Tech
Bezos sees no threat from Musk-Trump ties in space race
Jeff Bezos said he does not think SpaceX CEO Elon Musk will use his close ties with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to undercut his space company Blue Origin, adding he feels “very optimistic” about the incoming administration’s space agenda.
“Elon has been very clear that he’s doing this for the public interest and not for his personal gain. And I take him at face value,” Bezos, founder of Blue Origin which rivals SpaceX in the space industry, told Reuters in an interview on Sunday.
Bezos spoke with Reuters in Cape Canaveral, Florida where he will watch the debut launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn, a 30 story-tall rocket that is expected to chip away at SpaceX’s market dominance and kick start Blue Origin’s long-delayed entrance in the satellite launch business.
Musk, who spent more than a quarter billion dollars to help elect Trump, has had the president-elect’s ear on space matters.
Last month he said the U.S. should send missions straight to Mars instead of going to the moon first, fueling industry concerns of a major shakeup to NASA’s space exploration program.
“My own opinion is that we should do both – we need to go to the moon and we should go to Mars,” Bezos said, when asked if he was concerned about changes to NASA’s moon program.
“What we shouldn’t do is start and stop things. We should continue with the lunar program for sure,” Bezos said.
Trump in his second term as president is expected to make sweeping changes to NASA’s moon program and focus heavily on sending missions to Mars.
Amazon (AMZN.O) has donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund and will stream the event on its Prime Video service. Bezos, Amazon’s founder and executive chairman, has met with Trump but told Reuters “we really haven’t talked about space.”
Blue Origin, founded by Bezos in 2000, has a $3 billion contract with NASA to land humans on the moon later this decade after missions by SpaceX’s Starship, Musk’s fully reusable rocket in development that is designed to put humans and cargo on both the moon and Mars.
Tech
OpenAI, SoftBank each commit 19bn dollars to Stargate AI data center
OpenAI and Japanese conglomerate SoftBank (9984.T) will each commit $19 billion to fund Stargate, a joint venture to develop data centers for artificial intelligence in the U.S., the Information reported on Wednesday.
The ChatGPT maker will hold a 40% interest in Stargate, and would act as an extension of OpenAI, the report said, citing OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaking to colleagues. His comments imply SoftBank would also have a 40% interest, the report added.
OpenAI and SoftBank did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
On Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that OpenAI, SoftBank Group and Oracle (ORCL.N) will unveil Stargate and invest $500 billion over the next four years to help the United States stay ahead of China and other rivals in the global AI race.
Stargate will initially deploy $100 billion and the rest of the funding is expected over the next four years. The project is being led by SoftBank and OpenAI.
Tech
Taiwan’s HTC to sell part of XR unit to Google for 250mn dollars
Taiwan’s HTC (2498.TW) said on Thursday it will sell part of its unit for extended reality (XR) headsets and glasses to Google (GOOGL.O) for $250 million and transfer some of its employees to the U.S. company.
The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of this year, HTC said.
The two companies will also explore further collaboration opportunities, HTC added.
Google said in a separate statement that the deal will accelerate the development of the Android XR platform and strengthen the ecosystem for headsets and glasses.
Lu Chia-te, HTC vice president and general counsel, told reporters the company had granted its intellectual property rights to Google as a non-exclusive license.
“Therefore, this is not a buyout nor an exclusive licence. In the future, HTC will still retain the ability to use, utilise, and even further develop it without any restrictions,” he said.
Tech
Microsoft’s LinkedIn sued for disclosing customer information to train AI models
Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) LinkedIn has been sued by Premium customers who said the business-focused social media platform disclosed their private messages to third parties without permission to train generative artificial intelligence models.
According to a proposed class action filed on Tuesday night on behalf of millions of LinkedIn Premium customers, LinkedIn quietly introduced a privacy setting last August that let users enable or disable the sharing of their personal data.
Customers said LinkedIn then discreetly updated its privacy policy on Sept. 18 to say data could be used to train AI models, and in a “frequently asked questions” hyperlink said opting out “does not affect training that has already taken place.”
This attempt to “cover its tracks” suggests LinkedIn was fully aware it violated customers’ privacy and its promise to use personal data only to support and improve its platform, in order to minimize public scrutiny and legal fallout, the complaint said.
The lawsuit was filed in the San Jose, California, federal court on behalf of LinkedIn Premium customers who sent or received InMail messages, and whose private information was disclosed to third parties for AI training before Sept. 18.
It seeks unspecified damages for breach of contract and violations of California’s unfair competition law, and $1,000 per person for violations of the federal Stored Communications Act.
A lawyer for Prince Harry on Wednesday said the Duke of Sussex had reached a settlement with Rupert Murdoch’s news conglomerate.
LinkedIn said in a statement: “These are false claims with no merit.”
A lawyer for the plaintiffs had no immediate additional comment.
The lawsuit was filed several hours after U.S. President Donald Trump announced a joint venture among Microsoft-backed OpenAI, Oracle (ORCL.N) and SoftBank (9984.T), with a potential $500 billion of investment, to build AI infrastructure in the United States.
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