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

Photo of Palmer Luckey by Getty Images. Art by Mike Sullivan.

Anduril Is a Hot Ticket Despite Burning More Than $800 Million in Cash

By Cory Weinberg · Oct 27, 2025 6:00am PDT

Defense tech company Anduril expects to burn through $800 million to $900 million in cash this year in an aggressive bid to win giant Pentagon contracts. Investors big and small are unperturbed, lining up to back the fast-growing seller of drones, missiles and border surveillance towers. The company appears to be the most coveted stock in the... Defense tech company Anduril expects to burn through $800 million to $900 million in cash this...

The Pelican Spray, an electric autonomous cropduster. Photo: Courtesy Pyka

The Electric: This Startup Has Commercialized An Autonomous Electric Cropduster

By Steve LeVine · Oct 27, 2025 4:30am PDT

Michael Norcia’s passion for building aircraft started when he was a kid making model planes. After college, he worked for electric aircraft startups but never got to build anything commercial. Michael Norcia’s passion for building aircraft started when he was a kid making model planes....

Getty Images

Big Tech Earnings, Nvidia’s GTC Dominate Crowded Week

By Martin Peers · Oct 26, 2025 3:00pm PDT

This is our first of what we plan to be a regular Sunday evening Briefing, looking out at the coming week. And what a week this promises to be. Nvidia is holding one of its GTC events for developers and customers in Washington Monday through Wednesday—which leather jacket will Jensen Huang wear onstage this time? (For more on GTC, see below.) We... This is our first of what we plan to be a regular Sunday evening Briefing, looking out at the...

Vinod Khosla Talks AI, Power and Why Businesses Struggle With New AI Services

By Akash Pasricha · Oct 26, 2025 10:00am PDT · 2 comments

Vinod Khosla Talks AI, Power and Why Businesses Struggle With New AI Services

By Akash Pasricha · Oct 26, 2025 10:00am PDT · 2 comments

Vinod Khosla thinks companies which say they’re struggling to get a return on their spending on artificial-intelligence services may be doing it wrong. In an interview with The Information’s TITV this past week, he said “most enterprises who are executing AI are doing it with their people who are not qualified to execute.” In contrast, when... Vinod Khosla thinks companies which say they’re struggling to get a return on their spending on...

Chart by Mike Sullivan.

Sunday Insights

Why Netflix Is Still Outrunning Rivals

By Martin Peers and Catherine Perloff · Oct 26, 2025 8:00am PDT

Netflix’s quarterly earnings reports have lately lacked the drama that once made the updates a must-watch for investors and reporters. For the past eight quarters, the video streamer has routinely posted quarterly revenue growth averaging around 15%—hardly hypergrowth but a big improvement on the 2% to 4% growth rate it recorded between... Netflix’s quarterly earnings reports have lately lacked the drama that once made the updates a...

SoftBank's Masayoshi Son (left) and OpenAI's Sam Altman. Photo by Getty Images

SoftBank Greenlights Remaining $22.5 Billion of OpenAI Investment

By Sri Muppidi · Oct 25, 2025 1:19pm PDT · 1 comment

SoftBank has taken the next step to complete its gargantuan $30 billion investment in OpenAI. The Japanese conglomerate’s board has approved a second installment of $22.5 billion on that investment, as long as the artificial intelligence startup completes a corporate restructuring that would pay the way for an eventual public offering, according... SoftBank has taken the next step to complete its gargantuan $30 billion investment in OpenAI. The...

Photo via Getty

Google Investigates Weekslong Security Breach Involving Contractor

By Sylvia Varnham O'Regan and Erin Woo · Oct 25, 2025 11:12am PDT · 2 comments

Google is investigating a breach of its security systems involving a contractor who took almost 2,000 screenshots and sensitive internal files, including information related to Google’s Play store systems and guardrails, according to a person with knowledge of the situation. The contractor sent the images to an unidentified outsider, the person... Google is investigating a breach of its security systems involving a contractor who took almost...

Rodrigo Liang, Co-founder & CEO, SambaNova Systems. Getty Images.

