Hi there, this is your daily ☕️ Techpresso.
In today's Techpresso:
🇨🇳 China advances on its AI 'Manhattan Project'
📱 The ChatGPT app store is here
⚛️ Trump Media merges with nuclear fusion firm for $6 billion
📈 Coinbase adds stock trading, prediction markets in ‘everything app’ push
💰 OpenAI eyes $100 billion funding at $750 billion valuation
😨 Alexandr Wang calls Zuckerberg micromanagement 'suffocating'
🎁 + 20 other news you might like
🧰 + 6 trending tools
📚 + 1 trending papers
🇨🇳 China advances on its AI 'Manhattan Project' LINK
Chinese scientists in Shenzhen have secretly built a prototype machine for extreme ultraviolet lithography as part of a national Manhattan Project to produce advanced semiconductors independent of US supply chains.
The team includes former ASML engineers working under aliases who reverse-engineered components from older lithography tools to construct a massive prototype that now successfully generates extreme ultraviolet light.
Huawei coordinates the effort to replicate Western optical precision by firing high-powered lasers at droplets of molten tin inside a prototype that is far heavier than ASML systems.
📱 The ChatGPT app store is here LINK
OpenAI is opening its platform so any developer can plug their app right into the flow of conversation, allowing tools to be summoned contextually or by name instead of through tappable icons.
These connections rely on a rapidly growing new standard called MCP rather than a typical pile of APIs, which lets servers share data, tools, and memory in one consolidated, automated process.
Partners like Adobe and Target now let you edit images using granular sliders or browse product grids inside the chat, though many features still refer you back to their respective apps.
⚛️ Trump Media merges with nuclear fusion firm for $6 billion LINK
Donald Trump’s social media firm is entering the fusion-power business through a $6 billion all-stock merger with privately held TAE Technologies that pairs Truth Social with experimental nuclear fusion technology.
Devin Nunes will be the co-CEO along with Michl Binderbauer for the combined entity, which plans to site and begin construction on a utility-scale fusion power plant after the deal closes.
Investors sent shares surging on the news even though the platform consistently clocked losses, while its new partner is backed by Google to build neutral beam systems for AI data centers.
📈 Coinbase adds stock trading, prediction markets in ‘everything app’ push LINK
Coinbase is moving beyond just crypto by launching support for stocks and prediction markets as part of a broad push to become a complete one-stop financial app for mainstream retail investing.
CEO Brian Armstrong wants to create a place to trade everything, combining a streamlined futures experience and wagers through Kalshi with a tokenization roadmap that eventually brings traditional equities on-chain.
While competitors like Polymarket focus on liquidity, the executive argues that most people actually use these tools to track economic indicators or election sentiment rather than strictly as an asset class.
💰 OpenAI eyes $100 billion funding at $750 billion valuation LINK
OpenAI is reportedly holding discussions to raise as much as $100 billion in a new funding round that would give the company a massive valuation of roughly $750 billion overall.
Amazon is also currently negotiating to invest $10 billion or more in a circular deal where the firm turns around and spends it on Amazon chips and cloud services.
The startup has reached an annualized revenue run rate of $19 billion, but hitting its targets requires an enormous cash burn of roughly $26 billion for this year and next.
😨 Alexandr Wang calls Zuckerberg micromanagement 'suffocating' LINK
Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang privately told associates that Mark Zuckerberg’s tight control over the company’s artificial intelligence efforts is stifling progress, adding to the growing internal turmoil at Meta.
The botched rollout of Llama 4 saw the model lag behind rivals on key benchmarks like coding, with insiders blaming weak training data and insufficient testing for the humiliating blow.
Chief AI scientist Yann LeCun is departing to start a new initiative after reportedly objecting to reporting to the 28-year-old, while staff question if the TBD Lab head is out of his depth.
Other news you might like
- Apple announces more ads are coming to App Store search resultsLINK
- Meta is 'pausing' third-party VR headsets from ASUS and LenovoLINK
- Micron predicts the memory crisis will last beyond 2026, says it can't meet full demandLINK
- North Korea stole billions in crypto in 2025, new research saysLINK
- Google works to erode Nvidia's software advantage with Meta's helpLINK
- Memory efficiency: Apple’s new competitive advantageLINK
- Amazon says AI chief Rohit Prasad is leaving, Peter DeSantis to lead 'AGI' groupLINK
- Apple opens up its App Store to competition in JapanLINK
- FTC probing Instacart’s AI pricing tool after being caught charging customers different prices: reportLINK
- Meta AI chief Yann LeCun in talks to raise $586M for new AI startup at $3B valuationLINK
- YouTube will stream the Oscars — exclusively — beginning in 2029LINK
- Sony’s legal battle against Tencent’s Horizon ‘clone’ is already overLINK
- Adobe hit with proposed class-action, accused of misusing authors’ work in AI trainingLINK
- Visa says new AI shopping tool has helped customers with hundreds of transactionsLINK
- Epic Games accuses Apple of ‘competition-crushing’ junk fees as battle continuesLINK
- AI isn’t optional at Microsoft — CEO Satya Nadella just made that clear, but almost no one is using CopilotLINK
- Study links Amazon's algorithmic pricing with erratic, inflated costs for school districtsLINK
- Study finds ad blockers cut over 2 days of loading time per yearLINK
🧰 Trending tools
Monocle 3.0 for macOS: a focus timer that activates when you wiggle your mouse, helping you remember and return to your original task when distractions interrupt your workflow.LINK
Netlify AI Gateway: a unified API for accessing OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google models without managing separate credentials, API keys, or billing accounts yourself.LINK
Shadow: captures both audio and screen content from meetings without bots, then uses AI to generate actionable outputs based on complete context.LINK
Screenhance: a browser tool that transforms raw screenshots into polished, presentation-ready images with customizable layouts, backgrounds, and optional animations without needing design software.LINK
Mujo AI: an AI design agent that generates professional product images and marketing copy from a single photo upload, eliminating the need for designers or complex tools.LINK
wavelet-matrix: a Rust-powered Python library providing fast rank/select, top-k, quantile, range queries, and dynamic updates using wavelet matrix data structures.LINK
📚 Trending papers & reports
Factuality benchmark tests AI knowledge recall: researchers created a verified question set that measures how accurately AI models answer factual questions using only their trained knowledge.LINK
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