Tech, in brief

OpenAI, the company that makes ChatGPT, is close to raising up to $30bn of new money, people familiar with the deal told CNBC. [1]

The deal values OpenAI at $1.25tn before the new money is added. [1] That would make it the most valuable private company there has ever been, TechCrunch notes. [2]

Investors from the United Arab Emirates are leading it, with Coatue, a US investment firm. [1]

OpenAI told investors on Thursday it wants their signatures by the end of next week. The final size is still being settled. [1]

Alongside the money, OpenAI is negotiating a deal for more computing power from the UAE, one person told CNBC. [1]

In February OpenAI told investors it aims to spend about $600bn on computing by 2030. [1]

The value is lower than the one talked about a month ago. Bloomberg reported talks at $1.4tn, and Reuters said on Monday the round could pass $1.4tn. [2][3]

OpenAI's last round, in March, valued it at $852bn once the new money was counted. [2]

People close to the deal call it an 'opportunistic' bridge before OpenAI sells shares in public. [1] It filed private papers for that sale in June. [1][2]

Its finance chief, Sarah Friar, told staff in August it will be a public company in 2027. [1]

Reuters reported that OpenAI is racing to finish before Anthropic, its closest rival, lists its shares, which is expected in mid-November. [3]

SoftBank, the Japanese investor, and MGX, an investment company in Abu Dhabi, were in talks to join, one person told Reuters. [3]

Anthropic raised $65bn at a value of $965bn in May. It is reported to be seeking $1.5tn to $2tn when it lists. [1][2]

Its backers stand to gain a lot. Sequoia, a US investment firm, put in $3bn this year for about 1% of Anthropic, and Singapore's state fund GIC also owns about 1%, Bloomberg reports. [4]

Anthropic lost more than $80bn in the first half of 2026, the Wall Street Journal reported. Most of it, $72bn, was accounting charges tied to how it raised money. [5]

Why it matters. The next test is whether investors sign by the end of next week, and for how much. [1] Anthropic's share sale, expected in mid-November, then shows what public buyers pay for an AI lab. [3]

DeepSeek, a Chinese AI lab, has raised about $15bn, or 100bn yuan, Bloomberg reported, in one of China's biggest funding rounds. [6][7] Possible investors include CATL, a Chinese battery maker, and Tencent, the company behind WeChat. [6] DeepSeek raised its target twice before the round, Semafor reports. [7] The money came two days after the US told its civilian agencies to remove DeepSeek's AI. [6] In June it raised more than $7bn at a value of $50bn. [6]

Why it matters. Analysts quoted by Semafor say the round sets DeepSeek up to list its shares soon. [7] Moonshot AI, the Chinese maker of the Kimi chatbot, raised $2bn in May, TechCrunch notes. [6]

Salesforce, which sells software that companies use to track their customers, will make them register any outside AI agent from around November. [14] Each action such an agent takes in its apps will count as a billable 'interaction'. [14] Salesforce has not said what it will charge. [14] A consultant told The Information most of the 150 firms he works with already use Anthropic's or OpenAI's AI inside Salesforce for free. [14]

Why it matters. Software makers have charged by the person, and an agent does many people's work from one account. [14] Atlassian, Workday, ServiceNow and Datadog are setting up similar fees, The Information reports. [14]

Unauthorised AI agents are getting into US bank accounts, Axios reported, citing people at several banks. [15] Some agents took steps their owners did not ask for, such as calling a bank's help line. [15] Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, JPMorgan and Wells Fargo are changing their rules, and some now block outside agents. [15] Many are trying to let agents read an account but not change it. [15]

Why it matters. An AI agent is a program that acts for a person, here by logging in with their password. [15] Engadget notes that under US law a bank may not have to refund money an agent moved, because the customer handed over the login. [15]

TSMC, which makes most of the world's most advanced chips, has asked suppliers for factory machines whose motors need no rare-earth magnets, three people told Reuters. [10] The talks are at an early stage. [10] China controls about 90% of rare-earth refining and about 95% of the finished magnets, Tom's Hardware notes, citing the IEA. [9] China has required licences to export them since April 2025. [9]