AI Chip Startup SambaNova Explores Sale After Stalled Fundraising

By Valida Pau · Oct 25, 2025 7:34am PDT · 2 comments

Rodrigo Liang, Co-founder & CEO, SambaNova Systems. Getty Images.

AI Chip Startup SambaNova Explores Sale After Stalled Fundraising

By Valida Pau · Oct 25, 2025 7:34am PDT · 2 comments

Artificial intelligence chip startup SambaNova Systems is exploring a sale, after it struggled to complete a fundraising round, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter. The Palo Alto, Calif., startup was last valued at $5 billion in 2021. SambaNova and other AI chip startups have had difficulty growing sales in the face of... Artificial intelligence chip startup SambaNova Systems is exploring a sale, after it struggled to...

Art by Clark Miller

Our Smart Bed Future May Be a Nightmare

By Abram Brown · Oct 25, 2025 7:04am PDT

Welcome, Weekenders!Quickly, a programming note: The Briefing, the newsletter written by my colleague Martin Peers, is shifting to an altered schedule, and starting tomorrow, it’ll appear Sunday through Thursday. Martin on a Sunday evening—what a treat! Among other topics, he’ll be applying his inimitable powers of explanation to previewing tech... Welcome, Weekenders!Quickly, a programming note: The Briefing, the newsletter written by my...

Form left: Miami Heat's Terry Rozier, FBI's Kash Patel and Portland Trail Blazer's Chauncey Billups. Photos via Getty

Despite NBA Scandal, Sports’ Gambling Habit Will Be Hard to Break

By Sara Germano · Oct 25, 2025 6:00am PDT

The 2025–26 NBA season kicked off this week with loads to get excited about: new broadcasts from NBC’s Peacock and Amazon Prime Video, a blockbuster double-overtime opening matchup between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Houston Rockets, and a career-defining 40-point game by rising star Victor Wembanyama of the San Antonio Spurs. But all of... The 2025–26 NBA season kicked off this week with loads to get excited about: new broadcasts...

Art by Clark Miller. Photo of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman by Getty Images

OpenAI Moves to Generate AI Music in Potential Rivalry With Startup Suno

By Sri Muppidi and Erin Woo · Oct 24, 2025 2:22pm PDT · 1 comment

OpenAI recently made a splash with artificial intelligence that generates short videos from text prompts—say, a scene from “Lord of the Rings” but with Gen Z characters, or Pokémon’s Pikachu as “The Godfather.” Now the company has set its sights on doing the same thing with music. OpenAI staff have been taking steps to develop AI... OpenAI recently made a splash with artificial intelligence that generates short videos from text...

Andreessen Horowitz General Partner Anjney Midha. Photy by Getty Images.

Andreessen Horowitz General Partner Midha to Establish Compute Firm

By Katie Roof · Oct 24, 2025 12:52pm PDT · 1 comment

Andreessen Horowitz General Partner Anjney Midha. Photy by Getty Images.

Andreessen Horowitz General Partner Midha to Establish Compute Firm

By Katie Roof · Oct 24, 2025 12:52pm PDT · 1 comment

Andreessen Horowitz’s artificial intelligence chip hunter is setting out on his own. Anjney Midha—an Andreessen general partner who helped the firm’s startups gain access to highly sought-after graphics processing units—told the firm’s staff on Friday that he was setting up an outside venture called AMP to “provide compute and... Andreessen Horowitz’s artificial intelligence chip hunter is setting out on his own. Anjney...

Art by Mark Sullivan.

OpenAI Readies Itself for Its Facebook Era

By Kalley Huang, Erin Woo and Stephanie Palazzolo · Oct 24, 2025 6:03am PDT · 6 comments

This summer, Fidji Simo wasted no time addressing a concern among many at OpenAI. Leading her first all-hands meeting as the startup’s new CEO of applications, she acknowledged that she and many others at OpenAI shared the same background: They’d previously worked at Meta Platforms. And then Simo, who’d risen to be head of Facebook over a decade... This summer, Fidji Simo wasted no time addressing a concern among many at OpenAI. Leading her...

Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao. Getty Images.

