June 06, 2026: Worst Week In 2026 For S&P 500 And Nasdaq

Last week, Dow Jones fell 0.3%, S&P 500 was down 2.6%, and Nasdaq composite lost 4.7%, with Friday being its worst one day decline in over a year. Strong macroeconomic jobs data sparked interest rate fears, triggering a semiconductor-led selloff. Earlier in the week, global tech infrastructure spend and mega-listings reached unprecedented heights. Anthropic filed for a confidential Q4 IPO after closing a US$65 billion raise at a US$900 billion valuation, annualized revenue hit US$47 billion. ChatGPT surpassed 1 billion MAUs, and Anthropic’s Claude app grew 640% y/y. SpaceX is targeting a historic US$75 billion IPO at a US$1.7 trillion valuation. The company announced a US$4.16 billion Space Force contract and lucrative compute leasing deals, pulling US$1.25 billion monthly from Anthropic and US$920 million from Google. Google expanded its equity raise to US$84.75 billion to fund AI infrastructure. SoftBank committed US$87.5 billion to French AI data centers. SK Hynix crossed a US$1 trillion valuation. Apple is tapping Google Cloud’s Nvidia Blackwell chips to power its September Siri overhaul. Microsoft launched its “Scout” AI agents and custom models. Intel announced its Crescent Island inference chip. Broadcom reported 48% revenue growth, but guidance disappointed investors. CrowdStrike will split its stock 4-for-1. IBM pledged US$10 billion to quantum R&D, competing with Microsoft’s new Majorana 2 chip. Stripe, Visa, Mastercard, and Coinbase formed a stablecoin consortium. In Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney launched the “AI for all” strategy, featuring a $500 million Tech Growth Fund. Shopify expanded its buyback program by US$3 billion to counter AI-driven short pressure. In news pertaining to Sophic clients, Ionik reported Q1 growth and advanced a significant debt reorganization alongside a debt facility extension to June 25, 2026. Intermap expanded its Aquarius platform deployment with Generali into Central Europe, reinforcing its 80% recurring revenue mix. Cybeats Technologies secured an enterprise agreement for SBOM Studio with a global industrial software leader.

Shopify (SHOP-NASDAQ, SHOP-TSX) becomes latest software firm to buy back shares.

Shopify said Tuesday that it would expand its share buyback authorization by US$3 billion to a total authorization of US$5 billion, becoming the latest software firm to unveil expanded share repurchase plans as AI fears have battered stock prices. Several software firms have implemented or expanded share buybacks as worries about AI disruption have sunk their share prices. In March, Pinterest said that activist investor Elliott Management had agreed to invest US$1 billion in share repurchases, for a total of US$2 billion in buybacks during the first half of this year. Salesforce and ServiceNow have also ramped up their buybacks. Shopify’s share price is down more than 25% so far this year. As of June 1, the company has repurchased around US$1.45 billion so far this year. https://tinyurl.com/2e22n685

Sophic Client Ionik (INIK-TSXV, INIKF-OTCQX) provides update on historical acquisition-related debt amendments and assignments, a historical loan, and its previously announced debt reorganization.

Ionik provided an update to its May 22, 2026 announcement regarding the 30-day extension (the “Facility Extension”) to its syndicated debt facility (the “Current Debt Facility”), comprehensive debt reorganization (the “Debt Reorganization”) and the Company’s anticipated entrance into a new senior debt facility (the “New Facility”), which is expected to replace the Current Debt Facility. The Facility Extension extends the maturity date of the Current Debt Facility from May 25, 2026 to June 25, 2026 and has been secured solely to permit completion of the Debt Reorganization and New Facility. The Company’s capital structure reflects a series of acquisitions financed, in part, through vendor take-back debt, earnout obligations and other acquisition-related indebtedness. The Debt Reorganization is expected to reduce the Company’s near-term cash obligations by converting a significant portion of outstanding indebtedness into equity and extending the maturity of remaining obligations to March 31, 2030. Completion of the Debt Reorganization is a condition to the Company entering into the New Facility. In aggregate, the Debt Reorganization is expected to result in the settlement of indebtedness of approximately US$61 million through the issuance of an aggregate of approximately 225,631,690 Settlement Shares and through cash repayments of an aggregate of approximately US$25,833,000, all pursuant to the applicable Reorganization Debt Instruments. Based on the Company’s issued and outstanding Shares as of the date hereof, being 360,955,780 Shares, it is anticipated that approximately 586,587,470 Shares will be issued and outstanding (approximately 643,414,586 on a partially diluted basis) upon completion of the Debt Reorganization. Certain settlements, repayments, amendments and assignments described herein involve Insiders of the Company (as such term is defined in Policy 1.1 of the TSXV Corporate Finance Manual), and are non-arm’s-length transactions. https://tinyurl.com/yz7xdsza

Sophic Client Ionik (INIK-TSXV, INIKF-OTCQX) reports q1 2026 revenue growth and continued debt reduction.

Ionik announced financial results for the three months ended March 31, 2026, highlighting continued revenue growth across both operating divisions, continued debt reduction, and further progress on platform integration. Subsequent to quarter end, on May 22, 2026, the Company secured a 30-day extension from its senior lenders under its existing syndicated debt facility. The maturity date was amended from May 25, 2026, to June 25, 2026, providing additional time to finalize a longer-term financing solution. Ted Hastings, Ionik’s CEO commented: “Q1 2026 reflected continued revenue growth across both of our operating divisions, supported by healthy demand and the ongoing benefits of our integrated platform. While gross margin was impacted by higher media acquisition costs during the quarter, we remained focused on operating discipline, cash flow generation, platform integration, and continued debt reduction. Our priorities remain consistent: driving profitable growth, and cash flow, advancing integration across our Marketing Optimization and Media Activation platforms, strengthening the balance sheet, and aligning the business with the accelerating pace of AI-driven technology and data-driven marketing. We are also actively negotiating a new syndicated debt facility, which will further improve our balance sheet and help surface equity value.” https://tinyurl.com/ymw3ruj3

Sophic Client Intermap (IMP-TSX, ITMSF-OTC) Generali expands deployment of Intermap’s AI-enabled risk platform in Central and Eastern Europe.

