February 23, 2025: More Chop; Another Head Fake

Last week, after the S&P 500 hit record highs on Wednesday, major indices suffered reversals and ended the week down. Dow Jones was down 2.5%, S&P 500 fell 1.7%, Nasdaq composite lost 2.5% owing to growing concerns about U.S. consumer softness. The billion-dollar startup bubble is deflating, and more than US$1 trillion in value is locked up in companies with dwindling prospects, according to industry sources. X is in talks with investors to raise fresh equity capital at the US$44 billion valuation at which Musk bought the social media firm, then known as Twitter, in 2022. Austin-based defense startup Saronic has raised a US$600 million Series C to build an autonomous ship factory called “Port Alpha,” quadrupling its valuation to US$4 billion from its last round. Palantir’s surging stock fell 10% after reports of Pentagon budget cuts. OpenAI has topped 400 million users, despite DeepSeek’s recent emergence. Microsoft on Wednesday announced a new quantum computing chip called “Majorana 1” that it said is more reliable than previous quantum computers. The chip reflects a scientific breakthrough in the quantum computing field and could be used to train and run large AI models in “years, not decades,” the company said. In Canada, Shopify expanded its Affirm partnership to bring BNPL offerings to Canadian merchants. Ottawa-based Hyperlume raised US$12.5 million in seed funding to commercialize its data-centre interconnection technology. Sophic Clients had an eventful week. Intermap closed its $12 million financing. Legend Power reported Q1 F2025 financial results, an improved balance sheet, and new sales partnerships. Kraken took the top spot on the 2025 TSX Venture 50 list. Plurilock secured multiple high-profile government sales in The U.S. and Canada, and also signed a US$800,000 contract with a leading US hospital. Minnesota Timberwolves, and Aires Tech launch pioneering “EMF-Friendly Venue” tech.

Sophic Client Intermap (IMP-TSX, ITMSF-OTC) closes on $12 million in financing.

Equity Financing Consisted of Bought Deal LIFE Offering and Concurrent Private Placement. Intermap Technologies Corporation (TSX: IMP) (“Intermap” or the “Company”) announced the closing of its previously announced “bought deal” LIFE offering and concurrent private placement (together, the “Offerings”). The Company entered into an underwriting and agency agreement with Beacon Securities Limited (“Beacon” or the “Underwriter”) whereby the Company issued a total of (i) 2,957,000 Class “A” common shares of the Company (“Common Shares”) at a price of $2.25 per Common Share (the “Offering Price”) for aggregate gross proceeds of $6,653,250 (the “LIFE Offering”), including the full exercise of the Underwriter’s option; and (ii) 2,047,225 Common Shares at the Offering Price for aggregate gross proceeds of $4,606,256.25 (the “Concurrent Private Placement”), pursuant to other prospectus exemptions under NI 45-106. The Company intends to use the aggregate net proceeds of the Offerings for working capital and execution of government contracts. With increased capital, Intermap plans to accelerate its programs and augment its services. https://t.co/GJiLUQ2Ihr

Sophic Client Legend Power Systems Inc. (LPS-TSXV, LPSIF-OTC) reports Q1 F2025 financial results.

Legend Power Systems Inc reported its financial results for the three months ended December 31, 2024 (“Q1 F2025”). “The first quarter of 2025 marks a pivotal moment for Legend Power Systems as we build on the momentum generated over the past year,” said Randy Buchamer, CEO of Legend Power Systems. “Building owners require their facilities to operate optimally at all times, and SmartGATE™ has proven its ability to enhance reliability and efficiency. Business optimization has been underway to prepare for excess throughput to meet growing demand as the Company transitions from tens of SmartGATEs™ per year to hundreds and thousands to solve energy challenges and enhance operational stability across a wide range of applications including commercial real estate, education, government, and military infrastructure. With the successful financing post quarter end strengthening our balance sheet, we are now focused on scaling deployments with key partners to drive sustainable growth for years to come.” Events Subsequent to Q1 F2025: The Company closed it’s second tranche of non-brokered private placement of $851 thousand, further increasing liquidity bringing the total financing to $1.6 million, Signed a sales, distribution and installment partnership in New York City with Unity Electric, an Equans Company, Engaged with a major North American Transport Agency to assess and address power quality and energy efficiency challenges at one of the United States 10 largest airports. https://t.co/C0HWfMZfry

Sophic Client Kraken Robotics (PNG-TSXV, KRKNF-OTC) emerges from the deep to take top spot on 2025 TSX Venture 50 list.

