applications and agents to automate employee tasks, according to a person with knowledge of the company’s plans. The hiring effort could help it beat back competition from archrival Anthropic, which has also upped its... OpenAI is hiring hundreds of new staffers to expand a technical consulting team that helps large...

Google CEO Sundar Pichai. Jim Lo Scalzo/Getty Images

Google Cloud Finally Takes Off

By Martin Peers · Feb 4, 2026 5:00pm PST · 1 comment

Sundar Pichai, take a bow. Google parent Alphabet delivered some red-hot fourth-quarter numbers on Wednesday, a sign that—like its fellow digital ad giant, Meta Platforms—it is enjoying the fruits of its big investment in AI. Alphabet reported both an acceleration in Google’s search revenue growth to nearly 17%, from 15% in the third quarter,... Sundar Pichai, take a bow. Google parent Alphabet delivered some red-hot fourth-quarter numbers...

Alexandr Wang, left, and Mark Zuckerberg. Photos by AP

Meta Memo: New Avocado Model ‘Most Capable’ to Date

By Jyoti Mann · Feb 4, 2026 12:21pm PST · 2 comments

Alexandr Wang, left, and Mark Zuckerberg. Photos by AP

Meta Memo: New Avocado Model ‘Most Capable’ to Date

By Jyoti Mann · Feb 4, 2026 12:21pm PST · 2 comments

Meta Platforms is sounding an increasingly bullish note about the first major AI model expected to emerge from its new AI group. The company recently told some staffers in the group, known as Meta Superintelligence Labs, that its next generation large language model, codenamed Avocado, is “now Meta’s most capable pre-trained base model to date,”... Meta Platforms is sounding an increasingly bullish note about the first major AI model expected...

Art by Mike Sullivan

The Information Finance

Why Big Tech Companies Are Racing to Fund OpenAI

By Ken Brown · Feb 4, 2026 8:01am PST · 3 comments

Nvidia could invest around $30 billion, Amazon is down for at least $20 billion and Microsoft is looking at $10 billion as part of a $100 billion fundraising for OpenAI. SoftBank will bring the AI company closer to its goal with an investment worth around $30 billion. My colleague Sri Muppidi reported all of this last week. OpenAI has built... Nvidia could invest around $30 billion, Amazon is down for at least $20 billion and Microsoft is...

Art via Mike Sullivan/Getty Images

China’s Response To Google’s Genie; Why This OpenAI Researcher Left to Start a Competitor

By Juro Osawa · Feb 4, 2026 7:00am PST

Google last week generated buzz with a new AI tool called Project Genie, which enables users to create and play in virtual worlds like ultra-realistic videogames. An upstart Chinese competitor that recently announced a similar product is trying to keep up with Google and capture some of that buzz.PixVerse, which a few weeks ago unveiled its “... Google last week generated buzz with a new AI tool called Project Genie, which enables users to...

Art by Mike Sullivan.

Amazon Discusses Getting Special Access to OpenAI Tech

By Anissa Gardizy, Catherine Perloff and Amir Efrati · Feb 4, 2026 6:00am PST

As Amazon weighs an equity investment of tens of billions of dollars in OpenAI, the companies are also discussing a commercial agreement that could require OpenAI to dedicate its own researchers and engineers to developing customized models for powering Amazon’s own AI products, according to a person involved in the talks and another person who... As Amazon weighs an equity investment of tens of billions of dollars in OpenAI, the companies are...

Demonstrators hold protest signs in Atlanta in October, 2025. Photo by Julia Beverly/Getty Images (edited)

Venture Capital’s Showing in the Epstein Files

By Laura Mandaro · Feb 3, 2026 6:16pm PST

Demonstrators hold protest signs in Atlanta in October, 2025. Photo by Julia Beverly/Getty Images (edited)

Venture Capital’s Showing in the Epstein Files

By Laura Mandaro · Feb 3, 2026 6:16pm PST

On Monday, our reporter Jemima McEvoy broke the news that venture capitalist Masha Bucher had deep ties with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Their correspondence, released in a dump of more than 3 million pages from the Justice Department Friday, showed Bucher—née Drokova, the name she was using at the time—working as a publicist for... On Monday, our reporter Jemima McEvoy broke the news that venture capitalist Masha Bucher had...