Intermap Technologies announced the expansion of its collaboration with Generali Group to enhance underwriting, risk management and portfolio modeling across Central and Eastern Europe. Under the extended agreement, Poland, Hungary and Slovenia will be added to Generali’s deployment of Intermap’s Aquarius Risk Management & Analytics (RMA) solution. The expanded coverage enables broader quantification of natural hazard and climate-related risks across these key markets, supporting the full insurance lifecycle from underwriting and accumulation management through reinsurance and claims response. By combining Intermap’s automated risk analysis with authoritative geospatial data products, the solution helps solve complex large-scale problems that were previously impractical to address with accuracy and consistency. The platform integrates software, data and automation to help insurers transform massive volumes of location-based risk information into actionable intelligence. Central Europe remains one of Europe’s most climate-exposed regions. In September 2024, Storm Boris caused catastrophic flooding across multiple countries, resulting in approximately $4.3 billion in total losses, of which $2.1 billion were insured, highlighting a protection gap exceeding $2.2 billion, according to Munich Re’s NatCatSERVICE in January 2025 — underscoring the growing need for high-resolution risk intelligence across the region. Generali, one of the world’s largest integrated insurance and asset management groups, combines strong regional presence with advanced technical expertise. By leveraging Intermap’s high-resolution 3D terrain data and peril analytics, Generali enhances underwriting precision, improves accumulation control and strengthens claims responsiveness across Corporate, SME and Retail segments. “By expanding our collaboration with Intermap to the highly exposed markets of Poland, Hungary and Slovenia, we strengthen our ability to assess natural catastrophe risks with greater precision,” said Samuele Borghi, Chief Insurance Officer Non-Life at Generali CEE Holding and Head of CEE Global Corporate and Commercial at Generali. “Equipping our teams with advanced geospatial intelligence for risk evaluation and regional accumulation control further enhances our underwriting and risk management capabilities.” “This collaboration expansion reinforces Intermap’s growing role within the European insurance market,” said Patrick A. Blott, Chairman and CEO of Intermap. “As climate volatility increases, insurers require consistent, high-resolution risk intelligence that scales across markets. Aquarius RMA provides Generali with a unified analytics platform to support underwriting discipline, portfolio resilience and capital allocation decisions across Central Europe. We are proud to deepen our partnership with one of the world’s leading insurance groups. Recurring services revenue currently accounts for approximately 80% of Intermap’s revenue.” https://tinyurl.com/4dfda8kh

Sophic Client Cybeats Technologies Corp. (CYBT-CSE,CYBCF-OTCQB) secures new contract with a global leader in industrial software.

Cybeats Tannounced that it has signed a major enterprise agreement to deploy its flagship platform, SBOM Studio, with a global leader in industrial software and critical infrastructure solutions. This latest customer acquisition underscores an important driver of Cybeats’ commercial growth strategy: the enterprise network effect. Within large-scale industrial technology ecosystems, trust, rigorous compliance validation, and operational value carry significant weight. This contract win illustrates Cybeats’ progress on these revenue drivers as enterprises upgrade their SBOM implementations in advance of regulatory changes and evolving cybersecurity threats. By successfully delivering value to large, global tier-one players within their complex technology environments, Cybeats creates a natural channel to onboard associated enterprise accounts. This inherent “land-and-expand” dynamic accelerates sales cycles, simplifies corporate procurement, and drives compounding revenue growth without the traditional friction of net-new market entry. “Securing this partnership is a strong validation of SBOM Studio’s technical maturity and enterprise scalability,” said Dmitry Raidman, CTO of Cybeats. “As industrial software environments become more complex, organizations need continuous software supply chain visibility that can be operationalized across teams, products, and customers. Each successful deployment strengthens our market position and provides a repeatable model for broader adoption across the enterprise software ecosystem. As regulatory pressures mount globally, particularly around the security of industrial control systems (ICS) and operational technology (OT), organizations managing critical infrastructure face new, and increasingly complex demands for software transparency. Critical infrastructure operators and their software vendors are increasingly required to provide verifiable SBOMs, positioning Cybeats as an important compliance partner for enterprise software supply chains. https://tinyurl.com/3xjc8mwd

Mecka AI announces US$60 million to power physical AI.

The Toronto and New York City-based startup wants to build “the data and deployment layer” for physical AI. Mecka secured this sum across two previously unannounced SAFE financings: an initial US$25-million Series A round in November and US$35-million Series A extension that closed in recent weeks. San Francisco’s Framework Ventures, which typically focuses on crypto, led with support from SV Angel and ex-Google DeepMind researcher Ted Xiao, now a founding member of Jeff Bezos’ AI startup, Project Prometheus, among others. Mecka and others are betting that video captured from a first-person perspective will help robots not learn faster and scale more efficiently. The startup currently collects this data from home settings, culinary work, chemistry labs, task platforms, metal fabrication, and leather shops. Its internal “video understanding lab” turns this raw footage into training-ready data and refines its computer vision models. Since forming last year, the fast-growing firm has raised US$68 million, begun catering to multiple frontier robotics labs and Big Tech firms, and become—Mecka AI claims—one of the world’s largest providers of physical AI training data. Though it is domiciled in the US, three of its four co-founders are Canadian and 40 of its 45 staff are based in Toronto. It plans to use this money to help more companies deploy robots. https://tinyurl.com/bv9kjyfx

Pricepoint closes $6.6-million seed round for AI hospitality platform.