The TSX Venture Exchange (TSXV) has released the Kraken alongside the 2025 TSX Venture 50, the list highlighting the 50 best-performing companies on the stock exchange last year. The Venture 50 methodology has changed slightly from previous years. It previously ranked companies on five separate sector-specific top-10 lists in technology, cleantech and life sciences, diversified industries, mining, and energy. This year, the Venture 50 ranked companies together in one list based on three equally-weighted criteria: one-year share price appreciation, market capitalization increase, and Canadian consolidated trading value. It’s Kraken’s fourth appearance on the list since listing on the TSXV in 2015, and a return to form after its absence from the British Columbia-dominated 2024 Venture 50, after topping the list the previous year. https://tinyurl.com/2ccactxu

Sophic Client Plurilock (PLUR-TSXV, PLCKF-OTCQB) secures multiple high-profile government sales in The U.S. and Canada.

Plurilock Security Inc., a global cybersecurity services and solutions provider, announces multiple government contracts across the U.S. and Canada. Plurilock has been awarded three sales through key federal procurement channels, including the U.S. federal government’s SEWP V contract vehicle and Canadian federal procurement initiatives. “Plurilock continues to demonstrate resilience and momentum for our public sector customers,” said Ian L. Paterson, CEO of Plurilock. “These wins reinforce our role as a key cybersecurity and IT supplier to some of the most security-conscious government entities in North America.” https://t.co/X8tZ9vNJ3i

Sophic Client Plurilock (PLUR-TSXV, PLCKF-OTCQB) secures US$800,000 services contract with leading U.S. hospital.

Plurilock Security announced a US$800,000, 11-month contract with a top 10 U.S. hospital in New York to provide custom services. The contract, obtained through Plurilock’s subsidiary Aurora Systems Consulting, highlights the growing need for secure, customized technology solutions in the healthcare sector. “Many healthcare providers struggle to manage vast amounts of sensitive data while maintaining regulatory compliance. Our engagement with this leading hospital demonstrates the increasing demand for secure and customized technology solutions in the healthcare sector,” said Ian L. Paterson, CEO of Plurilock. “As cyber threats evolve and regulatory requirements tighten, organizations are turning to trusted partners like Plurilock to provide tailored cybersecurity and software solutions that align with their operational and compliance needs.” https://t.co/WN6ltAcUX9

A Fan Experience First: Minnesota Timberwolves and Aires Tech (WIFI-CSE, AAIRF-OTC) launch pioneering “EMF-Friendly Venue” Tech.

Aires Tech is backing this groundbreaking initiative, advancing its mission to optimize EMF radiation from electronics and wireless technology through the Aires Certified Spaces standard. NBA’s Minnesota Timberwolves have teamed up with Aires Tech to unveil an unprecedented electromagnetic fields (EMF)-friendly arena for fans, players and employees at Target Center, in addition to integration at the team’s practice facility at Mayo Clinic Square. This first-of-its-kind sports experience innovation aims to optimize the EMFs emitted by electronics and wireless technology, creating a healthier, more beneficial experience for all those that work, compete, and cheer at the arena. American Aires, Inc. is sponsoring the installation of Aires devices designed to screen players and fans from the potentially harmful effects of EMF radiation while enabling electronic devices to continue functioning normally. The long-term deal includes the tech’s installation in key player gathering spaces, such as the film room and weight room in the practice facility. Additionally, Aires-backed technology will be integrated into high-traffic fan areas throughout the concourse at Target Center. The installation marks the first official adoption of the Aires Certified SpacesTM (ACS) standard, a set of protocols for implementing EMF modulation solutions to create authorized EMF-friendly spaces. It also marks an important initial step toward Aires’ on-going plan of capturing the commercial B2B market, which represents a massive global opportunity for Aires to equip businesses and organizations of all types with EMF protection solutions. https://t.co/ZupSdufzi8

Shopify (SHOP-NYSE, SHOP-TSX) expands Affirm partnership to bring BNPL offering to Canadian merchants.

