OpenLight, which designs custom application-specific silicon photonic chips, raised a $34M Series A as it targets the data center interconnect market (Dan Swinhoe/DatacenterDynamics)

Dan Swinhoe / DatacenterDynamics:
OpenLight, which designs custom application-specific silicon photonic chips, raised a $34M Series A as it targets the data center interconnect market  —  Company secures funds, targets data center interconnect market  —  OpenLight, a designer of custom application-specific photonic chips, has secured $34 million in funding.

Crypto and tech entrepreneurs are attending Network School, founded by Balaji Srinivasan in Forest City, Malaysia, to test his concepts about the Network State (Ryan Weeks/Bloomberg)

Ryan Weeks / Bloomberg:
Crypto and tech entrepreneurs are attending Network School, founded by Balaji Srinivasan in Forest City, Malaysia, to test his concepts about the Network State  —  Balaji Srinivasan wants to design a new kind of nation state, and he's making a troubled megaproject a testbed for his ideas.

A critique of two contrasting research papers on AI's impact on US employment trends, along with caveats from a Stanford study on jobs in AI-exposed fields (Noah Smith/Noahpinion)

Noah Smith / Noahpinion:
A critique of two contrasting research papers on AI's impact on US employment trends, along with caveats from a Stanford study on jobs in AI-exposed fields  —  Some top economists claim AI is now destroying jobs for a subset of Americans.  Are they right?  —  The debate over whether AI …

TikTok suspends its live feature for the "next few days" in Indonesia, citing "increasing violence in protests" over lawmakers' pay (Stefanno Sulaiman/Reuters)

Stefanno Sulaiman / Reuters:
TikTok suspends its live feature for the “next few days” in Indonesia, citing “increasing violence in protests” over lawmakers' pay  —  ByteDance's TikTok has suspended its live feature for the “next few days” in Indonesia following protests in the country, its spokesperson said in a statement on Saturday.

Filing: StubHub, which is planning a September IPO, says revenue grew 3% to $828M in H1, missing its earlier projection of $885M, with adjusted EBITDA down 7% (Cory Weinberg/The Information)

Cory Weinberg / The Information:
Filing: StubHub, which is planning a September IPO, says revenue grew 3% to $828M in H1, missing its earlier projection of $885M, with adjusted EBITDA down 7%  —  Even as StubHub makes a renewed push to go public, its business isn't expanding as quickly as it had hoped.

A study focused on OpenAI's GPT-4o mini found that LLMs can be persuaded to comply with objectionable requests using the same tactics that persuade humans (Dina Bass/Bloomberg)

Dina Bass / Bloomberg:
A study focused on OpenAI's GPT-4o mini found that LLMs can be persuaded to comply with objectionable requests using the same tactics that persuade humans  —  AI chatbots can be manipulated much in the same way that people can, according to researchers.  But first...  Three things to know:

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem fires 24 FEMA IT staffers, including the CIO and CISO; DHS says they failed security protocols and let hackers access FEMA networks (David DiMolfetta/Nextgov/FCW)

David DiMolfetta / Nextgov/FCW:
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem fires 24 FEMA IT staffers, including the CIO and CISO; DHS says they failed security protocols and let hackers access FEMA networks  —  An internal FEMA email obtained by Nextgov/FCW ordered all agency employees to change their passwords “due to recent cybersecurity incidents and threats.”

Sources: ChatGPT co-creator Shengjia Zhao threatened to quit Meta within days of joining and return to OpenAI; later, he was given the chief AI scientist title (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
Sources: ChatGPT co-creator Shengjia Zhao threatened to quit Meta within days of joining and return to OpenAI; later, he was given the chief AI scientist title  —  Longtime acolytes are sidelined as Big Tech chief directs biggest leadership reorganisation in two decades

India's largest telco Reliance Jio, owned by Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, says it aims to list its shares through an IPO in India by the first half of 2026 (Chandini Monnappa/Reuters)

