Microsoft, Meta, and Alphabet disclosed that they had spent $32B+ combined on data centers and other capital expenses in Q1, as they accelerate AI spending
The spending that the industry's giants expect artificial intelligence to require is starting to come into focus — and it is jarringly large.
Oracle reports Q3 revenue up 7% YoY to $13.3B, meeting expectations, and cloud services and license support revenues up 12% YoY to $9.96B; ORCL jumps 9%+
despite the fact we are opening new and expanding existing cloud datacenters very, very rapidly” $ORCL: +9.4% AH [image] LinkedIn: Craig Guarente : Three problems with Oracle earni...
IBM reports Q4 revenue up 4% YoY to $17.38B, vs. $17.30B est., software revenue up 3% YoY to $7.51B, and net income of $3.29B, up from $2.71B YoY; IBM jumps 8%+
Jordan Novet / CNBC :
The European Parliament and the EU's 27 member states will need to approve the AI Act, which seeks fines of up to €35M or 7% of global turnover for violations
- Region couldn't ‘let the perfect be the enemy of the good’ — Negotiators broke coffee machine working late-night deal
The EU reaches a deal on the AI Act, one of the world's first comprehensive attempts to limit AI use, including in law enforcement and critical infrastructure
another set of rules that let them fine US big tech companies since there aren't any European ones. The law will require foundation models, including GPT & Gemini, to comply with ...
Sources: the FTC is finalizing its antitrust suit against Amazon and is likely to file its case in federal court rather than its own tribunal as soon as August
FTC readies lawsuit that could break up Amazon — https://www.politico.com/... Twitter: @ethangach : My favorite fan mantra from the Xbox Activision hearing was that losing cases ...
Dell Q1: revenue down 20% YoY to $20.92B, vs. $20.12B est., Client Solutions revenue down 23% YoY to $11.98B, vs. $11.41B est., net income down 46% YoY to $578M
Jeremy C. Owens / MarketWatch :
The UK CMA's block of Microsoft's Activision deal focuses on the nascent cloud gaming market, confusing analysts as regulators typically focus on mature markets
but that's what tripped up the Activision deal Reuters : UK watchdog defends Microsoft block in face of onslaught from companies Rebekah Valentine / IGN : Microsoft, Activision-Bli...
The UK CMA's block of Microsoft's Activision deal focuses on the nascent cloud gaming market, confusing analysts as regulators typically focus on mature markets
but that's what tripped up the Activision deal Sean Carey / TrueAchievements : Microsoft inks another 10-year cloud gaming partnership despite CMA setback Sean Hollister / The Verg...
A profile of Sarah Cardell, the UK CMA's Chief Executive, who played a key role in shaping the policy that led to Microsoft's Activision takeover being blocked
Former corporate lawyer has attracted the ire of the US group by blocking its $75bn acquisition of Activision
Sources detail Google's project Magi to upgrade search with AI, as Samsung considers defaulting to Bing; source: 160+ employees are working full time on Magi
The tech giant is sprinting to protect its core business with a flurry of projects, including updates to its search engine and plans for an all-new one.
French startup Yousign, a DocuSign-rival that provides an e-signature service targeting European SMBs, raises €30M Series A led by Lead Edge Capital
French startup Yousign has raised a $36.6 million Series A funding round (€30 million). Lead Edge Capital is leading the round … Tweets: @charlesfitz Tweets: Charles Fitzgerald / ...
Sources: IBM is exploring a sale of its IBM Watson Health business, which has roughly $1B in annual revenue and isn't currently profitable
WSJ reports IBM exploring sale of Watson Health business https://www.wsj.com/... Jeffrey Snover / @jsnover : I always considered Watson a pixie dust marketing ploy aimed at the low...
Facebook paid $367.6M to buy a 400K square foot complex from REI in Bellevue, WA, expanding its 3M square feet office space footprint in Seattle
Taylor Soper / GeekWire :
Amazon sues former AWS VP of product marketing Brian Hall, alleging his new role at Google Cloud violates a non-compete agreement
A lawsuit filed by Amazon against Brian Hall, former Amazon Web Services vice president of product marketing, alleges that his new role at Google Cloud violates …
The FTC is asking Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft about acquisitions from the past decade that were small enough to not be reported to the gov't
FTC to review acquisitions made by Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft — The Federal Trade Commission …
Sources: Google is testing a new communications app for businesses, which brings together functions from Gmail, Drive, Hangouts Meet, Hangouts Chat, and more
Google is working on a mobile application for businesses that brings together the functions of several standalone apps the company already offers …
Red Hat's big sale, disappointing exits of Hadoop-based startups and Pivotal show how public clouds like AWS affect business models of open source-focused firms
TL;DR: If the cloud didn't eat Hadoop Inc., Pivotal and Red Hat, what explains their diminished prospects?