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Jon Keegan

Apple announces extra slim iPhone Air, iPhone Pro with longer battery life, updated AirPods Pro 3 with live language translation, and refreshed Apple Watch line

At today’s “Awe Dropping” Apple event, the company announced its yearly refresh of the iPhone lineup. The new iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max were joined by a brand-new addition: the iPhone Air, a superthin model with tougher glass and faster processors.

Apple shares dipped on news of the product releases and are down about 1.4% on the day in afternoon trading.

The company also announced an updated Apple Watch line — Series 11, SE3, and Ultra 3 — with new features like 5G, high blood pressure detection, 24-hour battery life, and satellite communication. 

Apple iPhone 17
Apple’s iPhone 17 (Apple)

Here’s a breakdown of the new products Apple announced:

  • The ultrathin iPhone Air was described by Apple as “a paradox you have to hold to believe.” The sleek 5.6-millimeter-thin iPhone features a crack- and scratch-resistant front and back and “Macbook Pro levels of compute,” which you can pair with a weird $59 cross-body strap. It starts at $999.

  • The iPhone 17 has a faster A19 chip, an improved smart selfie camera, and a higher-resolution screen. It starts at $799.

  • The iPhone 17 Pro has a new design, ever-faster A19 Pro chip, a tougher “ceramic shield” on the front and back, better cameras, and a bigger battery that gets an extra 10 hours of video playback compared to its predecessor. It costs $100 more than the previous generation, but the minimum storage has doubled to 256 gigabytes. It starts at $1,099.

  • The iPhone 17 Pro Max starts at $1,199.

  • The AirPods Pro 3 have AI-powered live translation, a new heart rate sensor, eight hours of battery life, and improved active noise cancellation. The new AirPods can also track workouts, and Apple says they are built to fit more people’s ears with a new design and foam ear tips. They start at $249.

  • The Apple Watch Series 11 has 5G, a new high blood pressure detection feature, improved sleep tracking, a more scratch-resistant face, and 24 hours of battery life.

  • The entry-level Apple Watch SE 3 gets 5G, new health-tracking features, and an always-on display. It starts at $249.

  • The chunky Apple Watch Ultra 3 has an impressive 42-hour battery life, satellite communications for emergencies, and a brighter and bigger display. It starts at $799.

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tech
Rani Molla

Banks prepare record $38 billion debt financing to fund Oracle-tied data centers

Banks led by JPMorgan and Mitsubishi UFJ are preparing a $38 billion debt offering to fund two Oracle-tied data centers in Texas and Wisconsin, Bloomberg reports. The projects, developed by Vantage Data Centers, will support Oracle’s $500 billion Stargate AI infrastructure push with OpenAI and Nvidia.

The loans — $23.25 billion for Texas and $14.75 billion for Wisconsin — are expected to mature in four years, price about 2.5 percentage points higher than the benchmark rate, and mark the largest AI infrastructure financing to date.

Oracle executives recently said that the company anticipates cloud gross margins will reach 35% and that it expects to see $166 billion in cloud infrastructure revenue by FY 2030.

Oracle is up 1.5% premarket.

Record $38 Billion Debt Sale Nears for Oracle-Tied Data Centers

Record $38 Billion Debt Sale Nears for Oracle-Tied Data Centers

The loans — $23.25 billion for Texas and $14.75 billion for Wisconsin — are expected to mature in four years, price about 2.5 percentage points higher than the benchmark rate, and mark the largest AI infrastructure financing to date.

Oracle executives recently said that the company anticipates cloud gross margins will reach 35% and that it expects to see $166 billion in cloud infrastructure revenue by FY 2030.

Oracle is up 1.5% premarket.

tech
Rani Molla

Google rises on official announcement of Anthropic deal worth “tens of billions”

Google has made its deal to expand AI compute to Anthropic, reported earlier this week by Bloomberg, official. In order to train and serve its Claude model, Anthropic has agreed to pay Google Cloud “tens of billions of dollars” to access up to 1 million tensor processing units, or TPUs, as well as other cloud services.

Google, of course, has a 14% stake in Anthropic, making this one of the many circular AI deals happening at the moment.

“Anthropic and Google have a longstanding partnership and this latest expansion will help us continue to grow the compute we need to define the frontier of AI,” Anthropic CFO Krishna Rao said in the press release. “Our customers — from Fortune 500 companies to AI-native startups — depend on Claude for their most important work, and this expanded capacity ensures we can meet our exponentially growing demand while keeping our models at the cutting edge of the industry.”

The announcement has sent Google up again, more than 1% premarket.

tech
Rani Molla

Report: Snap seeking $1 billion to finance its AR glasses division in “existential” fundraise

Snap is down more than 1% this morning following news that the company is attempting to raise $1 billion for its AR glasses unit in what someone told Sources.news was an “existential” fundraise.

A Snap spokesperson countered, “We do not need to raise money to execute against our plans to publicly launch Specs in 2026, but remain open to opportunities that could accelerate our growth.”

Multiple investors are involved in the talks, including Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, according to Sources.news. The report also noted that Snap plans to turn the unit that makes its Specs glasses into an independent subsidiary à la Google’s Waymo “that can continue raising capital from investors.”

Snap plans to produce about 100,000 units of next year’s Specs, pricing them around $2,500.

The beleaguered stock saw quite a bit of retail interest last month, amid r/WallStreetBets chatter that its low nominal price made it a potential acquisition target.

Snap eyes $1 billion fundraise for AR glasses

Snap eyes $1 billion fundraise for AR glasses

Multiple investors are involved in the talks, including Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, according to Sources.news. The report also noted that Snap plans to turn the unit that makes its Specs glasses into an independent subsidiary à la Google’s Waymo “that can continue raising capital from investors.”

Snap plans to produce about 100,000 units of next year’s Specs, pricing them around $2,500.

The beleaguered stock saw quite a bit of retail interest last month, amid r/WallStreetBets chatter that its low nominal price made it a potential acquisition target.

Rani Molla
21h
After a record quarter, analysts point out that Tesla’s car sales don’t really matter anymore

Tell that to Apple and its iPhone.

New Tesla Model 3 With Full Self-Driving Activated
tech
Rani Molla

Meta says it’s replacing jobs with tech in new round of layoffs

Meta told employees in its risk division, which is responsible for ensuring regulatory and policy compliance, that some of their roles will be replaced by tech, Business Insider reports.

“By moving from bespoke, manual reviews to a more consistent and automated process, we’ve been able to deliver more accurate and reliable compliance outcomes across Meta,” Chief Compliance and Privacy Officer Michel Protti told the workers in an internal memo. “As a result, we don’t need as many roles in some areas as we once did.”

The news comes right after Meta laid off 600 employees across its AI team in yet another company reorganization, reflecting efforts to improve its flagship AI model, Llama 4.

Meta is only the latest tech company selling AI to say that AI is helping it save money on human labor.

Meta told some employees their jobs are being replaced by tech

Meta told some employees their jobs are being replaced by tech

The news comes right after Meta laid off 600 employees across its AI team in yet another company reorganization, reflecting efforts to improve its flagship AI model, Llama 4.

Meta is only the latest tech company selling AI to say that AI is helping it save money on human labor.

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