Montréal-based AI-for-hospitality startup Pricepoint announced a $6.6-million seed round to bring its platform to more hotels and accommodation providers. The startup, which helps hospitality providers optimize booking prices, said that the funding will go toward product development, expanding integrations, and doubling its 35-person team. https://tinyurl.com/36cmnffw

Version One Ventures raises US$108 million across two new funds.

Vancouver-based Version One Ventures has raised US$108-million (C$150 million) for two new funds. The early-stage investor in deep tech startups announced on Tuesday morning that it’s closed US$78-million for its fifth Version One Fund, and US$30-million for its third Opportunities Fund. The venture firm said its investment focus has evolved alongside major technological shifts, with a renewed focus on AI infrastructure and applications, robotics and physical AI, deep tech, and biology. It’s also looking at investing in emerging global ecosystems like India and Africa. https://tinyurl.com/khrhutk7

Canada says AI strategy will help create 250,000 jobs, boost GDP by 3%.

Canada unveiled a new artificial intelligence strategy on Thursday that it says will help create 250,000 jobs by 2031 and includes a new C$500 million ($360.05 million) tech fund to help homegrown AI ‌firms. The strategy, called “AI for all”, was announced by Prime Minister Mark Carney as the country’s biggest companies invest heavily to build new tools they hope will rapidly process information and increase Canada’s historically low productivity. The government expects the strategy to increase the country’s gross domestic product by 3%, unlocking nearly C$200 billion as commercialization and use of AI in key sectors increases labor productivity. Canada’s digital sector currently employs about 800,000 workers and contributes more than C$140 billion to GDP, with 150,000 jobs directly associated with AI. Canada will establish a C$500 million Canadian Tech Growth Fund to help close the capital gap ‌at ⁠Canadian AI companies versus U.S. tech giants. The fund will also enable the federal government to take equity stakes in Canadian AI firms. The government will use a C$500 million initiative from the Business Development Bank of Canada ⁠to finance access to AI tools for Canadian small and medium-sized enterprises. Canada reiterated plans to introduce new consumer privacy legislation to safeguard children’s information and online ⁠activities, combat deep fakes and strengthen consumers’ control over personal data. The government will also invest C$50 million to track emerging ⁠AI risks and conduct transparent evaluations of AI models. However, no timeline on the implementation of these regulations was disclosed. https://tinyurl.com/4zawkbnx

Semiconductor stocks lead Friday’s market selloff.

Semiconductor stocks sold off on Friday after going on a historic tear over the last several weeks, partly in response to May’s excellent jobs report that fueled speculation about an interest rate hike. Chip maker Marvell fell 17% while memory maker Micron and chip design firm Arm each fell 13%. Bigger chip designers Nvidia, Broadcom, Intel and AMD fell 6%, 8%, 11% and 11%, respectively. AI cloud provider Oracle fell around 9%. All fared worse than the S&P 500 index, which slid by around 2%. A breather appears completely reasonable,” said Morningstar analyst Brian Colello. The selloff doesn’t appear related to these companies’ financial results, though investors reacted poorly to Broadcom’s recent earnings despite the company reporting 48% revenue growth. Nearly all of the firms whose shares fell Friday are still up significantly this year. https://tinyurl.com/4rfcekvn

Anthropic makes confidential IPO filing.

Anthropic on Monday said it filed a draft S-1 form to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, a key step toward an initial public offering that Anthropic executives have discussed targeting for the fourth quarter. The company’s eventual IPO timing will depend on market conditions and other considerations. The filing follows Anthropic’s close last week of a US$65 billion fundraise at a US$900 billion valuation, the first time the company has overtaken rival OpenAI’s valuation. Anthropic recently crossed US$47 billion in annualized revenue, up from US$9 billion at the end of the year. OpenAI has also been expected to make its own confidential filing soon, if it hasn’t already. The company’s executives have discussed going public as soon as the fourth quarter. https://tinyurl.com/48smkufh

Google increases equity raise to US$84.75 billion.

Google’s parent company Alphabet said on Wednesday that it was increasing the size of its equity raise to US$84.75 billion from US$80 billion. The bulk of the money—Google’s first time selling new stock since 2005—is earmarked for spending on AI infrastructure and compute, highlighting the cost of the AI infrastructure buildout. Google said on Monday that around US$30 billion will go towards paying taxes on employee equity grants. Google is pricing the Class A common stock at US$355.19 per share and Class C capital stock at US$351.80 per share, both around 1% lower than the shares were trading as of Wednesday morning. Google’s shares dropped 2% in after hours trading on Monday after the equity raise was announced, and had dropped further as of Wednesday morning. https://tinyurl.com/3sbdbetc

SpaceX sets US$135 per share target price for IPO.

SpaceX plans to sell 555.6 million shares at an expected price of US$135 each when it goes public, the company said in a securities filing on Wednesday. SpaceX is expecting to raise US$75 billion, more than twice as much as any other IPO in history, at a valuation of US$1.77 trillion. Setting an exact price per share at this stage is unusual. Companies usually set a range and gauge demand before deciding on an exact figure. SpaceX shares are expected to start trading late next week on Nasdaq under the ticker SPCX. SpaceX is using a dual class share structure that will give CEO Elon Musk over 82% voting control after the IPO, according to filings. Wednesday’s filing also included a new disclosure that it purchased $269 million worth of Tesla megapack batteries in April, on top of previous purchases. https://tinyurl.com/2scht63m

SpaceX pushes for IPO banks to cut fees.

