Techmeme
February 1, 2026, 1:10 PM

Top News

Wall Street Journal:
Documents and sources: Abu Dhabi's Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan backed a $500M investment for a 49% stake in WLF, four days before Trump's inauguration  —  $500 million investment for 49% of World Liberty came months before U.A.E. won access to tightly guarded American AI chips
Zijing Wu / Financial Times:
A look at China's “genius class” system, which picks ~100K gifted teens annually for elite science-focused schooling; its alumni span ByteDance, PDD, and more  —  About three years ago, Stacey Tang, a manager in a pharmaceuticals company in Beijing, received a peculiar phone call.
X: @asanwal and @bgurleyLinkedIn: Leevi Saari
Connie Loizos / TechCrunch:
Inside Physical Intelligence, a startup co-founded by Stripe veteran Lachy Groom that is building general-purpose robotics foundation models and has raised $1B+  —  From the street, the only indication I've found Physical Intelligence's headquarters in San Francisco is a pi symbol that's …
Matthew Gault / 404 Media:
A researcher says an exposed Moltbook database could have let anyone take control of the site's AI agents and post anything; the database has since been secured  —  Moltbook is a “social media” site for AI agents that's captured the public's imagination over the last few days.
Reuters:
Filing: SpaceX is seeking US FCC approval to launch 1M satellites; SpaceX claims that they will orbit the Earth and harness the sun to power AI data centers  —  Elon Musk's SpaceX wants to launch a constellation of 1 million satellites that will orbit Earth and harness the sun to power AI data centers …
Nicole Fan / Rest of World:
Chinese government funding is backing traditional Chinese medicine providers to adopt AI for drug discovery, clinical diagnostics, acupuncture robots, and more  —  With backing from the Chinese government, TCM practitioners are integrating AI tools to reach new consumers at home and abroad.
Ann Cao / South China Morning Post:
Sources: Alibaba has delivered more than 100K units of the Zhenwu 810E, an ASIC for AI training and inference, surpassing those of its domestic rival Cambricon  —  The milestone underscores Alibaba's growing footprint in AI hardware, as Chinese firms accelerate efforts to build home-grown processors

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Zoho:
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Anuma:
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Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
OpenAI's User Growth Miss, Musk vs. Altman, Prediction Market Ban
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Training Data:
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The Upstarts Podcast:
Runway's Cris Valenzuela: Building The Hollywood-Friendly Video AI That OpenAI Couldn't
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
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Hard Fork:
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Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
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Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
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More News

Bloomberg:
X: @thestalwart and @thestalwart
LinkedIn: Antoine L. and Rachel GrafBluesky: @zachweinersmithForums: r/singularity

Earlier Picks

Debby Wu / Bloomberg: