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

Five times/week

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.

By providing your email, you agree to The Information’s Privacy Policy

Recent Editions

Comcast's Brian Roberts and Disney's Bob Iger. Photos by Getty

Comcast’s Roberts Has Upper Hand Over Iger as Hulu Battle Looms

By Sahil Patel · Apr 6, 2023 8:33am PDT · 4 comments

The last time Disney CEO Bob Iger and Comcast CEO Brian Roberts tangled, in a battle for control of 21st Century Fox’s entertainment business, Roberts came off second best. But as they prepare for their next contest, over ownership of streaming service Hulu, it’s the Comcast CEO who appears to have all the leverage. Next January,... The last time Disney CEO Bob Iger and Comcast CEO Brian Roberts tangled, in a battle for control...

OpenAI President Greg Brockman. Photo via OpenAI

The OpenAI Coder Who Spun Tech On its Head

By Jon Victor · Apr 6, 2023 6:00am PDT · 6 comments

Greg Brockman needed a win. In 2017, Brockman—then chief technology officer of OpenAI, a 50-person nonprofit at the time—was worried about getting left in the dust by bigger rivals like DeepMind, an AI lab owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet. He also was concerned that OpenAI might fall into the trap that had ensnared... Greg Brockman needed a win. In 2017, Brockman—then chief technology officer of OpenAI, a...

In September 2020, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, right, and his deputy, Drew Baglino, laid out a case for making battery electrodes in a completely dry process. Photo: Courtesy Tesla

The Electric: Tesla Recruits a Manufacturing Expert In a New Push for Cheap EVs

By Steve LeVine · Apr 6, 2023 3:30am PDT

In a fresh attempt to produce $25,000 electric vehicles, Tesla has hired manufacturing specialist Matt Tyler to jump-start its stalled efforts to cut the cost of making batteries. As Tesla’s “director of dry electrode development,” Tyler is taking on a key challenge of the EV battery industry, one that some experts jokingly compare to making a... In a fresh attempt to produce $25,000 electric vehicles, Tesla has hired manufacturing specialist...

Photo by Shutterstock

Arming the Enemy? Why U.S. VCs Investing in China AI Is Complicated

By Jessica E. Lessin · Apr 5, 2023 5:00pm PDT

Photo by Shutterstock

Arming the Enemy? Why U.S. VCs Investing in China AI Is Complicated

By Jessica E. Lessin · Apr 5, 2023 5:00pm PDT

It’s become a major refrain among several U.S. tech leaders that the U.S. can’t let China win in artificial intelligence. And so it is pretty interesting that leading venture firms funded by U.S. endowments and other institutional investors are putting money into the most promising young AI startups in China. In an important piece in The... It’s become a major refrain among several U.S. tech leaders that the U.S. can’t let China win in...

Priyanka Naik, a self-taught vegan chef. Photo: Courtesy of Priyanka Naik.

Creator Economy

The Ex-Twitter Employee Going Viral With Vegan Food

By Isabelle Sarraf · Apr 5, 2023 3:11pm PDT

Until November, Priyanka Naik’s career as a food blogger took place around the sidelines of her main job at Twitter, where she most recently led the social network’s North American and Latin American partnerships with large companies developing products with its API, or backend to its tweet data. But after she lost that position in layoffs that... Until November, Priyanka Naik’s career as a food blogger took place around the sidelines of her...

Paxos CEO Charles Cascarilla. Photo by Bloomberg

Winners and Losers of the Stablecoin Shakeout

By Aidan Ryan · Apr 5, 2023 9:08am PDT

Stablecoins have been in the spotlight recently, thanks to regulatory crackdowns and chaos in the traditional financial sector, and investors have been pulling money out of some stablecoins at a staggering pace. To recap what’s been going on: The New York State Department of Financial Services in February ordered Paxos to stop issuing the ... Stablecoins have been in the spotlight recently, thanks to regulatory crackdowns and chaos in the...

Tiger founder Chase Coleman. Photo by Bloomberg.

Tiger Global Tried to Sell VC Fund Stakes in Latest Sign of Strategy Shift

By Kate Clark · Apr 5, 2023 6:31am PDT · 2 comments

Tiger Global Management, the most prolific investor in private tech companies during the recent boom, also invested in dozens of venture capital firms as it sought to forge closer ties to the young startups those funds backed. But in recent months, the New York–based investment firm has been looking to dump some of those VC fund stakes. ... Tiger Global Management, the most prolific investor in private tech companies during the recent...

Art by Shane Burke/Shutterstock

Sequoia and Other U.S.-Backed VCs Are Funding China’s Answer to OpenAI

By Juro Osawa · Apr 5, 2023 6:00am PDT · 13 comments

Art by Shane Burke/Shutterstock

Sequoia and Other U.S.-Backed VCs Are Funding China’s Answer to OpenAI

By Juro Osawa · Apr 5, 2023 6:00am PDT · 13 comments

A boom in artificial intelligence startup funding sparked by OpenAI has spilled over to China, the world’s second-biggest venture capital market. Now American institutional investors are indirectly financing a rash of Chinese AI startups aspiring to be China’s answer to OpenAI. The American investors, including U.S. endowments, back... A boom in artificial intelligence startup funding sparked by OpenAI has spilled over to China,...

An Amazon warehouse in Rialto, Calif. Photo by Bloomberg.

Amazon’s Website Snafu Undercuts Its Image as a Well-Oiled Machine

By Martin Peers · Apr 4, 2023 5:00pm PDT

Who says there are no laughs in tech business news? Our scoop today that Amazon, the premier online retail website, was marking products made by big companies and foreign sellers with a label meant to denote small U.S. businesses has a comedic side (make sure you check out the anecdote about Chomps jerky). But there’s a serious angle here. Over... Who says there are no laughs in tech business news? Our scoop today that Amazon, the premier...

Photo: Mike Sullivan via Shutterstock

Creator Economy

Burning Questions About Instagram, LinkedIn and Creator Marketplaces

By Kaya Yurieff · Apr 4, 2023 2:38pm PDT

A few weeks ago, I asked readers to submit their questions about the creator economy. Let’s dive into a few of them today, and please keep the questions coming!1. Is Instagram dead? What should they do to stay relevant? —Anonymous subscriberAny eulogies for Instagram are premature. While the app has had plenty of stumbles in its fight against ... A few weeks ago, I asked readers to submit their questions about the creator economy. Let’s dive...

Kevin Mayer. Photo by Bloomberg.

Former Disney Exec Kevin Mayer Looks to Double VC Fund Size to $1 Billion

By Kate Clark and Sahil Patel · Apr 4, 2023 1:17pm PDT · 3 comments

Smash Capital, an investment firm co-founded by Disney veterans including Kevin Mayer, is seeking to raise as much as $500 million in fresh capital, according to two people familiar with the matter. The new fundraising would supplement half a billion dollars the fund previously raised. The fund, which is separate from Mayer’s ... Smash Capital, an investment firm co-founded by Disney veterans including Kevin Mayer, is seeking...

Art by Clark Miller.

Got a Growing Company? Watch Out for Business Drift.

By Holden Spaht · Apr 4, 2023 9:00am PDT · 2 comments

Art by Clark Miller.

Got a Growing Company? Watch Out for Business Drift.

By Holden Spaht · Apr 4, 2023 9:00am PDT · 2 comments

After slouching toward a sluggish end of 2022, technology mergers and acquisitions look to be showing new signs of life. That activity coincides with a continued rise in shareholder activism as value-oriented investors take advantage of the paradigm shift in valuations to demand higher profits and cash flow margins. Amid tightened market... After slouching toward a sluggish end of 2022, technology mergers and acquisitions look to be...

Art by Clark Miller.

Amazon Hands Out ‘Small Business’ Label to Huge Sellers

By Theo Wayt · Apr 4, 2023 6:00am PDT · 2 comments

What do a bottle of shampoo made by Johnson & Johnson, a lamp from a Chinese seller and an Arc’Teryx jacket all have in common? Amazon has labeled them all as coming from American small businesses. Amazon began adding a “Small Business” badge to items on its U.S. site about a year ago, pitching it as an effort to... What do a bottle of shampoo made by Johnson & Johnson, a lamp from a Chinese seller and an...

Photo by Getty.

Wall Street Greets WWE-UFC Deal With a Smackdown

By Martin Peers · Apr 3, 2023 5:00pm PDT

There’s no AI (and perhaps not too much human intelligence) involved in either World Wrestling Entertainment or Endeavor’s Ultimate Fighting Championship. But for sheer spectacle, today’s proposed merger of the two companies beats anything going on right now in tech—and we’re not talking just about what’s on the screen. Vince McMahon’s maneuvers... There’s no AI (and perhaps not too much human intelligence) involved in either World Wrestling...

Illustration by Shane Burke

Creator Economy

The Twitter Verification Purge That Wasn’t

By Kaya Yurieff · Apr 3, 2023 2:00pm PDT · 1 comment

Public figures ranging from celebrities to journalists braced for their blue check marks on Twitter to disappear over the weekend if they weren’t paying for Twitter Blue, its subscription service. For the most part, this didn’t happen. Instead, the social network simply decided to update the description of verified accounts. But some rivals are... Public figures ranging from celebrities to journalists braced for their blue check marks on ...

Ben Horowitz (left) and Marc Andreessen at the Future Investment Initiative Institute conference in Miami in late March. Photo courtesy of FII Institute

Saudi Arabia Discloses Ties to Andreessen Horowitz, Dozens of Other Venture Funds

By Becky Peterson and Kate Clark · Apr 3, 2023 12:49pm PDT · 10 comments

Ben Horowitz (left) and Marc Andreessen at the Future Investment Initiative Institute conference in Miami in late March. Photo courtesy of FII Institute

Saudi Arabia Discloses Ties to Andreessen Horowitz, Dozens of Other Venture Funds

By Becky Peterson and Kate Clark · Apr 3, 2023 12:49pm PDT · 10 comments

For several years, venture capital firms have been cagey about whether they have raised money from Saudi Arabia, following the 2018 murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in one of the country’s consulates. The Saudis, for their part, are no longer keeping quiet. The venture arm of the Saudi Public Investment Fund, the... For several years, venture capital firms have been cagey about whether they have raised money...

Art by Mike Sullivan

Birth of a Salesman: OpenAI Sheds Its Lab Coat to Seek Big Deals

By Aaron Holmes and Isabelle Sarraf · Apr 3, 2023 9:26am PDT

OpenAI has for years relied on a small, nimble team, composed primarily of researchers, to develop impressive artificial intelligence models rivaling those from Google and Microsoft. Now the seven-year-old startup is acting more like a traditional enterprise software company by building a sales team and aggressively courting customers to use its... OpenAI has for years relied on a small, nimble team, composed primarily of researchers, to...

Salesforce’s Benioff Discussing Management Reorg

By Kevin McLaughlin · Apr 3, 2023 6:00am PDT · 1 comment

Salesforce has always been known for internal power struggles. Now, as the dust settles from the January departure of Bret Taylor as co-CEO, at least two senior executives are vying for a wider range of responsibilities, perhaps anticipating the day CEO and co-founder Marc Benioff finally steps aside. Srinivas Tallapragada, chief engineering... Salesforce has always been known for internal power struggles. Now, as the dust settles from the...

Ford and Tesla have sought alliances with China's CATL in U.S. battery factories. Photo: Zhu Difeng/VCG/Getty

The Electric: With U.S. Rules in Place, a Non-Chinese Battery Supply Chain Takes Shape

By Steve LeVine · Apr 3, 2023 4:30am PDT · 2 comments

Last week, the Biden administration released near-final rules governing how companies and consumers can tap hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. tax credits meant to spur the rise of a mine-to-factory electric vehicle battery industry. But companies including Ford and Tesla have rushed ahead of the rules, in the process helping to reveal what... Last week, the Biden administration released near-final rules governing how companies and...

Instacart CEO Fidji Simo. Photo by Bloomberg

In Reversal, Instacart Hikes Its Valuation 18%

By Cory Weinberg and Erin Woo · Apr 2, 2023 1:10pm PDT · 4 comments

Instacart CEO Fidji Simo. Photo by Bloomberg

In Reversal, Instacart Hikes Its Valuation 18%

By Cory Weinberg and Erin Woo · Apr 2, 2023 1:10pm PDT · 4 comments

After slashing its private stock price four times last year, Instacart is feeling better about itself. The grocery delivery firm, whose business skyrocketed during the pandemic but later cooled off, in late February raised its internal stock price 18% compared to December, according to a person with direct knowledge. While the company’s... After slashing its private stock price four times last year, Instacart is feeling better about...