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J. Edward Moreno2/4/25

Merck getting merc’d after cutting Gardasil sales to China

Merck & Co. shares are down more than 10% on Tuesday after the drugmaker gave a gloomy guidance for 2025, in part because it will pause shipments of its HPV vaccine to China until at least midyear.

The vaccine giant said it expects to bring in $64.1 billion to $65.6 billion in revenue in 2025, compared to the $67 billion analysts polled by FactSet expected. Merck said it would pause shipments of Gardasil, a vaccine that prevents cancer from HPV, into China beginning in February and going through at least mid-2025. Sales of the vaccine began unexpectedly slumping in China in the second quarter of 2024, which management attributed to an anti-corruption crackdown focusing on the nation’s healthcare industry.

“Like many other companies, we’ve seen increased pressure on discretionary consumer spending, including across the vaccine space more broadly, and demand for Gardasil has not recovered to the level we had expected,” Merck CEO Robert M. Davis told analysts on Tuesday. “As a result, overall channel inventory remains elevated at above-normal levels.”

Gardasil is a key product for Merck, bringing in $8.6 billion of its $64.1 billion in sales for 2024. That shipment pause is another headwind for Gardasil, which already declined in demand compared to 2023.

Meanwhile, vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is nearing confirmation as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy has referred clients to the law firm that’s filed suit against Merck, saying Gardasil has potentially severe adverse effects.

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business

Tom Jones5/19/26

Demis Hassabis, Google DeepMind’s CEO and founder, was also an early Anthropic investor

A chess prodigy and an actual a knight of the realm in the UK, it’s perhaps no surprise that Demis Hassabis has made some strategic moves about his exposure to AI upside. According to people familiar with the matter, the influential AI architect became an angel investor in Anthropic, currently behind many of the leading AI models, per Arena AI leaderboards.

The Nobel Prize winner’s position in the Claude creator was previously undisclosed and, per the Financial Times, highlights Hassabis’ “growing influence across the AI industry.”

Google, which bought DeepMind, the company that Hassabis cofounded and heads to this day, for a reported ~$400 million in 2014, is also a key Anthropic investor. The tech giant reportedly plans to invest up to $40 billion in the AI company as part of the mutually beneficial relationship the pair have forged, with reports that Anthropic has committed to spending $200 billion in the other direction on Google’s cloud services over the next five years.

I’m playing all sides, so I always come out on top

In addition to his financial support for Anthropic, Hassabis has also invested in a range of AI startups launched by colleagues, such as Inflection AI, a company set up by DeepMind cofounder Mustafa Suleyman (who is now CEO of Microsoft AI), as well as efforts from other collaborators, like David Silver’s Ineffable Intelligence.

Hassabis also emerged as a recurring figure on the fringes of the recent Elon Musk v. Sam Altman trial, cropping up repeatedly in testimonies and court documents and appearing to live, as The Verge put it, “rent-free” in Musk’s head.

Founded in 2021, Anthropic has recently raised funding at a reported $900 billion valuation, sending it soaring ahead of competitor OpenAI.

Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis emerges as early Anthropic investor

Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis emerges as early Anthropic investor

The Nobel Prize winner’s position in the Claude creator was previously undisclosed and, per the Financial Times, highlights Hassabis’ “growing influence across the AI industry.”

Google, which bought DeepMind, the company that Hassabis cofounded and heads to this day, for a reported ~$400 million in 2014, is also a key Anthropic investor. The tech giant reportedly plans to invest up to $40 billion in the AI company as part of the mutually beneficial relationship the pair have forged, with reports that Anthropic has committed to spending $200 billion in the other direction on Google’s cloud services over the next five years.

I’m playing all sides, so I always come out on top

In addition to his financial support for Anthropic, Hassabis has also invested in a range of AI startups launched by colleagues, such as Inflection AI, a company set up by DeepMind cofounder Mustafa Suleyman (who is now CEO of Microsoft AI), as well as efforts from other collaborators, like David Silver’s Ineffable Intelligence.

Hassabis also emerged as a recurring figure on the fringes of the recent Elon Musk v. Sam Altman trial, cropping up repeatedly in testimonies and court documents and appearing to live, as The Verge put it, “rent-free” in Musk’s head.

Founded in 2021, Anthropic has recently raised funding at a reported $900 billion valuation, sending it soaring ahead of competitor OpenAI.

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