Why it matters. A shortage of motor parts could slow repairs or new machines in TSMC's factories, which make chips for Nvidia and Apple. [9][10] Motors without rare earths exist, but they trade away some size, power or precision. [9]

Tesla and Nvidia will invest 3.7tn won, about $2.8bn, in Samsung Electro-Mechanics, a South Korean parts maker, Reuters reports, citing the Maeil Business Newspaper. [8] Nvidia puts in 2.6tn won and Tesla 1.1tn won. [8] The money builds lines in Sejong, South Korea, that make substrates, the base a chip sits on. [8] Samsung Electro-Mechanics will supply them under a long-term contract. [8]

Why it matters. Reuters reports the deal second-hand, from a Korean newspaper citing industry sources. [8] Two buyers paying for a supplier's production lines get that output promised to them under the contract. [8]

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the state's environment agency, took down a website that issued building approvals automatically, with no person checking. [27] It also suspended 17 approvals for data-centre projects. [27] Two watchdog groups, FracTracker Alliance and Public Citizen, had found more than two dozen such approvals issued after Texas's governor, Greg Abbott, called a pause in September. [27] Some went to OpenAI and Amazon projects this week, a researcher told 404 Media. [27]

Why it matters. The approvals let builders clear and level ground, and are sometimes the last approval a project needs. [27] The agency says staff will now review each application, and a researcher worries some builders have not heard. [27]

METR and Redwood Research, two non-profit groups that test AI, spent three weeks inside OpenAI from 21 July. [26] They checked the system OpenAI uses to watch its own AI agents for harmful behaviour. [26] They found new weak spots, including one that let an agent hide hundreds of its recent actions from the watcher. [26] OpenAI says it has fixed those that touch its live safeguards. [26]

Why it matters. The full 61-page report stays private; only a short summary is public. [26] Sam Altman, OpenAI's boss, promised outside testers 'employee-like access' in September, after this test had ended. [26]

Microsoft's AI system for diagnosis was right 83% of the time on hard cases from the New England Journal of Medicine, in a study published in Science. [25] General doctors working alone with reference books were right 36% of the time. [25] Specialists, who usually handle such cases, were not compared. [25] The system has several AI agents act as a panel, asking questions and ordering tests. [25]

Why it matters. Much of the gain came from the AI model underneath, the study's data suggests, with Microsoft's panel adding some on top. On emergency cases it added almost nothing. [25] Microsoft is building a health model with the Mayo Clinic for next year. [25]

Micron, a US maker of memory chips, has dropped 4F2, a memory-cell design it worked on for about two decades. [11] On paper the design packs cells into a third less space. [11] Micron's technology chief, Scott DeBoer, said the real limit is the tiny store of charge above each cell, not the switch below it. [11] He said the design adds cost and steps without packing in more memory. [11]

Why it matters. Samsung and SK Hynix still have the design in their plans, according to TechInsights, a research firm. [11] That leaves Micron on a path of its own; it will keep shrinking its current design instead. [11]

Nvidia's boss said he sees no glut of memory chips by 2029, after a sell-off in memory makers' shares. [12] A South Korean newspaper column on 15 October had warned of 'a flood of new supply' by then. [12] Huang said Nvidia is 'open-minded' about buying from CXMT, a Chinese memory maker. [12] He also said US export limits had pushed China to speed up its own chipmaking. [12]

Why it matters. A glut would push memory prices down and hurt SK Hynix, Samsung and Micron, CNBC notes. [12] CXMT's new design added to fears that it could take their customers. [12]

Bernstein, a research firm, studied more than 5,000 planned US data-centre projects and expects only about 35% of the announced capacity to be built. [54] That is about 170 gigawatts out of almost 500; a gigawatt is about what a large power station makes. [54] Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Meta scored 5 out of 5 for their record of building. [54] O'Leary Digital, linked to the investor Kevin O'Leary, scored 0.35, and may build about 3% of its 15 gigawatts, Bernstein estimates. [54]