Canadian e-commerce giant Shopify has renewed and expanded its exclusivity agreement with San Francisco-based buy now, pay later (BNPL) tech company Affirm to bring its once United States (US)-restricted partnership to Canada and beyond. The renewed multi-year partnership maintains Affirm as the exclusive BNPL provider for Shop Pay Installments in the US, as well as permits the partnership to grow into new markets worldwide, starting with exclusivity in Canada with plans to enter the United Kingdom. https://tinyurl.com/7mt72mtr

Hyperlume raises $17.8-million seed round to commercialize its AI data centre tech.

Ottawa-based Hyperlume has raised US$12.5 million ($17.8 million) in seed funding to commercialize its data-centre interconnection technology. The round was led by BDC’s Deep Tech Venture Fund and ArcTern Ventures, with participation from MUUS Climate Partners, SOSV, and Intel Capital, the investment arm of American semiconductor giant Intel, with a strategic investment from LG Technology Ventures. BetaKit asked Hyperlume about the strategic nature of LG’s investment, but did not hear back by press time. Hyperlume will use the capital to expand its product, engineering, and R&D teams. Hyperlume claims its interconnects have 10-times the computing performance, five-times the power savings, and four times lower cost relative to traditional copper interconnects. https://tinyurl.com/3wfdp95h

The Unicorn boom is over, and startups are getting desperate.

The billion-dollar startup bubble is deflating, and more than US$1 trillion in value is locked up in companies with dwindling prospects. As hard as it is to remember, there were buzzy startups in Silicon Valley before the tech world became solely fixated on artificial intelligence. By the time the Covid-era tech boom crested in 2021, well over 1,000 venture capital-backed startups had reached valuations above US$1 billion, including fake meat purveyor Impossible Foods Inc., home maintenance marketplace Thumbtack and online-class platform MasterClass. Then came a squeeze sparked by rising interest rates, a slowing initial public offering market and the feeling that any startup not focused on AI was yesterday’s news. A reckoning that has been looming for years is becoming painfully tangible. In 2021 more than 354 companies received billion-dollar valuations, thus achieving unicorn status. Only six of them have since held IPOs, says Ilya Strebulaev, a professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Four others have gone public through SPACs, and another 10 have been acquired, several for less than US$1 billion. Others, such as the indoor farming company Bowery Farming and AI health-care startup Forward Health, have gone under. Convoy, the freight business valued at US$3.8 billion in 2022, collapsed the following year; the supply chain startup Flexport bought its assets for scraps. https://tinyurl.com/mumn3z2x

Musk’s X in talks to raise equity at US$44 billion valuation.

Elon Musk’s X is in talks with investors to raise fresh equity capital at the US$44 billion valuation at which Musk bought the social media firm, then known as Twitter, in 2022, Bloomberg reported. If Musk succeeds, it would be an extraordinary turnaround given that X’s valuation has dropped sharply since the acquisition. But it would be the latest sign that Musk’s closeness to President Trump is enhancing his status with investors. In the weeks after the election, Tesla stock skyrocketed and while it has since fallen back, it is trading 38% above its pre-elections despite a fourth quarter drop in auto revenues. In the past week or so, X’s lenders have offloaded most of the US$13 billion in debt they were holding from the takeover, although that doesn’t affect the hefty amount that X is paying in interest. A new equity raising could allow X to pay down debt. https://tinyurl.com/yckyv7mj

Saronic raises US$600 million to mass-produce autonomous warships.

