After already being delayed once before, OpenAI's first open source model since GPT-2 faces yet another indefinite delay to conduct more safety and high-risk testing, according to company CEO Sam Altman. Some speculate that the model, which was supposed to launch this week, may have been delayed due to the release of xAI's recent Grok 4 and perhaps even Kimi K2, a one-trillion parameter open-source model from Chinese AI startup Moonshot that has been making the rounds. Aidan Clark, OpenAI's VP of research, said in a post on X/Twitter that the team doesn't believe the model meets its "bar for an open source model."
A recent report from the Financial Times claims that xAI is in preliminary talks to secure fresh capital at a valuation anywhere between $170 billion and $200 billion. The report says that Saudi Arabia's PIF, its sovereign wealth fund, is set to lead the round via an indirect stake through Kingdom Holdings. However, despite the well-sourced reports, Elon Musk stated in a reply that the "rumors are false" and that "xAI is not seeking capital." SpaceX, another one of his companies, has reportedly agreed to invest $2 billion in xAI as part of a separate investment.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently announced that the company is currently building out a massive new AI data center capable of an estimated 5 gigawatts of power. Dubbed Hyperion, the to-be-built data center would have a footprint large enough to cover most of Manhattan, with its power output aimed at feeding Meta's newly formed AI lab. Zuckerberg also announced that Meta will have another 1 gigawatt AI super cluster, Prometheus, going online sometime in 2026. However, many worry that data centers of such size would put significant strain on local power grids and water supply, as The New York Times has reported.
OpenAI's planned $3 billion acquisition of AI coding startup Windsurf has come to a grinding halt as a joint post from it and Google announced the hiring of Windsurf's CEO, a co-founder, and some R&D employees. The group will join the team at Google DeepMind, with their efforts concentrated on Gemini's agentic coding powers. Google reportedly won't hold any stake or control in Windsurf, though it has signed a non-exclusive license to part of Windsurf's tech as part of the $2.4 billion agreement. Although OpenAI's deal fell through, Cognition, the one behind the viral Devin AI coding agent, was there to pick up the pieces as it acquired Windsurf instead.
While xAI may or may not be looking to secure fresh capital, what it has secured is a $200 million ceiling contract with the US Department of Defense. Under the guise of xAI's "Grok For Government," the AI suite will be available across "every federal government department, agency, or office" as part of the Pentagon's push to transform its operational procedures with the use of AI. The Pentagon also extended awards to Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI, each with its own $200 million ceiling.
Months since it was first forced to stop sales of its H20 AI chips to China, Nvidia announced on Tuesday that it is set to resume sales shortly. Nvidia's H20 GPUs were explicitly designed to skirt around earlier export curbs, but the current administration's April regulations effectively halted sales as licenses became required. However, Nvidia has now stated that the US government has given its assurance and commitment to seeing the company's filing through to the end and grant its licenses, paving the way for Nvidia to recover much of its slashed market share in China.