Payments startup Stripe said in its annual letter released Thursday that artificial intelligence startups are growing at a faster rate than traditional Software-as-a-Service companies have in the past, calling it "an AI boom." According to Stripe, the top AI companies by revenue were able to achieve $5 million in annualized revenue in 24 months in 2024, compared to the top 100 SaaS companies needing 37 months to reach the same milestone in 2018. "Much as SaaS started horizontal and then went vertical (first Salesforce (NYSE: CRM) and then Toast), we're seeing a similar dynamic playing out in AI: We started with ChatGPT but are not seeing a proliferation of industry specific tools," Stripe wrote, adding that these tools are helping companies "properly realize the economic impact of LLMs and that the contextual, data, and workflow integration will prove enduringly valuable."

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) backed AI start-up Anthropic released its latest large language model Claude 3.7 Sonnet on Monday, calling it the industry's first "hybrid AI reasoning model," due to its ability to give both real-time answers and "thought-out" answers to user queries. Users are able to activate Claude's "reasoning" abilities, prompting the AI model to "think" for an extended period of time to answer more complex challenges like math or coding questions. "Similar to how humans don't have two separate brains for questions that can be answered immediately versus those that require thought, we regard reasoning as simploy one of the capabilities a frontier model should have, to be smoothly integrated with other capabilities, rather than something to be provided in a separate model," Anthropic wrote in a blogpost. Claude 3.7 Sonnet is rolling out to all users and developers on Monday, but only premium users can access the new reasoning features.

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) announced plans Monday to invest $500 billion over the next four years in the United States to build out its artificial intelligence infrastructure. The first projects include a new factory in Houston, Texas to produce servers to support the tech giant's in-house AI, Apple Intelligence; doubling the value of Apple's U.S. Advanced Manufacturing Fund to $10 billion; and the creation of a new academy in Michigan to train employees for its next-generation factories. "From doubling our Advanced Manufacturing Fund, to building advanced technology in Texas, we're thrilled to expand our support for American manufacturing," CEO Tim Cook said in a statement. "We'll keep working with people and companies across this country to help write an extraordinary new chapter in the history of American innovation."

Yum Brands' (NYSE: YUM) Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) chain's U.S. headquarters will move from Louisville, Kentucky, to Plano, Texas, the fast-food corporation announced Tuesday. The relocation is part of Yum Brands' long-term goal to have two corporate U.S. headquarters: on is Plano, and the other in Irvine, California. KFC and Pizza Hut's global teams are already based in Plano, while Taco Bell and the Habit Burger & Grill's corporate teams are in Irvine. Roughly 100 KFC U.S. employees will be required to relocate over the next six month as part of the move. "These changes position us for sustainable growth and will help us better serve our customers, employees, franchisees and shareholders," said CEO David Gibbs in a statement. "I'm confident this is another important step in growing our iconic restaurant brands globally."

OpenAI officially rejected Elon Musk's proposal to buy the artificial intelligence start-up's nonprofit for $97.4 billion on Friday, with Chair Bret Taylor adding that the company "is not for sale," in a statement. In a short letter to Musk's attorney, Marc Toberoff, OpenAI's lawyer William Savitt said the company's board reviewed the proposal and concluded that Musk's "much-publicized 'bid' is in fact not a bid at all," the New York Times reports. Savitt went on to write that the "proposal, even as first presented, is not in the best interest of OAI's mission and is rejected. The decision of the OAI board on this matter is unanimous." On Monday, Musk, his AI company xAI, and a group of investors offered to buy OpenAI's nonprofit unit, adding to the billionaire's longstanding public feud with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

Major semiconductor designer Arm Holdings (NASDAQ: ARM) will reportedly begin making its own chips this year, according to the Financial Times, and Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META) has signed on to be one of its first customers. The chip is expected to be a CPU for servers in large data centers, according to the report, and the could be unveiled as early as this summer. This is a notable shift from Arm's current strategy of licensing its technology to its customers so they in turn can build their own chips; Arm's customers include Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL), Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) and Intel (NASDAQ: INTC). Meta announced recently is plans to spend as much as $65 billion this year on capital expenditures for AI development.

