TL;DR

U.S. allows Nvidia/AMD AI chip sales to China (with 15% levy); OpenAI restores GPT-4o; AI VC hits record.

Highlights

• U.S. allows Nvidia and AMD to resume AI chip sales (H20, MI308) to China with a 15% revenue share to the U.S. government; Trump open to licensing downgraded Blackwell chips if performance is cut by 30–50%15.
• Chinese regulators order ByteDance, Alibaba , Tencent, and others to halt Nvidia H20 purchases, citing security and “backdoor” concerns; state media urges boycott215.
• OpenAI restores GPT-4o for paid users after backlash over GPT-5 rollout; plans to double compute capacity in five months to address demand and service throttling34.
• Microsoft to fully integrate GitHub into its CoreAI division; CEO Thomas Dohmke to depart by end of 2025; GitHub Copilot reaches 20M users8.
• Venture and hedge fund investment in AI at record highs—41% of U.S. VC dollars in 2025 concentrated in ten AI firms; $350B in capex from major tech companies9.
• Dell , HPE , Cisco , Lenovo, and Supermicro announce new Nvidia Blackwell-powered servers for enterprise AI, LLM inference, and robotics workloads10.
• Tesla ends Dojo supercomputer project, pivots to Nvidia , AMD , and Samsung for AI hardware; executive departures continue; eyes licensing Full Self-Driving tech12.
• Reddit blocks Wayback Machine from archiving most content to prevent unauthorized AI data scraping; continues aggressive data monetization strategy6.
• Perplexity AI makes unsolicited $34.5B bid for Google Chrome ; faces ¥2.2B lawsuit in Japan for unauthorized news data use14.
• Pika Labs launches near real-time, audio-driven video generation model—produces HD videos in six seconds, 20x faster and cheaper than previous models11.
• C3.ai and BigBear.ai shares drop sharply after weak sales and guidance, highlighting challenges for smaller AI software vendors13.
• Elon Musk’s xAI plans antitrust lawsuit against Apple , alleging App Store favoritism toward OpenAI’s ChatGPT7.

Commentary

The U.S.-China AI chip trade remains highly dynamic. The Trump administration’s decision to tie AI chip export licenses to a 15% revenue share is a novel approach, reopening a key market for Nvidia and AMD but at a cost to margins15. However, China’s immediate regulatory pushback—ordering tech giants to halt Nvidia H20 purchases and raising security concerns—casts doubt on how much market access will actually be restored215. The situation highlights the ongoing tension between commercial interests and national security, with both sides seeking greater control over semiconductor supply chains.

OpenAI’s operational challenges with the GPT-5 rollout, followed by the restoration of GPT-4o for paid users, underscore the importance of model stability and user trust for enterprise AI adoption3. The company’s plan to double compute capacity signals sustained demand, but also reflects the growing infrastructure requirements for leading LLM providers4. In parallel, Microsoft ’s absorption of GitHub into its CoreAI division and the expansion of Nvidia Blackwell-powered enterprise servers by major OEMs show hyperscalers and infrastructure players consolidating their positions810.

The AI funding environment remains robust, with venture and hedge fund capital heavily concentrated in a handful of firms and tech giants committing unprecedented sums to AI infrastructure9. However, the sharp declines at C3.ai and BigBear.ai highlight the risks for smaller, niche vendors as spending consolidates around larger platforms and infrastructure providers13.

Data access and platform control continue to be strategic battlegrounds. Reddit ’s move to block the Wayback Machine is part of a broader trend of platforms restricting data access to protect monetization opportunities and user privacy6. Perplexity AI’s bid for Chrome and its legal troubles in Japan, as well as Musk’s antitrust threat against Apple , reflect intensifying competition over distribution channels and data sources147.

AI professionals should watch for further developments in U.S.-China chip policy, hyperscaler infrastructure investments, and the evolving regulatory landscape around data and platform access. The market is rewarding scale, infrastructure, and differentiated data assets, while smaller players face increasing pressure.