Austin-based defense startup Saronic has raised a US$600 million Series C to build an autonomous ship factory called “Port Alpha,” quadrupling its valuation to US$4 billion from its last round. Investor Elad Gil led the round, with General Catalyst joining existing investors Andreessen Horowitz, 8VC, and Caffeinated Capital, among others. That should make Saronic the second, possibly third, most valuable defense tech startup in the U.S. after Anduril’s last round valued it at US$14 billion. Shield AI could beat that, though, as it is reportedly in talks to hit a US$5 billion valuation on a new round of funding. (Anduril is in talks to raise again at double its valuation, to US$28 billion.) Saronic isn’t the only defense tech darling with big manufacturing ambitions: Anduril, for example, announced plans to build a billion-dollar megafactory in Ohio last month. Saronic hasn’t found a site for Port Alpha yet but is actively searching, a spokesperson confirmed to TechCrunch. Unmanned ships are a hot trend in naval warfare, in part thanks to Ukraine’s successful use of drone ships to drive the Russian Navy out of Crimea, despite Ukraine having effectively no manned navy of its own. Saronic has now raised almost US$850 million https://tinyurl.com/yjen347x

HP buys AI wearable startup Humane for US$116 million.

HP said Tuesday that it would pay US$116 million for Humane, capping a difficult run for the startup, whose AI-powered pin failed to gain traction since it was released last year. HP said the acquisition, expected to close at the end of this month, will help the company integrate AI into its devices including printers, personal computers and conferencing equipment. HP won’t sell any new pins, and existing pins’ key features will stop working at the end of the month. Humane, launched in 2017 by former Apple executives who helped build the iPhone, largely operated in secrecy until 2021. The company attracted intrigue both for its prominent founding team and for its ambitious goal of creating a new category of wearable device that could challenge the smartphone. According to PitchBook, Huamne raised a total of US$241 million to develop its pin, which was equipped with cameras, microphones and speakers that let wearers converse with an AI assistant or project text onto their hands. However, Humane struggled after early reviews of the product last year criticized its battery life, tendency to overheat and inability to connect with other devices like smartphones. https://tinyurl.com/5bsnes6s

Silver Lake nears deal for stake in Intel’s altera unit.

Silver Lake Management is in exclusive talks to acquire a majority stake in Intel Corp.’s programmable chips unit, people with knowledge of the matter said. The private equity firm is thrashing out details of an investment in Altera, whose multi-use chips are primarily deployed in telecommunications networks, according to the people. https://tinyurl.com/5477jhnv

‘Pokémon Go’ maker nears US$3.5 billion deal to sell games unit.

Niantic Inc., the company behind the 2016 hit Pokémon Go, is in talks to sell its video-game business to Saudi Arabia-owned Scopely Inc., according to several people familiar with the discussions. A deal could be announced in coming weeks. The price being discussed is about US$3.5 billion, according to one of the people. Any agreement would involve the Pokémon title as well as other mobile games, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private. There’s no assurance an agreement will be reached. https://tinyurl.com/5n6vpjwe

Carvana expects another ‘strong’ year after topping fourth-quarter expectations.

Carvana topped Wall Street’s top- and bottom-line expectations for the fourth quarter while guiding for another “strong” year in 2025. Carvana, as it has in the past, gave a broad guidance outlook for this year that includes growth in both retail units sold and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or EBITDA, including sequential increases in both during the first quarter. Shares of Carvana fell more than 10% during after-hours trading Wednesday. The stock closed at US$281.82, down roughly 1%. Wall Street analysts largely attributed the drop to high investor expectations and the vague forecast for 2025. Carvana said it sold 416,348 retail vehicles last year, up roughly 33% from the year before, for record total annual revenue of US$13.67 billion in 2024. Shares of Carvana are up roughly 40% in 2025, adding to last year’s nearly 285% gain. https://tinyurl.com/mrxe9998

Etsy stock tumbles on revenue miss as company reports drop in number of goods sold.

Etsy missed on revenue and gross merchandise sales for the fourth quarter, with the company citing “significant headwinds,” including a pullback in consumer spending. The stock closed down 10% on Wednesday. The fourth quarter includes the holiday shopping period. Etsy said the GMS slump was a result of “pressure on consumer discretionary product spending,” tough comparisons due to the shortened holiday shopping season and “category mix,” as well as a competitive retail and marketing environment. Etsy also gave a downbeat outlook for the current quarter, saying it expects GMS will fall at a rate similar to the year-over-year performance it reported in the fourth quarter. https://tinyurl.com/rs85u4kp

Ryan Cohen boosts Alibaba stake to US$1 billion.

