📋 Quick Takeaways

• Humans& raises $480M seed round at $4.5B valuation—one of the largest seed rounds ever for human-centric AI startup founded by ex-Anthropic, xAI, Google researchers
• OpenAI reportedly evaluating Pinterest acquisition to access 200 billion images for visual AI training and shopping integration
• Elon Musk predicts robotaxis “very widespread” in US by end of 2026; claims AI could surpass human intelligence this year
• Physical AI declared “next major wave” at Davos—executives predict 5-6x larger market than agentic AI within five years
• Micron’s HBM memory completely sold out through 2026 as AI chip demand continues explosive growth
• Prosus reveals 30,000 AI agents currently running; CEO predicts companies could be run entirely by agents in 5 years
• Yoshua Bengio warns current AI training approaches are problematic; calls next few years “critical” for regulation

💰 Major AI Funding & Investments

Humans& Raises Historic $480M Seed Round at $4.5B Valuation

Landmark Investment: Human-centric AI startup Humans& has secured a staggering $480 million seed round, valuing the company at $4.48 billion—making it one of the largest seed rounds in venture capital history.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• Skild AI secures massive $1.4B Series C to build a “universal brain” for robots, tripling valuation to $14B+.
• Apple officially partners with Google Gemini to power the next generation of Siri and Apple Intelligence features.
• Pentagon announces integration of Elon Musk’s Grok AI into military networks, sparking global controversy.
• Google unveils Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), an open standard to enable agentic shopping across the web.
• OpenAI acquires Torch Health for ~$100M to power its new ChatGPT Health vertical.
• Aikido Security hits $1B unicorn status, becoming the fastest-growing European cybersecurity startup.

🤖 Robotics & Physical AI

Skild AI Raises $1.4B at $14B+ Valuation for “Omni-Bodied” Robot Brain

Mega-Round Confirmed: Pittsburgh-based robotics startup Skild AI closed a massive $1.4 billion Series C funding round on January 14, led by SoftBank with participation from Nvidia, Jeff Bezos, and Samsung.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• MIT Technology Review officially names Hyperscale AI Data Centers as a top breakthrough technology for 2026, highlighting their pivotal role and energy challenges.
• Apple is reportedly shifting its flagship product cycle, with new reports suggesting a deviation from the standard “iPhone 18” release schedule.
• Motional announces a strategic reboot, placing “AI at the center” of its autonomous driving tech and targeting a late 2026 driverless launch.
• Lyte, a startup by former Apple engineers, emerges from stealth with over $100 million to build “visual brains” for robots.
• Google begins rolling out proactive Gemini-powered personal assistant features directly into Gmail.
• Volvo unveils specs for the EX60 EV, boasting a 400-mile range and 400 kW fast charging.

🌍 AI Infrastructure & Breakthroughs

Hyperscale AI Data Centers Named a 2026 Breakthrough

Critical Milestone: MIT Technology Review has released its influential “10 Breakthrough Technologies 2026” list, identifying hyperscale AI data centers as a defining technology of the year. Key Insights:

📋 Quick Takeaways

• xAI closes historic $20 billion Series E with strategic investments from NVIDIA, Cisco, Fidelity, and Qatar Investment Authority at ~$230B valuation
• NVIDIA unveils Vera Rubin AI platform featuring six co-designed chips optimized for agentic AI and trillion-parameter models
• NVIDIA releases Alpamayo open-source models for Level 4 autonomous driving, partnering with Mercedes-Benz for Q1 2026 US launch
• Google DeepMind integrates Gemini into Boston Dynamics Atlas in landmark robotics collaboration
• Mobileye acquires Mentee Robotics for $900M betting on humanoid robots as next AI frontier
• Hyundai announces $26B US investment over four years for robotics and autonomous driving ecosystem
• AMD reveals Ryzen AI 400 Series with 60 TOPS NPU and Helios rack systems challenging NVIDIA

