How India's IT services sector, which employs 6M people, contributes ~7% of GDP, and generates $300B+ annually, is shedding jobs as AI automates formulaic work (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
How India's IT services sector, which employs 6M people, contributes ~7% of GDP, and generates $300B+ annually, is shedding jobs as AI automates formulaic work  —  It was around 1.30am by the time Rakesh, a 45-year-old Oracle employee in the Indian technology hub of Bengaluru …

A look at London-based AI startup Cosine, which is building a frontier model with UK government backing, as some question if it has the talent and resources (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
A look at London-based AI startup Cosine, which is building a frontier model with UK government backing, as some question if it has the talent and resources  —  Britain's bid to build a “sovereign” AI model rests with a London start-up of about 30 employees that has raised just $15mn.

Sources: the UK FCA is consulting industry participants, including major banks, on a regulatory framework for tokenized gold; London dominates the global market (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
Sources: the UK FCA is consulting industry participants, including major banks, on a regulatory framework for tokenized gold; London dominates the global market  —  FCA is seeking to encourage digitisation of financial markets  —  UK regulators are preparing a framework for tokenised gold …

A look at Chinese state-owned investment bank CICC, which sponsored multibillion-dollar listings of China's tech champions, including CXMT and Zhongji Innolight (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
A look at Chinese state-owned investment bank CICC, which sponsored multibillion-dollar listings of China's tech champions, including CXMT and Zhongji Innolight  —  CICC has become a dominant financier in Beijing's drive to compete with US in tech race  —  China's top investment bank …

As PC makers start using CXMT RAM chips, Apple is testing them too, but it needs a custom version for its devices, and US rules block Apple from sharing designs (Wall Street Journal)

Wall Street Journal:
As PC makers start using CXMT RAM chips, Apple is testing them too, but it needs a custom version for its devices, and US rules block Apple from sharing designs  —  Maker of iPhones talks to China's CXMT, but any deal would be politically sensitive  —  Apple has been testing memory chips …

In-depth look at OpenAI's model training, dangerous decisions, and cluelessness before the HuggingFace hack; despite delaying Astra, OpenAI still doesn't get it (Zvi Mowshowitz/Don't Worry About the Vase)

Zvi Mowshowitz / Don't Worry About the Vase:
In-depth look at OpenAI's model training, dangerous decisions, and cluelessness before the HuggingFace hack; despite delaying Astra, OpenAI still doesn't get it  —  Today I am taking the time to write the shorter, simpler version of What Happened.  —  For those who want all the details …

A look back at "Move 37", a watershed AI moment from AlphaGo's 2016 Go victory, as math witnesses similar breakthroughs where AI makes surprising discoveries (Ben Cohen/Wall Street Journal)

Ben Cohen / Wall Street Journal:
A look back at “Move 37”, a watershed AI moment from AlphaGo's 2016 Go victory, as math witnesses similar breakthroughs where AI makes surprising discoveries  —  A decade ago, a computer did something that no human would have done.  It was considered a breakthrough for AI.

A profile of Russia's A7, a payment network that helps Russia bypass Western sanctions, handling ~20% of payments in Russian foreign trade, or $100B+ annually (Alexander Osipovich/Wall Street Journal)

Alexander Osipovich / Wall Street Journal:
A profile of Russia's A7, a payment network that helps Russia bypass Western sanctions, handling ~20% of payments in Russian foreign trade, or $100B+ annually  —  A7 says it handles nearly 20% of payments in Russian foreign trade, or more than $100 billion annually

Amazon is backing a 7.65 GW gas plant for an off-grid TX AI data center, potentially the largest single US emissions source, at odds with its 2040 net-zero goal (Hiroko Tabuchi/New York Times)

Hiroko Tabuchi / New York Times:
Amazon is backing a 7.65 GW gas plant for an off-grid TX AI data center, potentially the largest single US emissions source, at odds with its 2040 net-zero goal  —  The tech giant is investing in the natural-gas-burning power plant as part of a huge data center in Texas, even as it pledges to honor climate commitments.

South Korea's AI-driven chip industry boom is reordering the country's society, changing expectations around fairness, careers, and even culture and dating (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
South Korea's AI-driven chip industry boom is reordering the country's society, changing expectations around fairness, careers, and even culture and dating  —  Factory workers with $400,000-plus bonuses are supplanting doctors and lawyers as the new elite, while investors play a casino-like stock market.

How Amazon and Gilroy, California, quietly negotiated a $2B data center project that AWS applied to build in 2020, without any public meetings or votes (Zusha Elinson/Wall Street Journal)

Zusha Elinson / Wall Street Journal:
How Amazon and Gilroy, California, quietly negotiated a $2B data center project that AWS applied to build in 2020, without any public meetings or votes  —  Company and Gilroy, Calif., spent years quietly negotiating $2 billion project that few residents knew about until work began

Analysis: Google DeepMind has lost frontier-model momentum amid leadership and RL talent departures, with Google Cloud emerging as a winner with more compute (SemiAnalysis)

SemiAnalysis:
Analysis: Google DeepMind has lost frontier-model momentum amid leadership and RL talent departures, with Google Cloud emerging as a winner with more compute  —  GCP YoY rev growth >100%, DeepMind's long term failure is Google Cloud's short term gain  —  On Wednesday, August 5th …

Nintendo reports Q1 revenue down 10% YoY to ~$3.3B, above $2.8B est., net income of ~$933M, above ~$495M est., and Switch 2 sales down 34.4% YoY to 3.82M (Jenny Lee/CNBC)

Jenny Lee / CNBC:
Nintendo reports Q1 revenue down 10% YoY to ~$3.3B, above $2.8B est., net income of ~$933M, above ~$495M est., and Switch 2 sales down 34.4% YoY to 3.82M  —  Choose CNBC as your preferred source on Google and never miss a moment from the most trusted name in business news.

Uber and Wayve say Wayve received London private hire vehicle licenses for supervised robotaxis ahead of a full rollout; Waymo plans to offer robotaxis in 2026 (Natalie Lung/Bloomberg)

Natalie Lung / Bloomberg:
Uber and Wayve say Wayve received London private hire vehicle licenses for supervised robotaxis ahead of a full rollout; Waymo plans to offer robotaxis in 2026  —  Uber Technologies Inc. and UK startup Wayve Technologies Ltd. are preparing to launch their robotaxi service in London with a safety driver …

Sources: Beijing is growing concerned about the cyber capabilities of Mythos and other US-developed frontier AI models and their potential as offensive weapons (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
Sources: Beijing is growing concerned about the cyber capabilities of Mythos and other US-developed frontier AI models and their potential as offensive weapons  —  China is growing anxious that Anthropic PBC's Mythos could be wielded against the world's second-biggest economy …