SpaceX is negotiating to pay the banks working on its potentially record-breaking initial public offering a smaller than normal slice of the proceeds even by mega-IPO standards, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. SpaceX is aiming to raise about US$75 billion, more than any other IPO in history. Banks generally charge fees of 4% to 7% of capital raised on smaller IPOs, though that percentage typically shrinks with mega listings. SpaceX is seeking a less than 0.75% fee, Bloomberg reported, while previous mega listings have usually commanded at least 1%. Even if SpaceX winds up getting the fee structure it wants, the banks would still earn around US$500 million, marking a collective windfall for Wall Street. Banks may also receive fees on top of the 0.75% if the IPO goes well, Bloomberg reported. SpaceX publicly filed its IPO paperwork in late May and is due to start trading as soon as next week. The company has nearly two dozen banks working on the IPO led by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. https://tinyurl.com/mpha9r8u

S&P 500 won’t make change that would have fast-tracked SpaceX.

S&P Dow Jones Indices said Thursday it had decided not to change its rules to make it easier and faster for SpaceX to quickly join the S&P 500 and other indices after it goes public. The group’s index committee had been considering a series of changes that would have let so-called megacap companies join the S&P 500 after six months of being public, compared to 12 months currently, and end a requirement that companies are profitable. The changes would almost certainly have helped SpaceX, as well as other highly-valued IPO candidates Anthropic and OpenAI, by forcing passive funds tied to the S&P 500 to buy SpaceX shares. Nasdaq has already eased its rules this year to allow companies to enter the Nasdaq 100 index after just 15 trading days. S&P Dow Jones Indices said its committee had decided against changing the rules following a “review of the markets and after consideration of responses received from a wide range of market participants.” Not making the proposed change “preserves core index principles by maintaining consistent application of these key requirements,” the group said. https://tinyurl.com/2yxx99nb

Marvell Technology and Flex to join S&P 500 index.

Marvell Technology, a chipmaker that makes several different parts and products needed for the artificial intelligence infrastructure boom, is joining the S&P 500 on June 22, becoming the latest semiconductor company to be added to the benchmark. Flex, a contract manufacturer for electronics, will also be added to the index on June 22, according to a press release. The two companies will replace Pool Corp and The Campbell’s Company. Marvell, headquartered in Santa Clara, California, was founded in 1995 to produce parts for spinning disk drives. Flex, which was previously known as Flextronics, is headquartered in Singapore but operates factories in both the U.S. and Asia. https://tinyurl.com/39a2yckr

China’s MiniMax Launches new model as open-source AI coding battle heats up.

Chinese AI developer MiniMax on Monday launched a new large language model called M3, saying the new model’s coding capability approaches that of Anthropic’s Opus 4.7, which was released in April. The new MiniMax model is particularly suitable for coding and complex multi-step tasks for AI agents, according to the company. It can understand text, images and video in prompts. MiniMax’s M3 costs only US$0.12 per 1 million input tokens, compared with US$5 for Opus 4.7. Separately, MiniMax, which went public in Hong Kong in January, said on Sunday that it is exploring a listing on Shanghai’s tech-focused Star market. Competition is heating up among MiniMax and other Chinese developers of open-source models that offer much cheaper AI coding alternatives to Anthropic and OpenAI. Such models have gained popularity among cost-conscious customers around the world. DeepSeek launched its long-awaited new model, V4, in late April. Moonshot AI, another Chinese open-source AI developer, also released its latest model, Kimi K2.6, in April. https://tinyurl.com/ynd9srpb

U.S. officials said to discuss taking stakes in AI companies.

Senior U.S. officials have held preliminary discussions with major artificial intelligence companies about the federal government possibly acquiring shares in their firms, the publication Notus reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The preliminary discussions have centered on having firms voluntarily provide the shares, said the Notus article, which said OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has periodically discussed the idea with senior Trump administration officials and that Anthropic isn’t discussing providing equity to the government. The article didn’t specify which other companies might be involved in such discussions. It said planning is ongoing and details are in flux. Any such deals would be sure to stir controversy, though political figures on both the right and the left have made similar proposals. OpenAI floated the idea in an April research paper of a public fund that could distribute benefits from AI’s economic gains directly to citizens. The paper said policymakers and AI companies should work together to determine how to best seed such a fund. Under the Trump administration, the federal government already has acquired stakes in several companies including chipmaker Intel. https://tinyurl.com/3r37nmme

Anthropic cuts list of firms unauthorized for trading in its shares.

Anthropic reduced the list of secondary markets it says aren’t authorized to buy or sell its shares, scaling back guidance that had prompted confusion. The company revised guidance on its website about unauthorized stock sales to list four explicitly barred platforms, half the number in an earlier update in May. Anthropic in both versions said any sale or transfer of its stock offered by the listed firms is void. The earlier guidance prompted concern among some investors and a rebuttal from the CEO of Hiive, one of the platforms it named, who said his company only handles authorized trading, Bloomberg News reported. Hiive doesn’t appear on the new, shorter list. The CEO, Sim Desai, wrote on LinkedIn after the change that Anthropic’s earlier post had “caused needless confusion amongst the investment community and unfair damage to Hiive’s reputation.” Anthropic’s latest version notes that it periodically updates the page and that “removing a firm does not mean Anthropic recognizes or approves any related investment vehicles.” https://tinyurl.com/tchx98af

Salesforce stake in Anthropic reaches US$5 billion.

