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

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Recent Editions

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet. Photo via Getty.

Google Offers Buyouts to Employees in Search and Ads, Other Units

By Miles Kruppa and Catherine Perloff · Jun 10, 2025 12:14pm PDT · 2 comments

Google is offering voluntary buyouts to employees across several businesses and units, including the knowledge and information organization, which houses the company’s core search and much of the ads organization, a senior executive told staff on Tuesday. The move comes as Google’s search business faces unprecedented threats from ChatGPT and... Google is offering voluntary buyouts to employees across several businesses and units, including...

Photo via Adobe Stock

CEOs Try Cloning Themselves With AI

By Aaron Holmes · Jun 10, 2025 10:38am PDT · 2 comments

Artificial intelligence may not be advanced enough to run a company yet. But CEOs of some firms are testing ways that AI can sub in for them.They're trying chatbots and video avatars to answer employee questions, schmooze with customers and talk during earnings calls. Artificial intelligence may not be advanced enough to run a company yet. But CEOs of some firms...

Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang

Meta to Pay Nearly $15 Billion for Scale AI Stake and Startup’s 28-Year-Old CEO

By Cory Weinberg · Jun 10, 2025 8:08am PDT · 10 comments

Meta has agreed to take a 49% stake in data labeling firm Scale AI for $14.8 billion, two people familiar with the matter said. The unusual deal will be structured so Meta will send the cash to Scale’s existing shareholders and place the startup’s CEO, Alexandr Wang, in a top position inside Meta, the people said. The deal, which hasn’t yet been... Meta has agreed to take a 49% stake in data labeling firm Scale AI for $14.8 billion, two people...

‘AI Native’ Startups Pass $15 Billion in Annualized Revenue

‘AI Native’ Startups Pass $15 Billion in Annualized Revenue

By Amir Efrati · Jun 10, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

‘AI Native’ Startups Pass $15 Billion in Annualized Revenue

‘AI Native’ Startups Pass $15 Billion in Annualized Revenue

By Amir Efrati · Jun 10, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Annualized revenue at “AI native” companies selling artificial intelligence models or apps has passed $15 billion just two and a half years since OpenAI launched ChatGPT, according to The Information’s Generative AI Database.While that’s not the same as $15 billion in actual revenue, it’s still an unprecedented haul for such a short time period... Annualized revenue at “AI native” companies selling artificial intelligence models or apps has...

President Donald Trump (left), Elon Musk and SEC Chair Paul Atkins. Photos via Getty

SEC Employees Brace For DOGE Restructuring, AI Push

By Sylvia Varnham O'Regan · Jun 10, 2025 6:00am PDT · 2 comments

Elon Musk may have parted ways with Washington and President Donald Trump, but employees from Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency are moving forward with a plan to restructure the Securities and Exchange Commission and bring artificial intelligence technology into the agency. The reorganization will begin to take shape over the next... Elon Musk may have parted ways with Washington and President Donald Trump, but employees from...

Apple CEO Tim Cook. Photo via Getty

Apple Plays It Safe at Developer Conference

By Aaron Tilley · Jun 9, 2025 5:00pm PDT

Apple appears to have learned its lesson about overpromising on artificial intelligence. Last year, at its Worldwide Developers Conference, the company made a bunch of bold promises about its AI plans to show that it too had an answer to the ChatGPT age. Those claims turned out to be half-baked, as many of the AI features under its Apple... Apple appears to have learned its lesson about overpromising on artificial intelligence. Last...

Chime’s IPO Will Have Big, Big Winners and Serious Losers

By Cory Weinberg and Natasha Mascarenhas · Jun 9, 2025 7:30am PDT

When Chime CEO Chris Britt pitched his company to venture capitalists a decade ago, he got a lot of handshakes and little money. Venture capitalists, he has said, were too rich to understand why low- or no-fee bank accounts would appeal to people living paycheck to paycheck. He said investors would question him: “What’s the problem? I don’t get... When Chime CEO Chris Britt pitched his company to venture capitalists a decade ago, he got a lot...

