Monthly Digest: March’s Big Business Battles

In today’s digest, we’ll explore the latest tech headlines, beginning with the Department of Justice’s lawsuit against Apple over alleged iPhone monopoly control, followed by the conflict between Elon Musk and OpenAI. Stay tuned as we uncover the latest updates and explore noteworthy developments in the tech world!

Monopoly Wars

DOJ files lawsuit against Apple for iPhone monopoly

Let’s start this series of news from March 21st, when the United States Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Apple, accusing the tech giant of monopolistic practices in the smartphone industry. The lawsuit, joined by 16 state attorneys general, alleges that Apple’s ecosystem and App Store policies restrict competition and result in higher consumer prices.

“Consumers should not have to pay higher prices because companies violate the antitrust laws,” says Attorney General Merrick B. Garland.

The DOJ seeks relief to restore competition and lower costs for consumers. Apple is accused of blocking innovative apps, suppressing cloud streaming services, excluding cross-platform messaging apps, diminishing non-Apple smartwatch functionality, and limiting third-party digital wallets. The DOJ aims to address Apple’s anticompetitive behavior and seeks equitable relief on behalf of the American public. The lawsuit has garnered international attention amid growing regulatory scrutiny of tech companies’ practices.

Epic Games’ antitrust battle gets a boost

In the context of the DOJ filing against Apple for alleged monopolistic practices, Epic Games finds validation for its long-standing complaints against the tech giant’s App Store policies.

Epic Games, the creator of the popular game Fortnite, has been embroiled in a legal battle with Apple over its iOS App Store policies for several years. Epic has been vocal about its dissatisfaction with Apple’s requirement that developers pay a 30% commission on in-app purchases made through the App Store. Besides, Epic has criticized Apple’s control over app distribution, as iOS devices do not allow for sideloading apps from third-party sources like Android devices do.

The DOJ’s lawsuit against Apple reflects many of the concerns Epic Games and other developers raised regarding Apple’s App Store practices. The lawsuit alleges that Apple wields its monopoly power to stifle competition and extract high fees from developers, ultimately harming consumers and innovation within the smartphone industry.

While Epic Games and its CEO, Tim Sweeney, have been vocal critics of Apple’s practices in the past, they have declined to comment specifically on the DOJ lawsuit. Sweeney, who often speaks out on antitrust issues, has indicated that he will refrain from commenting on Twitter until the conclusion of legal proceedings in an unrelated trial involving Epic Games and Apple in Australia.

CAF cheers DOJ’s Apple antitrust suit

Meanwhile, The Coalition for App Fairness (CAF), comprising companies like Epic Games, Spotify, Deezer, Match Group, and other members, supports the Department of Justice’s antitrust lawsuit against Apple. They criticize Apple’s practices, alleging they stifle competition and harm consumers and developers. Epic and Spotify have previously clashed with Apple over issues like the 30% cut of in-app payments and compliance with regulations. While Apple portrays the CAF as an adversary, the coalition views Apple’s actions as monopolistic. Apple argues that the lawsuit threatens its ability to innovate and defends its practices.

What will be next? Will Apple’s response to the DOJ’s allegations reshape the landscape of digital platforms, or will it further entrench the company’s dominance in the ecosystem? Let’s see the outcome, and stay tuned!

Business

Reddit’s IPO priced at $34 per share & ended up at $50.31

Previously, we were writing about Reddit filing for an IPO, offering its shares to users. Now, Reddit has priced its initial public offering (IPO) at $34 per share, hitting the top of the anticipated range. The social media giant raised nearly $500 million in the offering, valuing the company at $5.4 billion, excluding employee stock options. Despite posting net losses of over $90 million, investors are enthusiastic about Reddit’s IPO, particularly due to its involvement in the AI sector through data licensing agreements with firms like Google.

However, Reddit’s stock price closed significantly higher than its IPO price of $34 per share. It ended its first day of trading at $50.31 per share, marking an increase of nearly 48% from its initial offering price.

AI

Nvidia hosted an AI conference at the GTC Event

From 17 to 21 March, Nvidia, a leading chip manufacturer, hosted a major AI conference as part of its GTC event, where it revealed groundbreaking advancements in AI and introduced several innovative projects and initiatives. Let’s see what Nvidia has announced.