Salesforce’s stake in frontier AI model provider Anthropic has reached a roughly US$5 billion following multiple investments and Anthropic’s latest funding round, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. Bloomberg first reported the value of Salesforce’s stake in Anthropic on Monday. Salesforce stock rose nearly 10% the same day, narrowing its year-to-date loss to 21%. Anthropic last week said it raised $65 billion at a US$900 billion valuation, 15 times its valuation a year ago. Salesforce began investing in Anthropic in 2023 and has participated in multiple funding rounds, the person confirmed. Salesforce’s AI assistant within Slack, Slackbot, is also powered by Anthropic’s Claude. https://tinyurl.com/ckeck6u5

Broadcom reports 48% revenue growth as AI chip business expands.

Broadcom reported 48% higher revenue for its second fiscal quarter, ended May 3, as its AI chip revenue jumped 143% to US$10.8 billion. Overall revenue of US$22.187 billion was roughly in line with the company’s projection issued in early March. Broadcom has benefited from growing efforts by companies such as Google and OpenAI to develop their own AI chips. That has turbocharged the semiconductor part of Broadcom’s business, dramatically accelerating its growth rate. The company projected its topline to expand 84% in the third quarter, driven by even faster growth in AI chips. Despite the improvement, Wall Street was disappointed, as Broadcom shares fell 12% in after hours trading, suggesting analysts were expecting even stronger growth. https://tinyurl.com/42f99w9j

CrowdStrike narrowly beats estimates on AI tailwinds, but stock falls 10%.

CrowdStrike narrowly beat Wall Street’s fiscal first-quarter estimates after the bell on Wednesday, but shares slid 10% following the report. The cybersecurity company said revenue grew 26% from a year ago. CrowdStrike also announced a four-for-one stock split effective in July. Shares closed at US$747.61 on Wednesday. CEO George Kurtz said the company is benefiting from an “AI inflection point” fueled by rising customer platform adoption. “In Q1, the worlds of cybersecurity and frontier AI collided: this was the Mythos moment,” he said in a press release. “CrowdStrike is AI security infrastructure, critical to successful AI adoption.” CrowdStrike is among a wave of cybersecurity companies profiting from skyrocketing demand for cyber tools as advanced models such as Anthropic’s Mythos threaten to accelerate the pace of cyberattacks. The sector has also managed to shake off recent AI disruption concerns that rattled software names earlier this year. CrowdStrike is up about 60% this year. Kurtz told analysts on a Wednesday earnings call that AI detection and response, or AIDR, is emerging as a new growth vector for CrowdStrike. He said its second-quarter pipeline had already exceeded US$50 million. “Think of CrowdStrike as the picks and shovels of the world’s largest technology gold rush of all time,” he said. CrowdStrike is an early tester of Anthropic’s Mythos through Project Glasswing. The AI lab gave select companies early access to the model, amid fears that hackers could use it to devastating effect if released globally. https://tinyurl.com/3fbx6jdk

Softbank to invest up to 75 billion Euros on AI data centers in France.

SoftBank Group announced a commitment to develop and operate five gigawatts of AI data center capacity in France, with an investment of up to 75 billion euros, or about US$87.5 billion. The commitment is SoftBank’s largest AI infrastructure investment to date in Europe, the company said on Saturday. SoftBank said its plans leverage strategic advantages for France including advanced grid infrastructure and industrial land availability. SoftBank will work with SB Energy and other strategic partners to develop the projects, which will start with a 45 billion euro investment to deliver 3.1 gigawatts of data center capacity in the Hauts-de-France region. SoftBank also will partner with Schneider Electric on a large-scale production cluster for AI infrastructure at the Port of Dunkirk. https://tinyurl.com/yp5zkymu

Google agrees to pay SpaceX US$920 million monthly for compute access.

Google has agreed to pay US$920 million a month to purchase compute capacity from SpaceX, SpaceX said in a filing. The deal will run from October 2026 through June 2029, and Google will be able to access approximately 110,000 Nvidia GPUs, CPUs and related components, according to the filing. SpaceX has been renting out compute capacity—among the scarcest resources of the AI boom—to other AI companies as its own model development efforts, via xAI, have faltered. Anthropic signed a deal last month to pay SpaceX US$1.25 billion a month for access to 325,000 Nvidia GPUs. Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is a major investor in SpaceX, which is expected to go public as soon as next week. Alphabet’s 6% stake in SpaceX could be worth more than US$100 billion if SpaceX IPOs at US$1.75 trillion as targeted. https://tinyurl.com/h5u33zt

SpaceX discloses updated details of Anthropic deal, flags data center water risks.

SpaceX’s compute rental deal with Anthropic will run for a minimum of six months, according to an amended securities filing on Monday, providing an additional level detail that had not been included in the IPO filing the company made public in May. Anthropic’s agreement to pay SpaceX US$1.25 billion per month to rent compute from its Memphis data centers will run for an “initial three-month period” and can then be cancelled by either party with 90 days’ notice until it ends in May 2029, the new filing says. The initial SpaceX filing did not include language about an initial three-month initial deal period with Anthropic, but SpaceX CEO Elon Musk posted on X last week describing it as a “180-day lease with 90 day notice mutual cancellation.” The updated SpaceX filing also includes new language about water shortages affecting its data centers, noting that “competition for local water resources” and “regulatory restrictions on water use” could “limit our ability to obtain sufficient water for cooling” and “delay or limit expansion of data center infrastructure.” SpaceX, which operates xAI data centers in the Memphis area, has been criticized by local officials for pausing construction in April of a planned $80 million plant that was supposed to recycle wastewater for use in its Colossus data center. https://tinyurl.com/bum96hrs

SpaceX is awarded US$4 billion contract with U.S. Space Force.

