business

Nia Warfield8/13/25

Warner Bros. Discovery surges as HBO Max inks new Asia streaming deal

Warner Bros. Discovery shares jumped almost 8% in Wednesday’s trading, leading S&P 500 gains, after the media giant unveiled a new streaming partnership in Southeast Asia.

Starting in Q4 of this year, HBO Max will join forces with leading local streamer Viu, which boasts viewers in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand.

Instead of fighting for market share from scratch, Warner is tapping into Viu’s strong regional base to speed adoption and cut marketing costs. The deal means subscribers get both global blockbusters and local hits under one roof, including “Harry Potter,” DC movies, “Game of Thrones,” and Korean drama “Taxi Driver 3.”

Back in June, Warner announced plans to split into two publicly traded companies, one of which includes a new Streaming & Studios unit that will house Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group, DC Studios, HBO, and HBO Max, along with the company’s deep film and TV library.

For Warner, the new deal could not only bolster exposure in the Asian market, but also boost margins and keep subscriptions coming in.

Shares of the media powerhouse are now up 14% year to date.

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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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