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, left, and Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang. Photos via Getty

What Meta-Scale AI Deal Could Mean; Cursor’s Explosive Revenue

By Amir Efrati · Jun 9, 2025 7:00am PDT

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, left, and Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang. Photos via Getty

What Meta-Scale AI Deal Could Mean; Cursor’s Explosive Revenue

By Amir Efrati · Jun 9, 2025 7:00am PDT

Before we get to today’s column, here’s something to noodle on.On Friday, word spread widely across the industry that an unnamed public company was going to invest a cool $10 billion in an unnamed private AI firm. On Saturday afternoon, Scale AI’s name popped up as the alleged recipient. By nighttime, Bloomberg reported Meta Platforms was the... Before we get to today’s column, here’s something to noodle on.On Friday, word spread widely...

Art by Clark Miller. Photos via Getty Images

How the Musk-Trump Relationship Went Off the Rails

By Nick Wingfield, Evan Robinson-Johnson, Sylvia Varnham O'Regan, Natasha Mascarenhas and Steve LeVine · Jun 9, 2025 6:00am PDT · 3 comments

Elon Musk’s bets on electric vehicles and rockets delivered some of the biggest payoffs in business history. But his bet on Donald Trump has backfired so spectacularly that it could jeopardize the future of those Musk businesses—unless a seeming weekend ceasefire between the two men can hold. The unraveling of the relationship between Musk... Elon Musk’s bets on electric vehicles and rockets delivered some of the biggest payoffs in...

LG Energy Solution's LFP battery plant in Holland, Mich. Photo: Courtesy LGES

The Electric: South Korea's LG Challenges China's Grip On Iron-Based Batteries

By Steve LeVine · Jun 9, 2025 4:30am PDT

The battery that would go on to power most Western electric vehicles was first produced 15 years ago in a plant in Holland, Mich., run by South Korea’s LG Chem.Last month at the same factory, the company began the West’s first commercial-scale production of the lithium-iron-phosphate battery that’s behind China’s dominance of the global... The battery that would go on to power most Western electric vehicles was first produced 15 years...

Frank Sands Jr., founder and CEO of Sands Capital.

How a Silicon Valley Newcomer Avoided the Meltdown in Startup Valuations

By Sri Muppidi · Jun 8, 2025 11:32am PDT · 5 comments

Dozens of investment funds that bet on mature startups before the Federal Reserve hiked interest rates in early 2022 got creamed. Not Sands Capital, which began investing in public stocks 33 years ago but decided to get into startup investing in 2014. The reason: The firm’s biggest late-stage private tech fund paused making investments in... Dozens of investment funds that bet on mature startups before the Federal Reserve hiked interest...

Art by Clark Miller

Tech’s Winners in Trump-Musk Split

By Abram Brown · Jun 7, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Art by Clark Miller

Tech’s Winners in Trump-Musk Split

By Abram Brown · Jun 7, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:• The Big Read: Why Eric Schmidt and Jeff Bezos are sky-high on space data centers• The Arena: Online gambling’s toxic content problem • Opinion: AI has only made coding skills even more essential, Hadi Partovi argues• Plus, our Recommendations: Massachusett’s major wager; Aristotle’s pastime; and a... Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:• The Big Read: Why Eric Schmidt and Jeff Bezos are...

No, AI Isn’t Killing Computer Science. It’s Making It Essential

By Hadi Partovi · Jun 7, 2025 6:00am PDT · 8 comments

Another year, another viral tweet argues against “learning to code.” The latest one comes with cherry-picked data implying that art history majors outperform computer scientists in labor markets. Yet the underlying data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York prove the opposite. Art history grads have low unemployment—just... Another year, another viral tweet argues against “learning to code.” The latest one comes with...

How Online Gambling Forces Athletes to Battle Hecklers on Their Own

By Sara Germano · Jun 7, 2025 6:00am PDT · 2 comments

As a triple Olympic champion, Sports Illustrated and Vogue model, and Harvard alum, sprinter Gabby Thomas attracts thousands of fans wherever she competes. She also attracts some genuine weirdos. Last weekend, for example, a man attending Thomas’ race in Philadelphia began to loudly berate her—yelling that she was a “choke artist” and that... As a triple Olympic champion, Sports Illustrated and Vogue model, and Harvard alum, sprinter...