The U.S. Space Force awarded a US$4.16 billion contract to SpaceX as part of a program to deploy space-based sensors to track and target airborne threats. The deal for the Space-Based Airborne Moving Target Indicator program, announced last Friday, highlights the increasingly important government relationship with SpaceX, which is preparing for what’s expected to be the biggest initial public offering ever next month. The Elon Musk-headed company is the U.S. government’s primary launch provider. Space Force said the new award is expected to lead to a constellation of satellites by 2028 that will provide “an early capability to eliminate operational blind spots.” It said it anticipates issuing multiple awards in the coming year to various vendors for the program. The space-based tracking network is part of the Trump Administration’s planned US$185 billion Golden Dome defense system, Bloomberg News reported. https://tinyurl.com/bdd2e8ka

ChatGPT app hits 1 billion monthly active users in record time, data shows.

OpenAI’s ChatGPT has crossed 1 billion global monthly active app users, becoming the fastest app ever to reach the milestone, ‌according to estimates from market intelligence firm Sensor Tower. The record comes amid growing competition between Anthropic and OpenAI for dominance in the rapidly expanding artificial intelligence market. ChatGPT ⁠reached 1 billion MAUs in May, roughly three years after launch, surpassing the pace set by apps including Google Maps, TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, Sensor Tower said. The firm said U.S. ChatGPT users who installed Anthropic’s Claude app in the first quarter of 2026 spent 5% less time on ‌ChatGPT ⁠one month after installation, compared with their average usage in the prior eight months. As of the second ⁠quarter to date, Claude had 56 million global monthly active app users, while its year-over-year MAU ⁠growth of about 640% significantly outpaced ChatGPT’s 62% growth, according to Sensor Tower. https://tinyurl.com/3e7k7v2c

Microsoft unveils new homegrown AI, OpenClaw-inspired agents for businesses.

Microsoft on Tuesday revealed new AI software geared towards developers and corporate customers, including homegrown AI models and new tools that aim to let corporate customers develop AI agents that can draw on internal company data to automate workplace tasks. The announcements come as Microsoft is aiming to woo more developers to use its AI-powered software, a key plank of its effort to bolster GitHub and its Azure cloud platform against rising competition from the likes of OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google. Microsoft announced seven new homegrown AI models, including one model specialized for coding, which will be available in Microsoft’s GitHub Copilot AI coding tool as a cheaper alternative to models from OpenAI and Anthropic, Microsoft said. Other AI models unveiled Tuesday are specialized for reasoning, transcription, generating images, and speech. Microsoft also debuted a new AI agent product called Microsoft Scout, combining the popular open source OpenClaw agent software with customers’ internal company data, such as their Teams and Outlook messages, to work on long-running tasks autonomously within companies. For instance, a company can use Scout to keep tabs on employees’ meetings and automatically send meeting attendees prep notes gleaned from their emails, or suggest ways to reschedule meetings when there are conflicts, Microsoft said. And Microsoft shared more details about how businesses can connect their AI agents to internal data stored within their other Microsoft apps, such as Office 365 or Fabric data software. Microsoft will sell access to the data through products dubbed Microsoft IQ, which will be available as application programming interfaces that let AI agents pull data directly out of those applications to automate tasks within a company’s IT systems. The release echoes similar data products for AI agents released by the likes of Salesforce and Snowflake in recent months. The company also revealed new cybersecurity tools that help companies track and manage agents, and tools that direct AI agents to find and fix security bugs in companies’ systems. Finally, Microsoft unveiled new tools geared towards app developers, including a desktop app version of its GitHub Copilot AI coding tool and a new tool called Project Rayfin that lets developers quickly spin up websites that they code using AI tools. Microsoft also pitched the new Surface RTX Spark laptop powered by Nvidia processors that it announced on Sunday as a device geared towards developers. https://tinyurl.com/mw9r323p

Microsoft debuts new Nvidia-powered “Dev Box” PC; OS for Wearable and Desktop “Agent First” devices.

Microsoft on Tuesday unveiled a new desktop PC powered by an Nvidia processor geared towards developers who want to run AI models locally. The new PC, called the Surface RTX Spark Dev Box, is powered by Nvidia’s new Arm-based chips announced earlier this week. Microsoft previously announced a new Surface laptop powered by the chips on Sunday. Microsoft said the Dev Box will make it possible for developers to run more AI models locally, making it less expensive for them to use AI tools like its GitHub Copilot coding product. The device gives Microsoft a more direct competitor to Apple’s Mac Mini, which has seen spiking demand from developers over the past year aiming to use the computers to run AI locally. “It’s like a datacenter right on your desktop,” CEO Satya Nadella said during his keynote address at Microsoft’s Build conference Tuesday. He added that Dev Box will offer 1 petaflop of compute power—while that’s not enough compute power to run frontier models from the likes of OpenAI or Anthropic locally, Microsoft said the Dev Box can handle smaller models, including its own homegrown models that can handle less complex AI tasks. Microsoft hasn’t disclosed pricing or detailed specifications for the new Surface devices, which it said will become available later this year. Separately, Microsoft on Tuesday previewed a new operating system meant for internet-connected smart devices that would let professionals to remotely control AI agents. Microsoft showed two prototypes of such devices—which it called “Project Solara”—including a wearable handheld badge with a built-in camera and microphone and a “stationary” desktop console, both of which feature touch screens and connect to the internet. Microsoft doesn’t have plans to sell those devices itself, but rather aims to sell the operating system for such devices that could be made by other manufacturers. The operating system is meant to let users control AI tools such as its 365 Copilot AI software, which automates workplace tasks like drafting emails, rescheduling meetings, or sending messages, by speaking to such internet-connected devices. Microsoft said the devices are built to support workers in fields like healthcare, construction, retail, and other industries—for instance, a healthcare professional could use the wearable badge device to scan patient records and automatically record and transcribe meetings with patients, Microsoft said. Corporate customers including Accuweather, Best Buy, CVS, and Target are currently “exploring” how to use the devices, Microsoft said. https://tinyurl.com/bdcmn6xp