The meme-stock king and investor still has his sights set on the Chinese e-commerce behemoth. Ryan Cohen still has his sights set on Alibaba Group and has been building up his position in the Chinese e-commerce behemoth. Cohen is known as the meme-stock king for helping ignite explosive rallies in GameStop and other businesses during the pandemic. In recent months, he has grown his personal stake in Alibaba to roughly US$1 billion, or about 7 million shares, according to people familiar with the matter. https://tinyurl.com/thw5pbvs

Palantir’s surging stock fell 10% after reports of Pentagon budget cuts.

Palantir Technologies shares tanked 10% on Wednesday to US$112.06 apiece. The loss extended to after-hours trade, falling another 5.2%. The slump ended a four-day winning streak for Palantir, whose stock had, until Wednesday, surged 65% this year. Palantir shares are now up 48% this year to date and the company’s market value is around US$255 billion. A major US defense contractor, the data analytics company’s clients also include allied governments and the private sector. Its stock surged over 300% in 2024. In early February, Palantir reported US$827.5 million in revenue in the fourth quarter, beating analysts’ expectations of US$775.9 million. Profit was 14 cents per share. Palantir’s share price was hit by reports that US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered budget cuts. Robert Salesses, the interim deputy secretary of defense, said in a Wednesday statement that Hegseth directed the Pentagon to identify around US$50 billion in programs that could be cut next year. That money would be redirected to programs aligning with President Donald Trump’s priorities. On the same day, Palantir disclosed in a regulatory filing that CEO Alex Karp has adopted a new trading plan that will allow him to sell up to nearly 10 million shares through September 12. Karp, who owns about 2.5% of the company, has sold shares before this, too. The plunge in Palantir’s stock reveals investor jitters about how the US government’s budget cuts could hit the company’s bottom line. It also highlighted existing concerns about Palantir’s valuation after an extended rally. Even before Wednesday, analysts had voiced concerns about Palantir’s valuation, flagging risks for its stock price despite solid results. Palantir stock has five buy ratings, 13 holds, and five sells, according to the Eikon database. Given that the US government is Palantir’s largest customer, any news of a budget cutback would hit sentiment in the company’s already high stock price. In 2024, Palantir’s revenue from the US government grew 30% from the year earlier to US$1.2 billion, accounting for about 42% of the company’s total revenue. https://tinyurl.com/43vw5hr9

OpenAI tops 400 million users despite DeepSeek’s emergence.

OpenAI appears to be growing quickly despite increasing competition. The San Francisco-based tech company had 400 million weekly active users as of February, up 33% from 300 million in December, the company’s chief operating officer, Brad Lightcap, told CNBC. These numbers have not been previously reported. Lightcap pointed to the “natural progression” of ChatGPT as it becomes more useful and familiar to a broader group of people. Developer traffic has also doubled in the past six months, quintupling for the company’s “reasoning” model o3, according to Lightcap. Developers use OpenAI to integrate the technology into their own applications. OpenAI counts Uber, Morgan Stanley, Moderna and T-Mobile among some of its largest enterprise customers. Lightcap likened this usage to cloud services, which Amazon Web Services pioneered two decades ago. While the consumer business may grow faster since people can adopt it at will, enterprise is in the “process of building up,” he said. https://tinyurl.com/bddz32vv

Microsoft announces new Quantum computing chip, “Majorana 1”.