💰 Major AI Funding

xAI Raises Record $20 Billion in Series E Funding

Historic Round: Elon Musk’s xAI announced on January 6 the completion of a $20 billion Series E funding round, exceeding its initial $15 billion target and representing one of the largest single funding rounds in tech history.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• NVIDIA unveils Vera Rubin platform — first extreme-codesigned six-chip AI system promising 10x reduction in inference token cost
• “ChatGPT moment for physical AI” declared by Jensen Huang as NVIDIA releases robotics foundation models for Boston Dynamics, Caterpillar, and LG
• NVIDIA launches Alpamayo — world’s first open-source reasoning AI for autonomous driving, shipping in Mercedes-Benz CLA this year
• AMD counters with Helios — “world’s best AI rack” featuring 72 MI455X GPUs to directly challenge NVIDIA’s dominance
• Intel debuts Core Ultra Series 3 — first consumer chips built on 18A process technology, pre-orders start January 6
• World Labs demonstrates Marble — Dr. Fei-Fei Li showcases 3D world model creating physics-accurate virtual environments

🚀 NVIDIA Vera Rubin: Next-Generation AI Computing Platform

NVIDIA Unveils Vera Rubin — The Most Powerful AI Platform Ever Built

Landmark Announcement: At CES 2026 in Las Vegas on January 5, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang unveiled Vera Rubin, the company’s first extreme-codesigned AI platform featuring six integrated chips designed to revolutionize AI training and inference.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang keynote at CES 2026 focuses on “what’s next in AI,” featuring robotics, autonomous driving, and next-gen GPU innovations
• AMD CEO Lisa Su delivers opening keynote unveiling Ryzen AI 400 series, refreshed desktop CPUs with 3D V-Cache, and enterprise AI roadmap
• Johns Hopkins research challenges AI training paradigm — brain-inspired AI models produce intelligent behavior without massive training data
• Boston Dynamics next-gen Atlas robot makes first public CES debut at Hyundai’s AI Robotics presentation
• Intel launches Core Ultra 300 (Panther Lake) — first chips built on revolutionary 18A process with 15% efficiency gains
• Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Elite delivers 44% better CPU performance per watt than Intel competitors

🚀 Nvidia CES 2026 Keynote: The AI Industry’s Most Anticipated Event

Jensen Huang Takes Center Stage for 90-Minute AI Showcase

Date & Time: January 5, 2026, 1:00 PM PT / 4:00 PM ET

📋 Weekly Summary

The transition into 2026 has been marked by seismic shifts in capital and competition. SoftBank redefined the landscape with a massive $40 billion investment in OpenAI, while Google surged past its rival in user metrics, prompting a “code red” at OpenAI. The industry is bracing for a historic year of IPOs with combined valuations potentially exceeding $1.5 trillion. Meanwhile, CES 2026 signaled the arrival of physical AI, with Boston Dynamics and LG debuting next-gen robotics. DeepSeek continued to challenge Western dominance with efficient architecture, and Agentic AI became the new standard for interoperability.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic prepare for historic IPOs with combined valuations exceeding $1.5 trillion
• Amazon commits $125 billion to AI development in 2026, the largest investment among hyperscalers
• Tech giants form Agentic AI Foundation with Microsoft, Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic collaborating on open standards
• OpenAI pivots to audio-first AI with new hardware initiative and advanced conversational audio models
• IBM predicts 2026 as the year quantum computers will outperform classical supercomputers
• Boston Dynamics’ new Atlas robot makes its first public appearance at CES 2026
• World models emerge as the next paradigm shift beyond large language models
• LG unveils CLOiD humanoid robot for home automation at CES 2026
• Sony Honda begins AFEELA 1 trial production integrating 40 AI sensors
• Anthropic targets $15 billion revenue for 2026, tripling its 2025 figures

🚀 Historic Tech IPOs

SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic Prepare for Landmark 2026 IPOs