Apple to launch new Siri in September with help of Google, Nvidia.

Apple is currently on track to launch its overhauled Siri in September, to run in part on Google’s cloud computing servers using Nvidia chips, according to people familiar with the matter. While Apple will try to run as much as possible of the new Siri on devices such as iPhones, certain parts will require more compute power and will run on Google Cloud. Specifically, Apple will tap into Google’s fleet of Nvidia’s Blackwell B200 data center chips, said the people. Apple will enable Nvidia’s confidential compute feature that encrypts data as it’s being processed on the chips. This measure is supposed to ensure Apple can maintain its high security and privacy standards while running customer data in another company’s cloud servers. The move diverges from Apple’s strategy of attempting to control all the critical ingredients to its products. It’s unclear how Apple’s previously launched server system, called Private Cloud Compute, will fit into the upcoming Siri product launch. Private Cloud Compute, which runs on Apple’s Mac-series chips, was announced two years ago as a way to offer cloud-based computing in a more private and secure fashion. Apple tried to get a modified version of Google’s Gemini–which Apple is relying on for the Siri overhaul–working on this in-house server system, but found it ran too slowly. Apple will announce the new Siri, which is supposed to offer a more personalized and sophisticated chat experience, next week at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference. The new version of its beleaguered voice assistant was initially announced in 2024, but Apple struggled to get a working version using its own internal artificial intelligence models. Instead, over the past year Apple has been turning to outside partners like Google and its Gemini model to power the Siri revamp. https://tinyurl.com/zu5rwym5

Nvidia unveils new chip for PCs.

Nvidia unveiled a new chip for personal computers alongside Microsoft on Monday, a major step into the PC chip market long led by Intel, Advanced Micro Devices and Apple. The new chip, called N1X, will power a new line of Windows computers starting this fall, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said during a keynote in Taipei. The N1X will sit inside Nvidia’s RTX Spark, a chip package that brings together a standard computer processor, an AI-focused graphics processor and shared memory in one system. While Nvidia is expanding into the PC market, the company’s core data-centre business is still scaling fast. Huang said Vera Rubin, Nvidia’s next computing system for AI data centers, is now in full production, and the supply chain built for it is twice as large as the one for Grace Blackwell, the current flagship platform. His comments suggest that demand for AI computing continues to grow, even after the huge spending wave around Blackwell. During his two-hour keynote speech, Huang also spent some time talking up Vera, Nvidia’s new central processing unit, the chip that acts as the traffic controller inside an AI server. Server CPUs from Intel and AMD are in short supply, and AI systems need more of them as workloads shift from training models to running agents. Huang said Vera offers far more memory bandwidth, or data-moving capacity, than server CPUs from Intel and AMD. He also said demand is already building from early adopters including OpenAI, Anthropic and SpaceX. https://tinyurl.com/2s3b7t3h

Intel to ship new AI chip this year to challenge Nvidia.

Intel plans to ship a new AI chip by the end of this year, betting that a cheaper, simpler processor can give it a new foothold in a market dominated by Nvidia, according to a Financial Times interview with Kevork Kechichian, who leads Intel’s data centre group. The chip, code-named Crescent Island, is built for inference, the work of running AI models, according to the newspaper. Inference is the fastest-growing part of the AI computing market and the area where customers care most about cost. Crescent Island uses lower-cost memory than Nvidia’s chips, and is designed for air-cooled servers, the kind of servers most data centres already run. That makes it easier and cheaper to deploy than chips that need liquid cooling and expensive high-bandwidth memory. Intel wants to build the chip in its own factories, rather than outsourcing production to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company as it has done for many recent products, according to Kechichian. Using its own factories would give Intel more control over supply and could push costs lower than rivals that depend on TSMC for their most advanced chips. Intel is also assessing whether a version of Crescent Island can be sold in China in compliance with US export controls, according to Kechichian. Washington’s restrictions have squeezed Nvidia out of much of the Chinese AI market, and a compliant, lower-cost Intel chip could land in a market its rivals can no longer freely serve. https://tinyurl.com/yzzytr3t

Why IBM is investing US$10 billion into quantum computing.

IBM is committing more than US$10 billion over the next five years to advance quantum computing. The investment will fund research and development, capital expenditure, manufacturing scaling, ecosystem partnerships, and strategic acquisitions. IBM already plans to deliver the world’s first large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computer in 2029—this investment is designed to accelerate progress beyond the roadmap and advance quantum leadership anchored in the United States. IBM plans to release the world’s first large-scale, fault tolerant quantum computer, IBM Quantum Starling, in 2029. Starling will be able to run 100 million quantum operations on 200 qubits. IBM clients are already pursuing use cases across chemistry simulation, optimization, financial services, and more, while researching algorithms that solve problems beyond the ability of any classical computer. By scaling quantum computing, this funding will allow us to scale these algorithms and applications. Use cases with the potential to scale include: Simulating molecules like large-scale proteins relevant to medical research, Optimizing complex networks like energy grids, Providing new methods for financial services applications like portfolio optimization and algorithmic trading. https://tinyurl.com/mpbap2au

Microsoft’s new quantum chip aiming for useful machine in 2029.