Tim Cook at WWDC 2024. Photo via Getty

Apple’s Needless App Store Fight

By Martin Peers · Jun 6, 2025 2:30pm PDT

Forget the Musk-Trump drama for a moment. Next week is WWDC, Apple’s annual developer conference, when the iPhone maker shows off slick new software features coming later in the year. I’m tempted to say this year’s event will be more in the spotlight than usual, except that might be difficult to assert given the massive attention Apple gets for... Forget the Musk-Trump drama for a moment. Next week is WWDC, Apple’s annual developer conference,...

Art by Clark Miller

Why Eric Schmidt and Jeff Bezos Are High On Space Data Centers

By Evan Robinson-Johnson · Jun 6, 2025 9:00am PDT · 3 comments

Art by Clark Miller

Why Eric Schmidt and Jeff Bezos Are High On Space Data Centers

By Evan Robinson-Johnson · Jun 6, 2025 9:00am PDT · 3 comments

If all goes as planned in August, a startup called Starcloud from Redmond, Wash., will load a rocket bound for space with a refrigerator-sized satellite, the first to contain an Nvidia H100 chip. Normally, that chip is at the heart of the sprawling data centers back on Earth that run the latest artificial intelligence models. Compared to... If all goes as planned in August, a startup called Starcloud from Redmond, Wash., will load a...

Photo via AP

Pro Weekly: IPO Hopefuls Are Getting Camera-Ready

By Akash Pasricha · Jun 6, 2025 8:00am PDT

Say cheese!Some companies on our Tech IPO Tracker are finally pushing ahead on long-awaited listings. The latest is stablecoin company Circle, which started trading on Thursday and ended the day with its shares closing at more than twofold its initial public offering price.Earlier this week, I took a look at the private firms that have hit dead... Say cheese!Some companies on our Tech IPO Tracker are finally pushing ahead on long-awaited...

Art by Mike Sullivan

App Developers See Opportunity to Escape Apple Tax

By Aaron Tilley · Jun 6, 2025 6:00am PDT

Some app developers are seizing the moment to try to get around the Apple tax. On May 1, Apple finally succumbed to a court order forcing the company to let U.S. apps link directly to external payment options. The company had resisted complying with the order for nearly four years, and with good reason: It allowed developers to bypass the fee of... Some app developers are seizing the moment to try to get around the Apple tax. On May 1, Apple...

Photo via Getty

What’s Next for Tech in Post-Musk Washington

By Martin Peers · Jun 5, 2025 5:00pm PDT

Today’s episode of America’s greatest reality series—yes, I’m talking about Elon Musk’s falling-out with President Donald Trump—was a barn burner. But rather than rehashing the gory details here (as extraordinary as their social media back-and-forth was, it was also entirely predictable), it’s more interesting to consider what this means for... Today’s episode of America’s greatest reality series—yes, I’m talking about Elon Musk’s...

Venture capitalists Lee Linden and Brian Singerman. Photos via Josh Line and The Information.

Ex-Founders Fund GP Brian Singerman Plots New Fund

By Natasha Mascarenhas · Jun 5, 2025 3:55pm PDT

Venture capitalists Lee Linden and Brian Singerman. Photos via Josh Line and The Information.

Ex-Founders Fund GP Brian Singerman Plots New Fund

By Natasha Mascarenhas · Jun 5, 2025 3:55pm PDT

Summer for venture capitalists used to be a time when dealmaking slowed down, as investors headed to the Italian Riviera or shifted their podcast recordings to a boat on Lake Tahoe. But that wasn’t the case last year, and it certainly isn’t shaping to be this year, either.Google challenger Perplexity is in the middle of raising $500 million—or... Summer for venture capitalists used to be a time when dealmaking slowed down, as investors headed...