 | Apr 07, 2025 | | | | | | Here comes the week! OpenAI has discussed buying an AI device startup that its CEO Sam Altman and ex-Apple design Jony Ive started. Meta released two versions of its new Llama 4 AI model over the weekend. And a venture firm co-founded by White House adviser David Sacks laid off half a dozen employees and shifted its focus to later stage investing.
| | | | OpenAI in recent weeks discussed acquiring a startup its CEO Sam Altman has been working on with ex-Apple designer Jony Ive's studio, which is developing an artificial intelligence-powered personal device, The Information reported. If it happens, the deal would include a team of engineers working on the device at the startup, which is called io Products. At one point, OpenAI executives considered an acquisition price of at least $500 million, according to the report. The designs for the AI device are still nascent and haven't been finalized, but potential ideas include a "phone" without a screen and AI-enabled household devices, according to the report. An acquisition of the startup would add to OpenAI's fast-growing portfolio of products, which range from AI software that can control users' web browsers to AI server chips to humanoid robots. It could help the ChatGPT maker get its AI into the hands of millions of consumers, but would also put it in more direct competition with Apple, Ive's former employer and an important partner to OpenAI. | | | | Meta Platforms on Saturday released two versions of Llama 4, the newest generation of its flagship open-source large language model. Both versions, Scout and Maverick, are mixture of experts models, which are trained so that only specialized parts of a model activate at a time. The Information previously reported that at least one version of Llama 4 would be a mixture of experts model. Meta is working on a version of Llama 4 that is a reasoning model, which takes more time to "think" about its response to a query, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on Instagram. It is also working on a much larger version, Behemoth, that will also be a mixture of experts model. Meta said in a blog post that its goal for Llama 4 was to remove bias from the model. "It's well-known that all leading LLMs have had issues with bias—specifically, they historically have leaned left when it comes to debated political and social topics," it said. Llama 4 now powers the company's Meta AI assistant in its social media apps. Meta AI has more than 700 million monthly active users, as of January. Some of that usage has been thought to be unintentional, though. | | | | Craft Ventures, the San Francisco venture firm co-founded by White House crypto and AI czar David Sacks, last week laid off a half dozen employees, the firm confirmed. Its investors are also changing their focus to later stage investments from seed stage deals. The departures mainly involved people who handled recruiting efforts for startups in Craft's portfolio. Jeff Fluhr, a Craft co-founder, is also stepping back from his role as a general partner to become a venture partner, according to Craft. | | | | President Donald Trump said Friday that Vietnam had shown willingness to eliminate its own tariffs to avoid new U.S. levies, which sent shares of some apparel firms surging. In a social media post, Trump said Vietnamese leader To Lam told him that Vietnam "wants to cut their Tariffs down to ZERO if they are able to make an agreement with the U.S." and that the two leaders would meet in the "near future." The post followed Trump's announcement on Wednesday of steep tariffs against many of the U.S.'s largest trading partners, including a 46% tariff on Vietnam. The announcement has prompted a deep selloff in the stock market and retaliation from China, which announced its own 34% tariff on U.S. goods on Friday. Many companies, especially in apparel and footwear, have shifted production to Vietnam over the past several years as a hedge against a trade war between the U.S. and China. Following Trump's post, shares of Nike, Skechers and Lululemon spiked and were each trading up 4% on Friday afternoon. Tech firms including Apple and Meta Platforms have also shifted some of their hardware production to Vietnam, but remain much more exposed to China than apparel and footwear makers. Apple shares were down 6% on Friday. | | | | Elon Musk's breach of charitable trust lawsuit against OpenAI will go to trial in March 2026, lawyers for both parties agreed in federal district court on Friday. That's three months later than the two parties had previously proposed. Musk is trying to stop OpenAI from converting to a for-profit corporation from its current nonprofit form. OpenAI is currently raising $40 billion in a funding round led by SoftBank, but $20 billion of those funds are conditional on OpenAI converting to a for-profit corporation by the end of the year. If OpenAI proceeds with the conversion but loses the trial next year, it could be forced to reverse the conversion. But OpenAI's lawyer embraced a slower timeline during Friday's hearing, saying "we're happy to accommodate more time" for expert testimony. The trial will determine, among other allegations, whether OpenAI has violated its charitable duties, including by taking investment from Microsoft and attempting to convert to a for-profit company. The judge overseeing the case last month declined Musk's request to block OpenAI's planned conversion. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. | | | | President Trump on Friday said he would sign another executive order to keep TikTok "up and running" for an additional 75 days. The White House had finalized a plan to spin off the app's U.S. operations into a new company as of Wednesday, but Trump's tariffs announcement on China presented a last-minute hurdle, according to a person close to the negotiations. NBC News first reported this development. After the tariffs were announced on Thursday, ByteDance representatives called the White House to indicate that China would no longer accept a deal until there could be negotiations about trade and tariffs, according to the person. The Information previously reported the framework for the White House's deal proposal on Wednesday, which was supposed to be announced later that day. "The Deal requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed," Trump wrote on his social network Truth Social on Friday. "We hope to continue working in Good Faith with China, who I understand are not very happy about our Reciprocal Tariffs … We look forward to working with TikTok and China to close the Deal." Just a day earlier, Vice President JD Vance said on Fox News that the Trump administration was on track to hash out a solution before the Saturday deadline the president had set in January. The executive order delays enforcement of a U.S. law passed last year requiring a TikTok ban if it doesn't divest from Chinese parent company ByteDance. The law went into effect on Jan. 19. Apple will keep TikTok and other apps owned by ByteDance available on its App Store for another 75 days following additional assurances from the Department of Justice, Bloomberg reported. | | | Popular articles By Ann Gehan and Catherine Perloff
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