Chandini Monnappa / Reuters:
India's largest telco Reliance Jio, owned by Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, says it aims to list its shares through an IPO in India by the first half of 2026  —  Telecom and digital giant Reliance Jio Platforms will file for an initial public offering in the first half of 2026 …

Google plans to invest an additional $9B in Virginia through 2026 to boost its cloud and AI infrastructure, including a new data center in Chesterfield County (Emily Forgash/Bloomberg)

Emily Forgash / Bloomberg:
Google plans to invest an additional $9B in Virginia through 2026 to boost its cloud and AI infrastructure, including a new data center in Chesterfield County  —  Alphabet Inc.'s Google is investing an additional $9 billion in Virginia through 2026 to enhance cloud and AI infrastructure across the state …

Microsoft is expanding Xbox Cloud Gaming to Game Pass Core and Standard subscribers, dropping the Game Pass Ultimate requirement, and tests more PC game access (Tom Warren/The Verge)

Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft is expanding Xbox Cloud Gaming to Game Pass Core and Standard subscribers, dropping the Game Pass Ultimate requirement, and tests more PC game access  —  Xbox Game Pass Core and Standard subscribers are also getting access to some PC games.

Tussell: UK government contracts for AI-related projects have reached £573M in 2025 to July 15, up from £468M for the whole of 2024, as it seeks efficiency (Josh Gabert-Doyon/Financial Times)

Josh Gabert-Doyon / Financial Times:
Tussell: UK government contracts for AI-related projects have reached £573M in 2025 to July 15, up from £468M for the whole of 2024, as it seeks efficiency  —  Ministers hope technology can help streamline the civil service, reduce government waste and save billions

Stanford researchers: over the past three years, employment has dropped 13% for entry-level workers starting out in fields that are the most exposed to AI (Rachel Metz/Bloomberg)

Rachel Metz / Bloomberg:
Stanford researchers: over the past three years, employment has dropped 13% for entry-level workers starting out in fields that are the most exposed to AI  —  Artificial intelligence is making it harder for entry-level workers in the US to find jobs in fields like software development and customer service, according to new research.

Court filing: Tesla rejected a $60M settlement offer in a lawsuit over a fatal 2019 crash of an Autopilot-equipped Model S, before losing a $243M verdict (Mike Scarcella/Reuters)

Mike Scarcella / Reuters:
Court filing: Tesla rejected a $60M settlement offer in a lawsuit over a fatal 2019 crash of an Autopilot-equipped Model S, before losing a $243M verdict  —  Billionaire Elon Musk's electric vehicle company Tesla (TSLA.O) rejected a $60 million settlement proposal in a lawsuit over the 2019 fatal crash …

A profile of A24, valued at $3.5B in June 2024, as the studio focuses on big budget projects and invests in AI tools via A24 Labs, drawing mixed reactions (Alex Barasch/New Yorker)

Alex Barasch / New Yorker:
A profile of A24, valued at $3.5B in June 2024, as the studio focuses on big budget projects and invests in AI tools via A24 Labs, drawing mixed reactions  —  The studio is brilliant at selling small, provocative films.  Now it wants to sell blockbusters, too.  —  In November of 2015, the upstart film studio A24 had a problem.

Shopify updated a help page in May to tighten its rules against "hateful content" like racist merchandise, after removing a similar ban in July 2024 (Thomas Seal/Bloomberg)

Thomas Seal / Bloomberg:
Shopify updated a help page in May to tighten its rules against “hateful content” like racist merchandise, after removing a similar ban in July 2024  —  Shopify Inc. tightened rules against “hateful content” as users sell racist merchandise using its popular e-commerce platform, roughly a year after removing a similar ban.