Microsoft on Wednesday announced a new quantum computing chip called “Majorana 1” that it said is more reliable than previous quantum computers. The chip reflects a scientific breakthrough in the quantum computing field and could be used to train and run large AI models in “years, not decades,” the company said. The breakthrough underlying Majorana, which was published Wednesday in Nature, came from the discovery of a new state of matter that Microsoft is calling a “topological state,” which makes quantum computing more stable and less prone to errors, Microsoft said. Today, all computation—for storing photos, steaming or even processing artificial models—is based on small pieces of data known as bits, which can be expressed in ones or zeros. Companies like IBM, Google, and Amazon are trying to build a more powerful computing system based on qubits, but qubits are unstable and hard to control. Google recently unveiled its own quantum computing chip, which it similarly said reflected a breakthrough in making qubits more stable. Microsoft’s new Majorana chip will be manufactured by Microsoft itself, rather than by a foundry like TSMC, but the chip is only being produced on a small scale for now. Microsoft will not make Majorana commercially available on its cloud computing platform because it can currently only handle relatively small computations, but the company is aiming to increase the chip’s performance and could make it commercially available in the next five years, executive vice president Jason Zander told CNBC. https://tinyurl.com/4nm4tujw

EssilorLuxottica plans Meta Ray-Ban manufacturing rampup.

Meta Platforms’ eyewear partner, EssilorLuxottica, plans to expand annual production capacity for the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses to 10 million units by the end of next year, CEO Francesco Milleri said last week. Speaking on the company’s earnings call, Milleri also revealed that since the Ray-Ban’s launch in September 2023, Essilor had sold more than 2 million units of the glasses. The Meta Ray-Bans have turned into a surprise hit product, garnering positive reviews, offering both the ability to stream music, make phone calls, take photos and more recently use Meta’s artificial intelligence assistant. The success of the glasses has prompted Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to invest more heavily in smart glasses. On Friday, Bloomberg reported that Meta had hired a retail veteran to build retail expertise for products like the smart glasses and virtual reality headsets. Last week, Milleri said that “we are planning for the long term with Meta.” He added that Essilor was considering the smart glasses with AI as a product that was “like a shared platform, ready to embark on third party brands and new function also in the form of subscription services.” https://tinyurl.com/yc54wcv4

Alibaba plans new reasoning AI model, “aggressive” cloud investment.

Alibaba Group said it will soon release a new artificial intelligence “deep reasoning model,” in what could be the Chinese tech giant’s answer to the recent success of DeepSeek. Alibaba CEO Eddie Wu said during a conference call with analysts Thursday that the new reasoning model is built on the company’s flagship AI foundation model, Qwen2.5-Max. Alibaba’s upcoming launch comes after DeepSeek last month upended the global AI industry with its R1 reasoning model, which offered performance comparable to OpenAI’s similar model even though DeepSeek said it had been developed at a much lower cost. Wu said Alibaba, an e-commerce giant that also operates China’s biggest cloud computing service, will invest “aggressively” in cloud and AI infrastructure. Such investment for the next three years will be larger than what the company has spent over the past decade, he said. Wu’s comments came shortly after Alibaba reported better-than-expected earnings for the quarter through December. Revenue from its cloud computing division rose 13%, and Alibaba said increasing adoption of AI-related products among cloud customers contributed to the solid revenue growth. Alibaba’s U.S.-listed stock jumped Thursday morning in New York on the upbeat results. https://tinyurl.com/mu942tyv

Tencent starts integrating DeepSeek’s model into WeChat in China.

WeChat, the ubiquitous messaging and social networking app in China, has started integrating DeepSeek’s open-source artificial intelligence model into its search function. Tencent said in a statement that it recently began testing a feature in Weixin, the domestic Chinese version of WeChat, that allows users to access DeepSeek’s model. Tencent also noted that Weixin continues to offer its existing AI search feature powered by Tencent’s own large language model, Hunyuan. The Hunyuan and DeepSeek AI search features are not available to users outside China. Tencent’s use of DeepSeek’s model, first reported by Chinese media outlets, comes after the startup became a global sensation. DeepSeek shocked Silicon Valley last month after releasing its latest reasoning model, R1, which achieved performance comparable to OpenAI’s similar model, despite being developed at a much lower cost. Shares of Tencent, which operates WeChat, jumped as much as 7.8% before closing 4% higher Monday in Hong Kong, as investors bought into hopes that the DeepSeek-powered feature would help elevate WeChat’s role as a platform for AI services in China. As of the end of September, Weixin in China and WeChat outside China had more than 1.3 billion monthly active users combined. https://tinyurl.com/88dr9vfn

Microsoft debuts AI model for video game development.