Unprecedented IPO Wave: Three of the most valuable private tech companies are preparing to go public in 2026, potentially raising more capital than all ~200 U.S. IPOs combined in 2025.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• IBM closes in on $11 billion acquisition of data streaming leader Confluent to bolster hybrid cloud capabilities
• Apple faces critical “executive exodus” in design and AI divisions, raising concerns about its 2026 strategy
• New UK-based AI model reportedly outperforms ChatGPT in early benchmark tests
• Tesla’s Optimus robot suffers viral malfunction in latest demonstration, sparking timeline debates
• SpaceX wins major regulatory approval to build Starship launch complex at Cape Canaveral
• SpaceX successfully deploys 28 Starlink satellites, continuing global coverage expansion

💼 Corporate AI & M&A

IBM Nears $11 Billion Confluent Acquisition to Boost Hybrid Cloud

Major Consolidation: IBM is in advanced negotiations to acquire data streaming platform Confluent for approximately $11 billion, with a potential announcement expected as early as Monday.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• Google unveils “Ironwood”, a massive AI hypercomputer connecting 9,216 chips to revolutionize inference speed.
• ChatGPT launches a Personal Shopper Agent, autonomously creating buyer guides and disrupting e-commerce search.
• Nvidia releases Orchestrator-8B, a highly efficient model that beats larger competitors in tool-use tasks.
• Microsoft introduces Fara-7B, bringing agentic intelligence to local consumer hardware with privacy focus.
• xAI builds a solar farm for “Colossus”, directly addressing the critical energy bottleneck for AI data centers.
• Meta quietly releases SAM 3, setting a new standard for zero-shot object segmentation in computer vision.

🚀 AI Infrastructure & Hardware

Google Unveils “Ironwood” AI Hypercomputer for Real-Time Inference

Major Breakthrough: Google [finance:Alphabet Inc.] announced the launch of Ironwood, a new supercomputing architecture that links 9,216 chips into a single “superpod.”

📋 Quick Takeaways

• Physical Intelligence raises $600M at $5.6 billion valuation for AI robotics systems
• Genspark joins unicorn club with $275M Series B for AI productivity suite
• Google launches Scholar Labs - experimental AI tool for complex academic research
• Claude Sonnet 4.5 receives major system update with enhanced guidelines and capabilities
• Google integrates AI image verification into Gemini app using SynthID technology
• $145M deployed to robotics and voice AI through Flexion ($50M), Harvey ($50M), and Wispr ($25M)
• Over $1 billion total funding announced across AI startups in past 48 hours

🤖 Major Robotics & AI Funding

Physical Intelligence Raises $600M at $5.6 Billion Valuation

Record-Breaking Robotics Round: Physical Intelligence secured $600 million in new funding, valuing the AI robotics startup at $5.6 billion on November 20, 2025.

📋 Quick Takeaways

• Jeff Bezos returns as co-CEO of Project Prometheus, $6.2B AI manufacturing startup targeting computers, automotive, and aerospace
• Tether invests $1.16 billion in Neura Robotics, aiming for “iPhone moment” in humanoid robotics with 5M units by 2030
• Fei-Fei Li’s World Labs launches Marble, groundbreaking 3D world model creating immersive environments from text, images, or video
• Microsoft unveils Fairwater 2GW AI superfactory, world’s most powerful AI datacenter with hundreds of thousands of NVIDIA GB200/GB300 chips
• Japanese AI ecosystem surges with Sakana AI ($2.6B valuation) and Turing ($388M) securing major funding rounds
• Mind captioning breakthrough enables AI to translate brain activity into descriptive text using fMRI and language models
• GMI Cloud announces $500M Taiwan datacenter with NVIDIA chips, leveraging semiconductor supply chain advantages
• RIKEN researchers create 100-billion-star Milky Way simulation using AI and supercomputing, 100x faster than previous methods
• Nebura launches N Box platform, accelerating enterprise access to customized AI computing infrastructure

🚀 Major AI Startup Launches & Investments

Jeff Bezos Returns as Co-CEO of $6.2 Billion AI Manufacturing Startup

Historic Move: Amazon founder Jeff Bezos announced on November 17 his return to active CEO duties for the first time since leaving Amazon in 2021, co-leading Project Prometheus, an AI startup focused on revolutionizing manufacturing across computing, automotive, and aerospace industries with $6.2 billion in funding—one of the largest early-stage rounds in startup history.