How German delivery giant DHL uses automation and AI to help offset an ageing workforce, with one in three support staff set to retire in the next five years (Andrew Hill/Financial Times)

Andrew Hill / Financial Times:
How German delivery giant DHL uses automation and AI to help offset an ageing workforce, with one in three support staff set to retire in the next five years  —  The German delivery company says artificial intelligence is not taking jobs, but filling gaps in a stretched workforce

How Masayoshi Son became President Trump's favored foreign investor, after cultivating close ties since Trump's first term, leading to SoftBank's $2B Intel deal (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
How Masayoshi Son became President Trump's favored foreign investor, after cultivating close ties since Trump's first term, leading to SoftBank's $2B Intel deal  —  Japanese billionaire's deal for OpenAI and Intel came after careful courting of US president

A look at Apple's three-year iPhone redesign plan, starting with iPhone Air this fall, foldable with Touch ID in 2026, and a curved-glass "iPhone 20" in 2027 (Mark Gurman/Bloomberg)

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
A look at Apple's three-year iPhone redesign plan, starting with iPhone Air this fall, foldable with Touch ID in 2026, and a curved-glass “iPhone 20” in 2027  —  Apple is weeks away from its big product launch event, where it will lay the foundation for a once-in-a-generation iPhone overhaul.

An interview with Nick Clegg about Zuckerberg's "masculine energy", Silicon Valley's "cloying conformity" and "combination of machismo and self-pity", and more (Gaby Hinsliff/The Guardian)

Gaby Hinsliff / The Guardian:
An interview with Nick Clegg about Zuckerberg's “masculine energy”, Silicon Valley's “cloying conformity” and “combination of machismo and self-pity”, and more  —  When Britain's former deputy PM took a job at Meta, nothing could have prepared him for the ‘cloying conformity’ of the tech world.

How Raya, a privately held dating app with a waitlist of 2.5M people, found success through its rigorous user selection process and Fight Club-style rules (Lane Florsheim/Wall Street Journal)

Lane Florsheim / Wall Street Journal:
How Raya, a privately held dating app with a waitlist of 2.5M people, found success through its rigorous user selection process and Fight Club-style rules  —  The privately held company has attracted an A-list clientele and even gotten Gen Z onboard with online dating.

The US CFTC staff describe chaos, cutbacks, and an atmosphere of resentment and paranoia as the agency prepares to take on new crypto regulatory duties (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
The US CFTC staff describe chaos, cutbacks, and an atmosphere of resentment and paranoia as the agency prepares to take on new crypto regulatory duties  —  The Commodity Futures Trading Commission is poised to take on vast new responsibilities.  Staff describe chaos, cutbacks and an atmosphere of resentment and paranoia.

Some experts say Trump's extraordinary intervention is unlikely to save Intel, which faces challenges with poor yields and competition from TSMC and Nvidia (Reuters)

Reuters:
Some experts say Trump's extraordinary intervention is unlikely to save Intel, which faces challenges with poor yields and competition from TSMC and Nvidia  —  U.S. President Donald Trump is injecting nearly $9 billion into Intel(INTC.O) in exchange for a 9.9% equity stake.

Sources: Foxconn recalled ~300 Chinese engineers from its Indian plant making iPhone parts, replacing them with Taiwanese staff, its second such move in months (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
Sources: Foxconn recalled ~300 Chinese engineers from its Indian plant making iPhone parts, replacing them with Taiwanese staff, its second such move in months  —  Apple Inc. assembly partner Foxconn Technology Group has recalled about 300 Chinese engineers from a factory in India …

How AI is increasingly being used to replace human content moderators, who say that the tech is not yet capable of reliably identifying harmful content (Cecilia D'Anastasio/Bloomberg)

Cecilia D'Anastasio / Bloomberg:
How AI is increasingly being used to replace human content moderators, who say that the tech is not yet capable of reliably identifying harmful content  —  Kevin decided on a career in content moderation after his YouTube recommendations took a bewildering swerve.

Q&A with David Luan, head of Amazon's AGI research lab, on leaving Adept in a reverse acquihire deal, why he believes progress on AI models has slowed, and more (Alex Heath/The Verge)

Alex Heath / The Verge:
Q&A with David Luan, head of Amazon's AGI research lab, on leaving Adept in a reverse acquihire deal, why he believes progress on AI models has slowed, and more  —  Why Amazon AGI Labs chief David Luan thinks solving agents is the next ‘S-curve’ for AI.