Bob Iger and Josh D'Amaro. Getty Images. Disney/Getty Images.

Disney’s CEO Choice Reflects Entertainment’s Decline

By Martin Peers · Feb 3, 2026 5:00pm PST

It’s CEO replacement time. Both Walt Disney Co. and PayPal named new chief executives on Tuesday, with each appointment symbolizing major business shifts. Disney named parks chief Josh D’Amaro to succeed longtime CEO Bob Iger, who turns 75 next week (D’Amaro is Iger’s second successor, after the first one flopped so badly Iger had to return to... It’s CEO replacement time. Both Walt Disney Co. and PayPal named new chief executives on Tuesday,...

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Photo by Getty Images

Meta Officially Ties Employee Performance to AI Usage; Microsoft On OpenClaw Security Risks

By Jyoti Mann and Aaron Holmes · Feb 3, 2026 10:31am PST · 3 comments

Businesses such as Microsoft are increasingly nudging their employees to utilize AI to get more done. Others are forcing the issue.One of the biggest firms to take the more aggressive path is Meta Platforms, which at the end of December had 78,865 employees. Businesses such as Microsoft are increasingly nudging their employees to utilize AI to get more...

Carina Hong, founder and CEO of Axiom. Screenshot via YouTube

A Major Anthropic Backer Quintuples an AI Math Startup’s Valuation in New Deal

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Valida Pau · Feb 3, 2026 7:00am PST

Investors usually fund startups based on metrics involving revenue, profits or product usage. But investors backing newer AI research startups that are taking on Anthropic and OpenAI have to rely on other measures of success, such as incremental research breakthroughs or recent talent hirings. One example is AI math startup Axiom, which is... Investors usually fund startups based on metrics involving revenue, profits or product usage. But...

Stripe co-founder John Collison. Photo by Jeenah Moon/Getty Images.

Stripe’s Stablecoin Startup Tangles With Sanctions and Scammers

By Michael Roddan and Yueqi Yang · Feb 3, 2026 6:00am PST · 1 comment

Stripe co-founder John Collison. Photo by Jeenah Moon/Getty Images.

Stripe’s Stablecoin Startup Tangles With Sanctions and Scammers

By Michael Roddan and Yueqi Yang · Feb 3, 2026 6:00am PST · 1 comment

When Stripe acquired crypto startup Bridge last year, it described stablecoins as financial services “superconductors.” Thanks to Bridge, Stripe has since integrated stablecoins into an array of products, such as stablecoin cards that allow customers to spend crypto anywhere. Using stablecoins for payments turns out to be harder than it looks.... When Stripe acquired crypto startup Bridge last year, it described stablecoins as financial...

Photo of Elon Musk by Getty Images; art by Mike Sullivan

Inside Musk’s SpaceX-xAI Megamerger

By Cory Weinberg, Theo Wayt, Miles Kruppa, Amir Efrati and Katie Roof · Feb 2, 2026 6:13pm PST · 3 comments

Elon Musk rammed through the combination of his space company, SpaceX, with his AI startup, xAI, on Monday, merging the shiniest jewel in his business empire with his most money-losing firm. The deal—which valued xAI at $250 billion and SpaceX at $1 trillion, according to people familiar with the situation—comes as xAI battles to... Elon Musk rammed through the combination of his space company, SpaceX, with his AI startup, xAI,...

Elon Musk. Getty Images.

What’s Really Driving Musk’s SpaceX-xAI Merger

By Martin Peers · Feb 2, 2026 5:00pm PST · 5 comments

Talk about pie in the sky. On Monday, Elon Musk announced that his SpaceX had acquired his cash-eating xAI, at a price we reported to be $250 billion. SpaceX was already planning to go public, but now xAI will be able to get some of the cash the newly enlarged company will raise. Of course, that’s not how Musk explained the combination. Instead,... Talk about pie in the sky. On Monday, Elon Musk announced that his SpaceX had acquired his...