Microsoft on Wednesday unveiled a new generative artificial intelligence model that can be used to generate video game scenes and environments, which change in response to a game player’s actions on their game controller. The model, called Muse, was trained by Microsoft researchers and staff in its Xbox gaming unit using seven years’ worth of gameplay footage from its Xbox game Bleeding Edge. The model is meant to be a tool for game developers, and could one day be used to speed up game development or create games that are customized to individual players, Microsoft said. Microsoft is publishing the model’s source code, meaning anyone can download and use it, and is also hosting a prototype of the model on its Azure cloud computing platform so game developers can experiment with it. For now, the model is rudimentary and only creates scenes that resemble Bleeding Edge, but Microsoft is optimistic that the technology could one day be used for “gameplay ideation” and “novel, AI-based game experiences,” senior researcher Katja Hoffman said in a blog post. Microsoft isn’t the first company to train a generative AI model geared towards generating videogame environments—Sequoia recently invested in Decart, a startup that trained a model that generates worlds from the videogame Minecraft in real-time as users move around, while OpenAI has implied that its Sora video-generating model could also eventually be applied to video game development. https://tinyurl.com/mar599as

YouTube testing a cheaper Ad-free version.

YouTube is testing a cheaper version of its paid, ad-free YouTube Premium service, the company confirmed. It’s unclear what the price of this cheaper tier will be, while YouTube Premium is priced at US$13.99 per month. The news was first reported by Bloomberg. In a statement, a YouTube spokesperson said the company has been testing a new YouTube Premium tier with “most videos ad-free in several of our markets. We’re hoping to expand this offering to even more users in the future.” This version will have some limitations when compared to YouTube Premium: specifically, music videos will feature ads. Two years ago, YouTube nixed a previous cheaper version of YouTube Premium in some European markets. https://tinyurl.com/2jzpp8x8

Amazon shuts down TikTok-like shopping feed.

Amazon has shut down Inspire, a TikTok-style shopping feed inside its mobile app that it launched in 2022, according to messages to users and a company spokesperson. Users accessed the Inspire feed through a lightbulb-shaped icon in the navigation tab at the bottom of the Amazon app. The feed featured an endless scroll of videos and images of products sold on Amazon. Some of the videos and images shown in Inspire were posted by influencers who received commissions, while others were sourced from customers’ video reviews on Amazon. An Amazon spokesperson said: “We regularly evaluate various features to better align with what customers tell us matters most, and as part of that, Inspire is no longer available.” The spokesperson pointed to other Amazon discovery features and social shopping features, such as its shopping chatbot Rufus and social media partnerships that let shoppers buy Amazon products from within advertisements on services including TikTok and Instagram. https://tinyurl.com/3ecshecy

Binance.US restores U.S. Dollar deposits for users. 

Binance.US, the American entity of crypto exchange Binance, said it is restoring the ability for customers to deposit and withdraw U.S. dollars after finding a payment service provider to work with. The exchange became a poster child of the crypto industry’s challenges in getting access to banking services when it was cut off by banks in 2023 amid its legal battle with the U.S. securities regulator. It became a crypto-only exchange subsequently, meaning users can only transfer funds on and off in the form of crypto, and lost market share. The company declined to share the name of the provider. Christopher Blodgett, its chief operating officer, said in an interview that the provider, while not a bank itself, is a U.S.-based fintech provider that has a network of banking partners, a broker-dealer license, and enables retail and crypto trading platforms to accept ACH bank transfers. https://tinyurl.com/3968zewb

Sophic Client American Aires (WIFI-CSE, AAIRF-OTCQB) – Does “not profitable today” mean “your model doesn’t work”?

Want to hear how the Aires’ CEO and CFO responded to the idea that “not profitable today” means “your model doesn’t work”? Then check out this video. https://tinyurl.com/2x5h9u65