Trump Opens Door for Crypto’s Offshore Giants

By Yueqi Yang · Oct 23, 2025 5:00pm PDT · 1 comment

For crypto’s offshore giants these days, there’s nothing more important than figuring out their Trump playbook. Most are succeeding, as President Donald Trump’s pardon of Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao today demonstrated. The pardon of Zhao, who was convicted of violating anti–money-laundering laws and served a four-month sentence last year,... For crypto’s offshore giants these days, there’s nothing more important than figuring out their...

Synthesia co-founder and CEO Victor Riparbelli. Getty Images

Why Some AI Startup Acquisitions Are Failing

By Laura Mandaro and Katie Roof · Oct 23, 2025 2:49pm PDT · 1 comment

Over the last few days our reporters have broken news about two merger discussions that fizzled: Adobe, which was interested in buying video startup Synthesia, and SoftBank, which talked with humanoid robotics maker Agility about a takeover. In both cases, the startups ended up pursuing more venture capital funding at higher valuations.These are... Over the last few days our reporters have broken news about two merger discussions that fizzled:...

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky. Getty Images

Airbnb CEO Throws Subtle Shade at OpenAI; Khosla’s Enterprise AI Fix

By Kevin McLaughlin · Oct 23, 2025 11:12am PDT

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky. Getty Images

Airbnb CEO Throws Subtle Shade at OpenAI; Khosla’s Enterprise AI Fix

By Kevin McLaughlin · Oct 23, 2025 11:12am PDT

Welcome back! At its developer conference earlier this month, OpenAI showed a forthcoming feature that lets ChatGPT users access services from Expedia, Uber and Spotify directly in the chatbot. Some consumer apps might view such a feature as a threat because it bypasses their sites, preventing them from showcasing other products.For his... Welcome back! At its developer conference earlier this month, OpenAI showed a forthcoming...

SoftBank CEO, Masayoshi Son. Getty Images

SoftBank Hunts for Humanoid Robot Startups

By Rocket Drew · Oct 23, 2025 11:11am PDT · 2 comments

SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son has long predicted a future where robots would outnumber people and take over many jobs from humans. But some of SoftBank’s bets in robotics over the past 10 years, such as robot companion Pepper, have not panned out. Now the company is renewing its robot ambitions—particularly in robots that resemble humans. Late... SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son has long predicted a future where robots would outnumber people and take...

Art by Getty Images; Mike Sullivan

Music App Suno Nearly Quadruples Annual Recurring Revenue to $150 Million

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Oct 23, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

You can count the number of breakout consumer AI applications on the fingers of one hand. There’s OpenAI’s ChatGPT and…that’s about it, at least so far. Suno, which helps people create music using conversational prompts, isn’t yet a breakout—but it could be soon. The company is generating around $150 million in annual recurring revenue from... You can count the number of breakout consumer AI applications on the fingers of one hand. There’s...

Art by Clark Miller; Getty Images

Could Apple and Musk’s SpaceX Finally Do a Satellite Deal?

By Aaron Tilley and Wayne Ma · Oct 23, 2025 6:30am PDT · 1 comment

A few years ago, Elon Musk pitched Apple unsuccessfully on the idea of his company, SpaceX, providing satellite connectivity to iPhones. There are tantalizing hints that such a deal could be back on the table. In recent months, in anticipation of a possible future arrangement with Apple, SpaceX has added support in its new satellite designs for... A few years ago, Elon Musk pitched Apple unsuccessfully on the idea of his company, SpaceX,...

Photo by Getty Images

TikTok Empowers Chinese Executives in Management Revamp

By Juro Osawa · Oct 23, 2025 5:52am PDT · 1 comment

Photo by Getty Images

TikTok Empowers Chinese Executives in Management Revamp

By Juro Osawa · Oct 23, 2025 5:52am PDT · 1 comment

TikTok is implementing drastic leadership changes that pull the video app closer to the orbit of its parent ByteDance, just as Washington and Beijing are on the cusp of reaching a deal over the app’s future in the U.S. TikTok’s global content and distribution partnership teams, both led by Western executives, will be moved under Fiona Zhi, a ... TikTok is implementing drastic leadership changes that pull the video app closer to the orbit of...