Microsoft Corp. announced an updated quantum-computing chip, the Majorana 2, at its Build developer conference in San Francisco. The company says its main achievement with the new device is that the qubits last longer than 20 seconds, and it boasts 12 qubits, up from 8 in the prior model. Microsoft aims to reach a scalable, practical quantum computer by 2029, based on the rapid progress it has made with the Majorana 2. Several large companies are racing to build working quantum computers, which they argue will transform finance, medicine and cybersecurity. While some have demonstrated impressive advances recently, none has been able to demonstrate applications beyond research. Microsoft is taking a unique approach, called topological qubits, which is different than the path used by Google, IBM and other companies. https://tinyurl.com/5af2k73e

Royal Navy readies mine-clearing robot as RFA strike nears.

RFA Lyme Bay has been loaded with the Defender Viper system, a remotely operated vehicle equipped to locate and destroy buoyant mines just below the water surface. The portable submersible uses sonar and video feeds to operate effectively in low visibility, and can be deployed from small boats or shipboard command centres. The UK, US and Australia have launched a joint programme under the AUKUS security partnership to develop uncrewed undersea vehicles for protecting seabed infrastructure such as communications cables and pipelines. Expected to be operational next year, the drones will carry advanced sensors, payloads and weapons for missions including surveillance, logistics and precision strikes. The £150 million UK investment comes amid heightened concern over Russian and Chinese activity near critical underwater assets. https://tinyurl.com/5dd4urjf

Florida sues OpenAI and Sam Altman over safety concerns.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Monday sued OpenAI and its chief executive Sam Altman, alleging 10 counts of negligence, liability, and other state law violations related to safety concerns over OpenAI’s consumer-facing tool ChatGPT. With the lawsuit, Florida became the first state to sue the AI company. The 83-page complaint alleges that ChatGPT has “aided and abetted” mass shooters, encouraged “vulnerable people” to commit suicide, and addicted minors by feigning “human compassion.” The lawsuit, which seeks both monetary damages and to stop certain business practices from OpenAI, also seeks to hold Altman personally liable for what the complaint describes as “reckless and willful misconduct.” “This litany of harms is driven by Defendants’ insatiable quest to win the AI arms race and amass large fortunes,” reads the complaint. A spokesperson for OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Uthmeier had previously announced a criminal investigation into OpenAI in April over the role of ChatGPT in a mass shooting at Florida State University in 2025, coming after an initial review by prosecutors of the chat logs between ChatGPT and the gunman. While Florida’s politicians have positioned the state as a tech hub to attract startups and venture investors, Uthmeier and Governor Ron DeSantis have emerged as stark critics of AI companies. “People are getting hurt, parents are getting deceived, and they need to pay for it,” said Uthmeier during a press conference on Monday. https://tinyurl.com/3rswvnbp

Stripe, Visa, Mastercard, Coinbase to form consortium to issue new stablecoin.

Stripe, Visa, Mastercard and Coinbase are planning to form a consortium to issue a new stablecoin, according to people familiar with the matter, seeking to challenge the dominance of Circle and Tether, the two biggest issuers that make up 80% of market share currently. The new stablecoin will be compliant with the Genius Act, the U.S. legislation passed last year. Coinbase’s participation is notable, given its close partnership with Circle. Coinbase is the biggest distribution partner for Circle’s stablecoins and shares a portion of Circle’s revenue. Coinbase and its users held about US$19 billion of USDC tokens, accounting for more than 25% of the tokens in circulation, as of the end of the first quarter. Stripe-owned Bridge offers a stablecoin issuance business and has won partners including payroll company Deel and buy-now-pay-later firm Klarna. Visa and Mastercard are also growing their stablecoin-related businesses, including offering stablecoin-backed cards and using the token for settlement. The combination of payments and card giants involved could boost adoption of the new token, but the field has become increasingly competitive, threatening profits as platforms give out rewards, or yield, to users as incentives. CoinDesk on Wednesday reported on some of the group’s plans, without specifying the launch of a new stablecoin. The four companies declined to comment. https://tinyurl.com/ypvrxpmw

SK Hynix to double capacity as AI strains memory supply.

SK Hynix plans to double its memory chip capacity within five years as AI demand keeps straining global supply, Bloomberg reported. The expansion can ease one of the biggest hardware constraints facing AI data centers. Chairman Chey Tae-won said in Taipei that the memory crunch could persist until 2030, according to Bloomberg. SK Hynix is stepping up investment to narrow the shortfall, though Chey said the final cost for expansion is hard to estimate because prices for land, equipment and electricity are volatile. The company has said previously its 2026 capital spending will rise sharply from 30.2 trillion won (US$20 billion) in 2025, without giving further details. SK Hynix has also filed to list its American depositary receipts this year, which would give US investors an additional avenue to bet on the AI memory trade. SK Hynix, along with Samsung Electronics and Micron Technology, are the dominant players for global memory market and are suppliers of high bandwidth memory used in AI accelerators, including Nvidia’s chips. The company has become a winner of the global AI boom, as memory chips are increasingly seen as one of the main bottlenecks for AI development. Its shares rose last week in Seoul, pushing the company past US$1 trillion in market value and lifting its 12-month gain to more than 1,000%. https://tinyurl.com/yhyssv5a