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Hi there, this is your daily ☕️ Techpresso.
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In today's Techpresso:
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👀 Apple's potential next CEO 💸 Musk's xAI burns almost $8 billion, reveals Optimus plan ⚛️ Meta bets big on nuclear power 🛒 Microsoft adds checkout feature to Copilot 🤖 China leads global humanoid robot shipments 🖼️ Grok limits AI image generation to paid users after backlash 🎁 + 12 other news & articles you might like 🧰 + 5 trending tools 📚 + 1 trending papers & reports
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👀 Apple's potential next CEO
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- John Ternus, Apple's head of hardware engineering, is now seen as the front-runner to replace Tim Cook as CEO, as the company has sped up its succession planning since last year.
- Cook, who is 65, has told senior leaders he is tired and wants to reduce his workload, and he would likely become chairman of Apple's board if he steps down.
- Ternus is known for balancing new features with costs, like his 2018 suggestion to add an expensive laser only to Pro iPhones, but some question if Apple needs an innovator or manager.
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💸 Musk's xAI burns almost $8 billion, reveals Optimus plan
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- Elon Musk's AI startup xAI lost $1.46 billion in the September quarter and spent $7.8 billion in cash during the first nine months of the year while building data centers and recruiting staff.
- The company told investors it plans to build AI agents and software under a project called "Macrohard," which will eventually power Tesla's Optimus humanoid robots designed to replace human labor.
- Revenue nearly doubled quarter-over-quarter to $107 million, and Musk continues to link his companies together, with Grok integrated into X and xAI spending hundreds of millions on Tesla Megapack batteries.
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⚛️ Meta bets big on nuclear power
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- Meta has signed contracts with three companies to keep existing nuclear plants running longer and to support new reactor technologies, positioning itself as a major corporate buyer of nuclear energy.
- The deals with Vistra, TerraPower, and Oklo could deliver up to 6.6 gigawatts of capacity by 2035, with most power coming from existing Ohio and Pennsylvania plants that will receive upgrades.
- The plans for Small Modular Reactors remain uncertain because no commercially operating SMRs exist in the United States yet, and both the TerraPower and Oklo projects still need regulatory approval.
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🛒 Microsoft adds checkout feature to Copilot
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- Microsoft has launched Copilot Checkout in the United States, a feature that lets users buy products directly inside AI conversations, but only from retailers who have chosen to participate.
- Shopify merchants will be auto-enrolled in Copilot Checkout after an opt-out window, giving Microsoft access to millions of storefronts through partnerships with PayPal, Shopify, and Stripe.
- Microsoft's consent-first approach contrasts with Amazon's Buy for Me feature, which drew complaints from over 180 businesses about unauthorized product scraping and forced participation on the platform.
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🤖 China leads global humanoid robot shipments
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- Chinese companies led global humanoid robot shipments in 2024, with Shanghai AgiBot Innovation Technology alone accounting for nearly half of the approximately 13,000 units sold worldwide last year.
- Global sales more than quintupled from 2024, while US firms like Tesla and Figure AI remain at early stages, with Tesla having produced only a few hundred Optimus robots so far.
- Chinese firms offer lower prices, with Unitree selling an entry-level model for $6,000 and AgiBot at $14,000, compared to Tesla's estimated $20,000 to $30,000 for Optimus robots.
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🖼️ Grok limits AI image generation to paid users after backlash
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- Elon Musk's AI company xAI has restricted Grok's image generation feature to paid X subscribers following widespread criticism over the tool being used to create sexualized and nude images of women and children.
- The limits only apply to X, while the separate Grok app still lets anyone generate pictures without paying, and the feature previously allowed users to upload photos and create sexualized versions.
- The U.K., European Union, and India have all criticized xAI over the issue, with the EU requesting documentation and India threatening to remove X's safe harbor protections unless changes are made.
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Other
news & articles you might like
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The venture firm that ate Silicon Valley just raised another $15 billion
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YouTube's updated filters are good news for anyone sick of Shorts
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Snowflake announces its intent to buy observability platform Observe
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OpenAI to acquire the team behind executive coaching AI tool Convogo
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Creators Say Spotify Pays Up to Twice as Much as YouTube for Video Podcasts
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Anduril’s Palmer Luckey thinks the future of tech is in the past
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Nvidia Hires Google Veteran as Its First Chief Marketing Officer
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Why AI is pushing developers toward typed languages
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LLM predictions for 2026, shared with Oxide and Friends
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🧰 Trending tools
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SEORCE: consolidates SEO metrics, AI discovery tracking, and competitor analysis into a unified dashboard that prioritizes visibility issues across search platforms.
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Chirpz Agent: searches academic papers across multiple databases using context-aware queries instead of basic keywords to find relevant research you'd otherwise miss.
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Repo Prompt: generates structured, context-aware prompts from your codebase to help AI coding agents understand your project and produce more accurate results.
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Autonomous: automates personal wealth management for high-net-worth individuals, eliminating the need for expensive advisors or error-prone DIY spreadsheet tracking.
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ChatLocal: a social network app that loads location-based chat rooms within custom geographic perimeters drawn anywhere on a map.
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📚 Trending papers & reports
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Techpresso is hiring its first Account Executive: If you've got energy, drive, and want to join a fast-growing tech newsletter — we want to hear from you. Apply Here
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AI interpretability methods find fake patterns: researchers showed that popular techniques for explaining AI decisions detect plausible explanations even in randomly initialized networks that can't actually think.
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