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Jack Raines & Nia Warfield

“Snacks Mix”: The LA fires; quantum cold water; alcohol warnings; and a special announcement

Welcome to “Snacks Mix”! Nia Warfield and Jack Raines run through the week’s market maze, from fires in LA to the future of drinking.

  • The story everyone IS talking about: Fires are raging in LA — is this the new normal for homeowners, insurance companies, and local governments?

  • The story everyone SHOULD be talking about: A couple weeks after quantum computing went wild, there’s a lot more skepticism.

  • The story everyone WILL be talking about: The surgeon general issues dire warnings about alcohol consumption.

  • Plus: We say goodbye to Jack Raines, who is leaving Sherwood (shed a tear!).

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“Snacks Mix” is a production of Sherwood News, made in collaboration with Roulette Productions. Jody Avirgan and Claire Bidigare-Curtis are the producers. Wanna get in touch? Let us know what you make of the show and what we should cover next: podcasts@sherwood.news

Sherwood Media’s Snacks podcast is for informational purposes only, and is not a recommendation, solicitation, or research report relating to any investment strategy, security, or digital asset.

Views presented on this podcast are those of the speakers (hosts and guests). There is no guarantee that any statements or opinions provided herein will prove to be correct. The speakers’ opinions belong to them and may differ from opinions of Sherwood Media and its affiliates.

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Tom Jones

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, according to 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 spend $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 his 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 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, according to 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 spend $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 his 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 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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Jury rules against Musk in lawsuit against OpenAI and Altman

Jurors in Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s lawsuit against Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI found the defendants not liable on all claims on Monday.

In a unanimous verdict reached after less than two hours of deliberation, the Oakland jury found that Musk had waited too long to bring his case forward, exceeding the statute of limitations.

Musk had alleged that OpenAI abandoned its founding mission as a nonprofit dedicated to developing AI for humanity and instead became a profit-driven company closely tied to Microsoft.

The verdict caps off a three-week blockbuster tech trial that could have seen Altman and Brockman removed from OpenAI leadership.

Jury tosses Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI and Sam Altman

Jury tosses Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI and Sam Altman

Musk had alleged that OpenAI abandoned its founding mission as a nonprofit dedicated to developing AI for humanity and instead became a profit-driven company closely tied to Microsoft.

The verdict caps off a three-week blockbuster tech trial that could have seen Altman and Brockman removed from OpenAI leadership.

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Smartphones are 12% cheaper than last year, according to the latest inflation data... except they’re not

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