Newsletter

Google's TPU Yard Sale

Google's Chips vs. Nvidia's Margin Google and Meta have long been fierce rivals in the world of digital advertising. They fight for every second of user attention and every cent of marketing budget. But in the basement of the internet—the data center—they are fast

The Disposable Interface

Infinite App Store The primary way we interact with computers is through "apps." In essence, an app is a durable tool you acquire and keep on your phone or desktop. If you want to calculate a mortgage, you get a mortgage calculator app. If you want to play
The Disposable Interface

Microsoft's $30 Billion Round Trip

Programming note: We've just released our new thematic report: Enterprise AI Monetization: 2025 Scorecard. It's a 24-page analysis deconstructing how software giants are winning the AI revenue race—and who is falling behind. Access a free copy here. The Infinite Cash Glitch If you loan a
Microsoft's $30 Billion Round Trip

China's Efficiency Hack

The Post-Text Pivot We talked recently about how the "Scale is All You Need" dogma—the Silicon Valley belief that you just need vastly more compute to process vastly more data—is running headfirst into the laws of physics. It turns out that even if you have infinite
China's Efficiency Hack

Meta's Chief Scientist Hates LLMs

Programming note: We've just released our thematic report: Mapping the Neocloud Landscape. It’s a 25-page analysis deconstructing the dynamic between hyperscalers and neoclouds, the capital flows, and the financial risks. Access a free copy here. Is a Cat Smarter Than ChatGPT? It is probably poor career strategy
Meta's Chief Scientist Hates LLMs

Samsung's Pricing Power

The "Boring" Memory Chip Just a few months ago, the story of the AI memory market was simple: SK Hynix was the new king, and Samsung, the long-reigning monarch, had been humbled. Having masterfully aligned itself with Nvidia, SK Hynix became the dominant supplier of High Bandwidth Memory
Samsung's Pricing Power

Anthropic's OpenAI Moment

The Gunslinger There are, it seems, two ways to build a world-changing AI company. The first is the OpenAI way: you raise money at a blistering pace, you spend it at an even more blistering pace, and you bet that by building the biggest, most powerful models—for text, for
Anthropic's OpenAI Moment

GPUs as Collateral

The Ticking Clock The numbers coming out of the "neocloud" space this week were, as is typical these days, completely dizzying. CoreWeave, the publicly-traded bellwether for this new category of AI infrastructure providers, saw its revenue more than double to $1.36 billion for the quarter. Its rival,
GPUs as Collateral

AI Productivity Paradox

The AI Mandate There is a new, slightly menacing message echoing through the halls of corporate America: use AI, or else. The initial, abstract fear that a robot might one day take your job has been replaced by a much more immediate and tangible one: your boss might fire you
AI Productivity Paradox

The Cloud Report Card

Programming note: ARPU will be off the rest of the week, back next Monday. Amazon's 20% Problem For the first time in a long time, Wall Street was genuinely relieved that Amazon Web Services had a good quarter. The company's stock soared more than 11% after
The Cloud Report Card