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Happy Tuesday! Meta Platforms will more than double the planned computing capacity of its Louisiana data center. Smartphone shipments fall to the lowest second quarter levels in 13 years. Chinese humanoid startup LimX Dynamics closes a pre-IPO funding round at a $2.2 billion valuation.

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Meta Doubles Louisiana Data Center Capacity
By Jyoti Mann	Source: Meta Platforms

Meta Platforms said Monday it will invest an additional $40 billion to more than double the planned computing capacity of its Louisiana data center to five gigawatts from the two gigawatts originally announced in 2024.

The data center was already Meta’s largest computing facility. Five gigawatts is a significantly large amount of capacity, and is 100 times more than what a traditional data center typically consumes. The expansion highlights Meta’s push to secure more computing power to fuel its AI ambitions.

Meta previously announced that it was investing more than $10 billion to build its data center in Louisiana.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg has pledged to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in the company’s infrastructure build out over the coming years to support its AI ambitions. The project has secured external financing from investors including Blue Owl Capital. To power the campus, Entergy Louisiana plans to build seven new natural gas-fired power plants.

Smartphone Shipments Fall to Lowest Q2 Level in 13 Years
By Martin Peers	Source: The Information

Smartphone shipments around the world fell 11% in the second quarter, Counterpoint Research reported on Monday, which it said was the lowest second quarter levels in 13 years.

The research firm attributed the sales drop to rising prices for smartphones caused by higher memory chip costs, which in turn is a result of the AI data center boom squeezing supplies of memory. Manufacturers such as Samsung have raised some prices, while iPhone maker Apple has raised prices for some hardware devices except the iPhone. But Apple is expected to hike iPhone prices when it unveils its next generation in the fall.

Despite the price increases, Samsung had the leading market share with 24%, Counterpoint estimated, while Apple’s share rose to 20%.

Chinese Humanoid Startup LimX Dynamics Closes Pre-IPO Funding at $2.2 Billion Valuation
By Jing Yang	Source: The Information

Chinese humanoid startup LimX Dynamics said on Tuesday it had closed a pre-IPO funding round at a 15 billion yuan ($2.2 billion) valuation, after raising $200 million from investors in China and around the world.

The round is led by IDG Capital, one of China’s leading venture firms, Lens Technology, a major supplier and assembler of Apple devices, and Abu Dhabi-based Stone Venture. European investment firms GGG Group and Redstone VC also participated in the round. The company has raised a total of $400 million in equity financing over the past six months, underscoring the investing frenzy in China’s humanoid sector.

Shenzhen-based LimX said it plans to use the fresh capital to “advance the integration of high-level cognition and whole-body control,” which refers to better intelligence and locomotion alignment in humanoid development, and to expand its global presence. The company has secured thousands of orders, with more than half coming from overseas markets such as the Middle East, Europe and other Asian countries.

LimX was founded in 2022 by Dr. Wei Zhang, a former tenured professor at the Ohio State University. The company has launched two full-size humanoids, a series of multi-form robots with dual-arm and bipedal configurations.