tech

Apple’s capital spending is heading the opposite direction of Big Tech

The big story in Big Tech has been just how much they’re spending on capex to furnish their AI futures. Not only are Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft spending more than ever, they’re also spending more than they said they would just a quarter earlier. In total, their 2026 capital expenditure bill is now slated to surge beyond $700 billion.

Apple, by contrast, continues to take a different approach. The company has lagged peers in developing its own frontier AI models and has leaned more on partnerships. The strategy certainly doesn’t seem to be hurting Apple yet. The company posted record revenue in the March quarter that beat analysts’ expectations this week, even without a robust AI offering.

Apple’s capex actually fell in the March quarter. Its payments for acquisition of property, plant, and equipment totaled about $1.9 billion in its fiscal second quarter, down 36% from roughly $3 billion a year earlier. So on a year-over-year basis, Apple’s capex declined while everyone else’s jumped sharply.

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Tesla’s related party transactions in 2025

Elon Musk’s companies more than doubled their spending on each other last year

And that’s before Tesla invested $2 billion in xAI, which it has since converted to a stake in SpaceX.

tech

Tim Cook: Popular Mac mini and Mac Studio will be constrained for “several months”

Apple may have missed out on the first wave of generative AI when it comes to software, but its hardware is another story.

The current OpenClaw craze — where users run their own AI agents on a dedicated computer in their homes, and chat with it via messaging apps — has made the once sleepy Mac mini and pro-level Mac Studio an unlikely hit.

Reports of shortages are not lost on Apple.

During this week’s earnings call, outgoing CEO Tim Cook acknowledged the supply constraint of the popular desktops:

“On the Mac mini and the Mac Studio, both of these are amazing platforms for AI and agentic tools, and the customer recognition of that is happening faster than what we had predicted. And so we saw higher-than-expected demand.”

Cook noted that the Mac mini was the top-selling desktop computer in China last quarter, where the DIY agentic AI boom is especially popular. In addition to strong customer demand, Cook cited supply chain constraints adding to the problem, which “may take several months to reach supply/demand balance.”

The Mac mini is one of the products that Apple will be making in the US starting later this year.

Apple Says Mac Studio and Mac Mini Will Be in Short Supply for Months

Apple Says Mac Studio and Mac Mini Will Be in Short Supply for Months

Reports of shortages are not lost on Apple.

During this week’s earnings call, outgoing CEO Tim Cook acknowledged the supply constraint of the popular desktops:

“On the Mac mini and the Mac Studio, both of these are amazing platforms for AI and agentic tools, and the customer recognition of that is happening faster than what we had predicted. And so we saw higher-than-expected demand.”

Cook noted that the Mac mini was the top-selling desktop computer in China last quarter, where the DIY agentic AI boom is especially popular. In addition to strong customer demand, Cook cited supply chain constraints adding to the problem, which “may take several months to reach supply/demand balance.”

The Mac mini is one of the products that Apple will be making in the US starting later this year.

tech

Apple’s iPhone is the top-selling smartphone in urban China

Apple’s second-quarter earnings beat expectations and underscore its growing strength in China, where it is closing in on the top spot in the smartphone market.

“We are thrilled with the performance in Greater China,” CEO Tim Cook said, noting that the iPhone was “the top-selling model in urban China.” Cook first called the iPhone the rather than a top-selling model there during the company’s first-quarter earnings earlier this year.

Data from IDC and Counterpoint Research shows Apple accounted for 19% of smartphone shipments in China in the first calendar quarter of 2026, just behind Huawei at 20%. Analysts say Apple is poised to take the lead soon, helped in part by rising memory chip costs, which are pushing up competitors’ prices.

Apple’s China revenue rose 28% in the March quarter, ahead of analyst estimates, and is up 33% in the first half of the year.

Apple is on its way to becoming the biggest smartphone seller in China

Apple is on its way to becoming the biggest smartphone seller in China

Data from IDC and Counterpoint Research shows Apple accounted for 19% of smartphone shipments in China in the first calendar quarter of 2026, just behind Huawei at 20%. Analysts say Apple is poised to take the lead soon, helped in part by rising memory chip costs, which are pushing up competitors’ prices.

Apple’s China revenue rose 28% in the March quarter, ahead of analyst estimates, and is up 33% in the first half of the year.

tech

SpaceX’s compensation plan for Musk is partially tied to creating a permanent human colony on Mars, America’s favorite planet

The conditions of SpaceX’s pay package for founder Elon Musk were revealed in a confidential registration statement, which was reviewed by Reuters last week.

While the compensation plan, approved by the SpaceX board in January, includes a sky-high valuation target of $7.5 trillion, it turns out Musk will only be awarded 200 million in super-voting restricted shares if he also establishes a permanent human colony on Mars with more than a million people, according to excerpts from the statement.

Luckily, there might be some volunteers to become cosmic X-patriates, since Mars just so happens to be Americans’ celestial body of choice. A new YouGov survey, published Tuesday, found that Mars is Americans’ favorite planet (19%), followed by ring-laden Saturn (14%) and 143,000-kilometer-wide Jupiter (8%).

Americans favorite planet YouGov — Sherwood News

Respondents were less enthused by Mercury and almost-planet Pluto, with roughly one in five respondents calling one of these their least favorite planet — though a majority of US adults (55%) simply didn’t know what their least favorite planet was, like the 38% who couldn’t say what their top choice was.

Whether Mars is America’s favorite because of manifold endeavors to colonize it, or whether its proximity to Earth, relatively livable climate (Mercury’s temperatures, for example, are a little more mercurial, hitting 800 F in the day then dropping to -290 F at night), and grip on pop culture, from Ziggy Stardust to chocolate bars, have given us a rosier view of the Red Planet, is unclear.

Ahead of the company’s highly anticipated IPO, it had appeared that SpaceX’s priorities were shifting away from Mars, further toward Earth’s moon. But if the world’s richest man wants to ensure even more company shares come June, SpaceX’s path to Mars shouldn’t be eclipsed.

Luckily, there might be some volunteers to become cosmic X-patriates, since Mars just so happens to be Americans’ celestial body of choice. A new YouGov survey, published Tuesday, found that Mars is Americans’ favorite planet (19%), followed by ring-laden Saturn (14%) and 143,000-kilometer-wide Jupiter (8%).

Americans favorite planet YouGov — Sherwood News

Respondents were less enthused by Mercury and almost-planet Pluto, with roughly one in five respondents calling one of these their least favorite planet — though a majority of US adults (55%) simply didn’t know what their least favorite planet was, like the 38% who couldn’t say what their top choice was.

Whether Mars is America’s favorite because of manifold endeavors to colonize it, or whether its proximity to Earth, relatively livable climate (Mercury’s temperatures, for example, are a little more mercurial, hitting 800 F in the day then dropping to -290 F at night), and grip on pop culture, from Ziggy Stardust to chocolate bars, have given us a rosier view of the Red Planet, is unclear.

Ahead of the company’s highly anticipated IPO, it had appeared that SpaceX’s priorities were shifting away from Mars, further toward Earth’s moon. But if the world’s richest man wants to ensure even more company shares come June, SpaceX’s path to Mars shouldn’t be eclipsed.

Apple beats estimates on earnings and revenue

Apple reported second-quarter earnings after the bell Thursday.

Apple CEOs John Ternus and Tim Cook

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