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1.	Amazon’s OpenAI Investment Could Link Funding to IPO or AGI By Anissa Gardizy Source: The Information

As Amazon weighs a major equity investment in OpenAI, the ultimate size of its commitment could hinge on whether OpenAI goes public or achieves a loosely defined milestone known as artificial general intelligence, The Information reported Wednesday.

The proposed Amazon investment is part of OpenAI’s current funding round, which could top $100 billion at a valuation of $730 billion before the financing. Under terms still being negotiated, Amazon would invest $15 billion upfront, with an additional $35 billion tied to the achievement of the specific milestones.

OpenAI’s existing partnership with Microsoft is influencing the structure of the pending Amazon deal, The Information reported. Microsoft currently has the exclusive right to run OpenAI models on its cloud business Azure until OpenAI reaches AGI.

2.	Nvidia Revenue Growth Accelerates—Again—to 73% By Amir Efrati and Anissa Gardizy Source: The Information

Nvidia’s revenue rose 73% to $68.1 billion in the three months ended in January, 11 percentage points higher than the remarkable growth it reported in the November quarter. It also projected even faster revenue growth—nearly 77%—in the current fiscal quarter.

The results shows Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, is still in a league of its own in selling the primary hardware that powers AI and its performance is improving even as its stock gets cheaper on a multiple of its expected earnings. The stock is trading at 27 times forward earnings, according to S&P, down from 32 times forward earnings as of three months ago.

As always, one of the main long-term concerns about the stock is that a handful of customers make up a majority of Nvidia’s revenue, and their increased spending on Nvidia chips is eating into their cash balances. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang responded to that concern by saying he believed the spending on AI chips was producing profitable revenue among Nvidia customers.

Nvidia shares rose 3% in after-hours trading and was up around 4% so far this year before the close of normal trading Wednesday. Advanced Micro Devices, whose revenues are more than six times smaller than Nvidia’s reported revenue growth of 34% in the December quarter.

Nvidia generated $216 billion in the fiscal year that ended in January, with $194 billion of that total coming from its data center business, which includes its AI chip and networking sales. In the January quarter, it generated $11 billion in networking revenue, up 263% from a year earlier, as customers increasingly used its NVLink product to connect their AI server clusters.

Nvidia’s gross margin improved 2 percentage points in the quarter, compared to the same period a year earlier, and free cash flow more than doubled to nearly $35 billion. In addition to dividiends and share buybacks, Nvidia has been making large investments in some of its biggest customers, and recently made its largest acquisition-like deal when it licensed technology from AI chip designer Groq. Nvidia said Wednesday it paid $13 billion so far, with $4 billion in additional costs related to the deal to be paid within a  year. The company also has been considering making a $30 billion equity investment in OpenAI, The Information has reported.

“We are finalizing an investment and partnership agreement with OpenAI. There is no assurance that we will enter into an investment and partnership agreement with OpenAI or that a transaction will be completed,” Nvidia said in its annual filing.

3.	Bill Gates Apologizes for Epstein Relationship in Meeting With Foundation Staff By Aaron Holmes Source: The Wall Street Journal

Bill Gates told staff of his charitable foundation that he’s sorry for maintaining a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, but said he didn’t participate in any of Epstein’s crimes, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Files recently released by the Justice Department indicated that Gates met several times with Epstein beginning in 2011, years after the disgraced financier was convicted of soliciting a minor for prosecution, and photos released as part of the files show Gates alongside women whose faces are redacted. Gates told staff that he failed to adequately check Epstein’s background and that the women he was pictured with were Epstein’s assistants, not his victims, according to the report.

The released files also show Epstein sending emails that allude to Gates’ extramarital affairs. Gates reportedly told staff this week that he did have affairs with two Russian women while married to his then-wife Melinda, but that he didn’t meet either of the women through Epstein.

4.	Salesforce Stock Slips 5% as Investors Wait For Its AI Products to Boost Growth By Laura Bratton Source: The Information

Salesforce shares fell more than 5% in after-hours trading as the enterprise software firm said Wednesday that revenue in the January fiscal quarter rose 12% to $11.2 billion, including sales from Informatica, a data management firm it acquired late last year.

Excluding revenue from Informatica, Salesforce revenue climbed 8% in the period, 1 percentage point lower than its growth in the prior quarter. Salesforce projected revenue would climb 8% to 9% in the April quarter, excluding Informatica sales.

Investors have been waiting for Salesforce to show that its internal AI products, namely Agentforce, will boost overall revenue.

On the bright side, Agentforce annual recurring revenue—typically defined as the current monthly subscription multiplied by 12—rose nearly three times to $800 million. “Agentic AI is a tailwind for our business,” CEO Marc Benioff said in a statement.

Salesforce stock had fallen nearly 28% so far this year before the market closed Wednesday, as software equities have been hammered by investor fears about the impact of AI on sales growth in the sector.

5.	Exclusive: OpenAI Hires Meta AI Researcher Who Previously Led Apple’s Models Team By Stephanie Palazzolo, Theo Wayt and Wayne Ma Source: The Information

OpenAI has hired a high-profile AI researcher at Meta Platforms who had joined the company from Apple about seven months ago, a spokesperson from OpenAI confirmed.

Ruoming Pang, who led AI infrastructure for Meta Superintelligence Labs, which is developing new AI models, left the company last week and has joined OpenAI. Pang, who was aggressively recruited by OpenAI over several months, told colleagues he was happy at Meta and that its infrastructure was in good shape, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter.

A spokesperson for Meta didn’t have a comment.

Pang previously led model development at Apple and joined Meta last year for a pay package reportedly worth more than $200 million over several years and contingent on meeting certain milestones. The move was a blow to Apple, which has been struggling to develop AI models and features for its devices.

Pang’s move to OpenAI follows a wave of departures from Meta’s AI teams over the past year, though Meta has also hired numerous people from OpenAI and other AI competitors.

Mat Velloso, who led product for developer platforms at Meta Superintelligence Labs, also departed after a short stint. He joined Meta’s AI organization from Google DeepMind in July and announced his departure on LinkedIn last week. And Yann LeCun, a longtime chief AI scientist at Meta, left last year.