Addressing concerns about AGI

At the conference, CEO Jensen Huang discussed Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and refrained from providing a specific timeline for its development. However, he suggested that achieving AGI-defined milestones could be possible within 5 years if specific criteria are met, such as passing specific tests like a legal bar exam or logic tests. Besides, Huang emphasized the importance of ensuring AI-generated answers are well-researched to prevent inaccuracies, particularly for critical topics like health advice.

Nvidia introduces NIM

Nvidia also unveiled NIM, aiming to simplify the deployment of AI models in production environments. NIM combines optimized inferencing engines with AI models, packaged into containers for easy deployment as microservices. It significantly reduces the time and effort required to ship containers, making AI deployment more accessible. Currently, NIM supports models from various providers and integrates with platforms like Amazon SageMaker, Google Kubernetes Engine, and Microsoft Azure AI.

Nvidia’s project GR00T: Advancing Humanoid Robotics with cutting-edge AI and hardware

Besides, Nvidia introduced Project GR00T, an AI platform aimed at humanoid robotics involving major players like Agility Robotics, Boston Dynamics, and Sanctuary AI. The platform, along with new hardware like Jetson Thor, aims to accelerate development in the humanoid robot field, offering state-of-the-art dexterity and AI capabilities for robotic arms, as well as vision processing for autonomous mobile robotics.

Pienso launches no-code AI platform for model deployment

Are you struggling with deploying AI models due to technical barriers or lack of coding expertise? If so, platforms like Pienso could help address these challenges.

Pienso, founded by MIT alumni, offers a no-code AI platform to help users build and deploy models without coding. It originated from research on social media content moderation. Pienso aims to empower non-technical users like researchers and marketers to train AI models with their data. The platform guides users through data annotation and integrates with enterprise systems securely. Sky and a US government agency have already tested Pienso for customer service and illegal weapons tracking, respectively. Pienso recently raised $10 million in Series A funding to expand its teams and develop new features.

Elon Musk VS OpenAI

Elon Musk is suing OpenAI, its founders, and affiliates, alleging they’ve betrayed their nonprofit AI mission by prioritizing profit over humanity. Musk claims OpenAI, originally intended as a nonprofit, has become a for-profit subsidiary of Microsoft, focusing on commercializing AGI research. He accuses them of breaching agreements to make technology freely available and demands they return to their original mission. The lawsuit seeks to prevent the monetization of AI technologies for private gain and requests recognition of AGI systems like GPT-4 as beyond licensing agreements. Musk also criticizes OpenAI’s board for lacking expertise in AI ethics and governance.

OpenAI reacts to Elon Musk’s lawsuit

OpenAI has responded to Elon Musk’s lawsuit, dismissing his claims and asserting that Musk’s influence on the company’s success has been overstated. The company revealed that Musk had only contributed $45 million since its inception in 2015, despite initially pledging up to $1 billion in funding. OpenAI also highlighted that it had received over $90 million from other donors to support its research.

OpenAI stated that the transition from a nonprofit model to a for-profit structure was necessary to secure the substantial funding required for AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) research, which could amount to billions of dollars annually.

OpenAI disclosed email exchanges indicating that Musk had suggested merging OpenAI with Tesla or gaining full control but eventually left the organization to pursue his own AI initiatives. The company emphasized its commitment to developing beneficial AGI for humanity and promoting access to its tools globally.

Elon Musk’s xAI releases an open-sourced LLM Grok

Finally, Elon Musk’s xAI released its Grok AI model as “open source” to challenge rival OpenAI’s closed approach, hoping to foster collaboration and transparency in the AI community. Grok, a chatbot trained to answer queries with a sassy tone and access to Twitter data, competes with models like ChatGPT and Claude. While releasing the code provides developers with access to advanced AI capabilities, the unique nature of AI models complicates the concept of “open source.”

Unlike traditional software, AI models are complex statistical representations derived from vast amounts of training data, making them difficult to understand or modify fully. As discussions continue within the standards community regarding the definition of openness in AI, the release of Grok raises broader questions about transparency and accountability in AI development.