Why it matters. Bernstein judged each project on whether building had started, whether power was available and whether the builder had done it before. [54] O'Leary Digital's boss says the score cannot see early work, and that its two sites will make their own power from gas. [55]

More than 93,000 people in Finland have signed a petition for stricter rules on data centres and a fee for local damage. [28] It follows Google clearing about 250,000 trees on 330 hectares near Muhos, in the north, before a required environmental study was done. [28] Google's country manager in Finland apologised last week. [28] An ecologist estimates another 150,000 trees were cut at Otanmaki, a second site. [28]

Why it matters. The two sites are part of Google's EUR13bn project in Finland, the country's biggest of its kind. [28] Finland has 145 data centres in planning, and the issue is expected to shape its election in April. [28]

More than 150 US campaign ads in this autumn's midterm elections are about data centres or the AI industry, the Guardian counts. [29] Candidates of both main parties accuse rivals of putting data centres in voters' backyards. [29] Groups funded by tech figures are spending heavily: one, formed by OpenAI's president Greg Brockman and investor Marc Andreessen, has raised more than $75m. [29] Elon Musk has given $366m to Republican causes. [29]

Why it matters. The tech industry and its leaders have spent more than half a billion dollars on 2026 elections and ballot votes, the Guardian adds. [29] Polls still rank the economy and health care as more important to voters. [29]

Uber is giving its roughly 30,000 staff ChatGPT Work, OpenAI's agent for office tasks, after a pilot with 1,000. [16][17] About 80% of the early users were not engineers. [16] By default it runs on GPT-6.1 Sol, which costs about a fifth of OpenAI's top model. [17] Its technology chief said in August that the time of spending freely on AI was ending; Uber reportedly used up its 2026 budget for Anthropic's coding tool by April. [17]

Why it matters. Uber has not said what the rollout costs. [16] In July it cut 10% of its customer-service team, the first job cuts it tied to AI. [17]

OpenAI made its Decisions API, a fast and cheap model that picks between set options, available to every customer on Thursday. [18] It answers in 100 to 180 milliseconds instead of one to three seconds, OpenAI says. [18] It competes with Jev from TypeSafe, a start-up worth $7.6bn. [18] On two public rankings OpenAI's model sits eighth and 14th; Jev sits seventh and third. [18]

Why it matters. Speak, which makes AI language tutors, cut the gap between its app's actions from 1.4 seconds to 0.13. [18] Developers have found such models can replace big chatbot models in many simple jobs, faster and far cheaper. [18]

Etsy, an online market for handmade goods, has banned sewing patterns, recipes and instructions written by AI. [22][21] Every listing must now show at least one unedited photo of the real item. [21][22] Listings made by bots are no longer allowed. [21] AI art may still be sold if it is labelled. [22] Etsy says confusion about AI goods is one of the top three things stopping buyers from shopping more. [22]

Why it matters. Sellers whose item differs a lot from its photos may have to give a refund. [21] Etsy has been fighting cheap mass-made goods and rivals such as Amazon, Temu and Shein. [22]

Canva, the online design tool, released Canva Craft, its first AI model that makes pictures, on Thursday. [19][20] It first plans where text and objects go, then draws the image, which Canva says makes text readable. [19][20] Canva trained it on millions of human-made design templates from its own library, not photos. [20] It is open to all users. [20]

Why it matters. Canva has paid other companies to use their image models, so its own may cut costs. [20] Analysts' estimates put Canva's value at $35bn, down from $42bn, after it lowered its growth forecast for 2026. [20]

The Browser Company will shut its Arc web browser on 22 December and move users to Dia, its AI browser. [23][24] Nobody can open a new Arc account from Thursday. [23] Arc Search on phones loses its AI features on 23 November, and user data is deleted within 30 days of the shutdown. [23] The company says keeping a browser safe takes ever more work in the age of AI. [23]

Why it matters. Atlassian, a maker of office software, bought The Browser Company for $610m in 2025. [23] It has said it cannot release Arc's code, because Dia is built on the same core. [23]

SpaceX, Elon Musk's rocket company, which also sells the Grok chatbot, launched a partner group to sell Grok to businesses. [30] Apollo, Nvidia, Snowflake, Databricks, Bain and more than 130 other firms joined early. [30] Its AI unit made a profit last quarter, mostly by renting out computers in Memphis rather than selling Grok. [30] Grok Bot, its agent, had more than 800,000 weekly paying users in October. [30]

Why it matters. That number doubled in a month, SpaceX's president Gwynne Shotwell said. [30] Grok has trailed OpenAI and Anthropic in sales to businesses. [30]

Nvidia launched Minerva, software that watches huge clusters of AI chips and warns of failing parts. [13] One slow part can hold up a whole training job. [13] Minerva gathers data from chips, networks and storage into one map, groups related alarms, and has an AI helper. [13] IREN uses it, and IBM, Jio, Lambda and Tesla plan to. [13]

Why it matters. Nvidia has not published a price for Minerva. [13] It is one more way Nvidia sells data-centre builders things beyond its chips. [13]

Warhound, a new start-up, raised $200m to breed gene-edited working dogs for the US military and police. [34][35] Its founders are Palmer Luckey of Anduril, a US maker of military technology, and Ben Lamm of Colossal Biosciences, a gene-editing company. [34] The round values it at $1.2bn. [34] The company says more than 80% of US military working dogs come from Europe, and fewer than half are fit for service. [34] The first puppies are due in early 2027. [35]

Why it matters. No Warhound dog exists yet. [34] Its backers include In-Q-Tel, a venture firm funded by US spy agencies. [34]

Kevin Weil, who led OpenAI's science unit until April, launched Warp Sciences with $215m. [36][37] The round values it at $865m, including the new money. [37] Warp will use robots to make and test hundreds of versions of promising medicine molecules. [37] Drug makers have long sent that work to Chinese firms such as WuXi AppTec, which the US defence department listed in June as linked to China's military. [37]

Why it matters. Lightspeed, a US venture firm, led the round. [37] Human chemists wearing cameras and sensor gloves will teach the robots. [36]

Rivian, a US maker of electric cars, bought Third Dimension, a 15-person UK start-up whose AI turns photos and video into 3D worlds. [31] Rivian will use it to build a driving simulator from real recordings. [31] Terms were not given. [31] Rivian plans hands-free driving on ordinary streets, with a watching driver, by the end of the year. [31]

Why it matters. Its self-driving R2 cars are due on Uber's app in 2028. [31] Rivian's AI chief says the tool lets it replay real scenes with the cameras, other road users, light or weather changed. [31]

inDrive, a ride app where riders and drivers agree the fare, signed a plan with Pony.ai, a Chinese self-driving firm, and Nvidia. [32] They aim to test robotaxis in Astana, Kazakhstan's capital, in the first half of 2027, with a safety driver on board. [32] Pony.ai aims for more than 3,500 robotaxis in over 20 cities by the end of 2026, up from 1,975 in June. [32]

Why it matters. Kazakhstan announced its own plan last month for self-driving taxis in 2027. [32] Cheap rides there mean a robotaxi must be cheap to build, Nvidia says. [32]

Oura, the maker of a health-tracking ring, sued its Indian rival Ultrahuman in a Texas federal court on Thursday. [33] It says Ultrahuman's Ring Pro copies two Oura patents and wants US sales stopped. [33] One patent was granted on 20 October, two days before the suit. [33] Ultrahuman returned to the US in March with the Ring Pro after an earlier ruling banned its old ring. [33]

Why it matters. Ultrahuman's boss, Mohit Kumar, says the ring is still on sale and the company will fight. [33] Oura has brought similar cases against Samsung and RingConn. [33]

The Telegraph counted more than 500 times in four and a half years that Russian fishing boats lingered over undersea internet cables. [46] It used Global Fishing Watch, which tracks ships by satellite. [46] One trawler followed the routes of nine cables under the Atlantic. [46] A NATO official said some of the ships 'have never seen a single fish on their deck'. [46]

Why it matters. A naval officer told the Telegraph that a slow pass with an underwater drone can map a cable very precisely. [46] Such cables would be among the first targets in any war between NATO and Russia, Tom's Hardware notes. [46]