Art by Clark Miller (photos: YouTube, Getty Images)

Epstein Files Reveal Deep Relationship With Venture Capitalist Masha Bucher

By Jemima McEvoy · Feb 2, 2026 1:10pm PST · 10 comments

There are plenty of tech luminaries whose correspondence with Jeffrey Epstein has turned up in the files of the disgraced financier. But few of those exchanges are quite like those that Epstein had with Masha Bucher, who is now a well-known venture capitalist. On June 25, 2019, 11 days before Epstein was arrested and charged with sex trafficking... There are plenty of tech luminaries whose correspondence with Jeffrey Epstein has turned up in...

Art by Getty Images

Betting That AI Can Ease AI Infrastructure Pains

By Ann Davis Vaughan · Feb 2, 2026 8:00am PST · 2 comments

Art by Getty Images

AI Infrastructure

Betting That AI Can Ease AI Infrastructure Pains

By Ann Davis Vaughan · Feb 2, 2026 8:00am PST · 2 comments

Right now, money and attention is focused on building infrastructure for AI. What’s coming next, though, is AI for infrastructure: using the very same technology to make the power and industrial systems we’re building cheaper, better and faster.Since its founding in 2016, venture investor Blue Bear Capital has allocated about $350 million across... Right now, money and attention is focused on building infrastructure for AI. What’s coming next,...

Art by Getty Images

Why OpenClaw FKA Clawdbot Matters

By Rocket Drew · Feb 2, 2026 7:30am PST

If you’ve been online in the past few days, you’ve likely been bombarded with words like “Moltbook,” “OpenClaw” and “Clawdbot.” We’re here to break down what it means and how it’s giving us a peek into how AI might evolve.OpenClaw is an open-source AI agent released late last year that can write code, edit files and surf the web to complete... If you’ve been online in the past few days, you’ve likely been bombarded with words like “...

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. Jason Redmond/Getty Images.

Microsoft Is Striking the Right Balance Between Software and Cloud

By Anita Ramaswamy · Feb 2, 2026 6:00am PST · 2 comments

Microsoft is in Wall Street’s doghouse. The company’s shares have lagged the S&P 500 index for the past few months, and the big stock sell-off that followed last Wednesday’s earnings report has left them trading at their lowest value, as a multiple of operating profits, since 2022. Investors were responding to a slight slowdown in growth at... Microsoft is in Wall Street’s doghouse. The company’s shares have lagged the S&P 500 index...

A home battery in Houston, which has been hit hard by power outages in recent years. Photo: Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle/Getty

The Electric: Amid the Flurries, Home Battery Installers Are Going After Grid and Data Center Demand

By Steve LeVine · Feb 2, 2026 4:30am PST

Heavy snow and Arctic temperatures last week strained the natural gas-powered electric grid across the Northeastern U.S. states and inland as far as Virginia, leaving utilities to ask customers to curtail their use of power and causing thousands of homes to go dark. Heavy snow and Arctic temperatures last week strained the natural gas-powered electric grid...

Palantir CEO Alex Karp. Fabrice Coffrini/Getty Images

What to Expect From Palantir, Google and Amazon Earnings This Week

By Martin Peers · Feb 1, 2026 3:00pm PST · 2 comments

Palantir CEO Alex Karp. Fabrice Coffrini/Getty Images

What to Expect From Palantir, Google and Amazon Earnings This Week

By Martin Peers · Feb 1, 2026 3:00pm PST · 2 comments

If you like poring over earnings reports (and who doesn’t!), then you’ll be in your happy place this coming week. We’ve got so many tech earnings announcements that we can barely keep track. I’m not kidding—couldn’t these tech executives space things out a little bit? The biggest reports will be on Wednesday, when Google parent Alphabet reports... If you like poring over earnings reports (and who doesn’t!), then you’ll be in your happy place...