Chevron (NYSE: CVX) announced plans Wednesday to cut its workforce by 15% to 20% in effort to lower costs, with most of the layoffs taking place before the end of 2026. The oil giant is seeking to reduce costs by between $2 billion and $3 billion in that timeline. "We do not take these actions lightly and will support our employees through the transition," Chevron Vice Chair Mark Nelson said in a statement. "But responsible leadership requires taking these steps to improve the long-term competitiveness of our company for our people, our shareholders and our communities." Chevron delivered disappointing results in its recent quarter, with its fuel business reporting a loss of $248 million compared with a profit of $1.15 billion in the previous year.

The National Football League's Super Bowl on Sunday attracted a record 127.7 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research, airing on Fox Corporation's (NASDAQ: FOXA) broadcast network. The championship game also aired on Fox's Spanish-language cable network Fox Deportes and NBCUniversal's (NASDAQ: CMCSA) Telemundo, as well as Fox's free, ad-supported streamer Tubi -- this was the first year the Super Bowl was available on the app. The game on streaming platforms also broke records, garnering 14.5 million viewers across platforms and 13.6 million on Tubi alone, according to Adobe Analytics. The Super Bowl's viewership peaked at an audience of 137.7 million from 8 p.m to 8:15 p.m, according to Nielsen, while the halftime show, headlined by Kendrick Lamar, had an average 133.5 million viewers across TV and digital platforms.

Investors led by Elon Musk are offering $97.4 billion in an unsolicited bid to buy control of OpenAI, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday. "It's time for OpenAI to return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it once was," Musk said in a statement provided by his attorney Marc Toberoff, WSJ reports. "We will make sure that happens." OpenAI CEO Sam Altman co-founded the artificial intelligence company with Musk in 2015 as a charity effort to create AI to benefit humanity. After Musk left the company in 2019, OpenAI created a for-profit subsidiary to raise capital from investors, including Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT); Musk has previously filed legal complaints claiming OpenAI of betraying its original non-profit mission. The bid is backed by Musk's AI company xAI, which could merge with OpenAI is a deal is reached. Other backers include Valor Equity Partners, Baron Capital, Atreides Management, Vy Capital and 8VC, WSJ reports.

Shopify (NYSE: SHOP) on Friday published a blog post endorsing "open trade," in response to President Donald Trump's pause to end the "de minimis" exception on certain imports from China, calling for regulators to give online merchants the "freedom to expand without constraints imposed by geopolitical brinkmanship." The ruling, signed into law in 1930, lets imports under $800 enter the country tax free. "Without small-business protections, legitimate entrepreneurs suffer under policies intended to curb exploitation," the post read. "This hikes costs, disrupts supply chains, and hinders cross-border trade." The Trump administration argues that the exception makes it difficult for U.S. customs to identify illegal shipments, and only reversed its decision in response to push back from merchants and consumers. However, the de minimis rule is set to be removed once "adequate systems are in place to fully and expediently process and collect tariff revenue," according to an executive order signed by Trump on Friday.

MicroStrategy (NASDAQ: MSTR), the largest corporate holder of bitcoin, announced it will be changing its name to Strategy, and unveiled a new bitcoin-focused logo and orange brand color alongside an online merchandise store as the company plans to shift its focus to "bitcoin development." The company currently holds over 471,000 bitcoins on its balance sheet, acquiring 218,887 bitcoins by the end of its recent quarter, as part of its aggressive effort over the past year of selling billions of dollars of convertible bonds to purchase the cryptocurrency. “Strategy is innovating in the two most transformative technologies of the twenty-first century – bitcoin and artificial intelligence. Our new name powerfully and simply conveys the universal and global appeal of our company, and the value we bring to the strategies of our shareholders, customers, partners, and employees," CEO Phong Le said in a statement.

Snap (NYSE: SNAP) said that "uncertainty" surrounding TikTok's future operations in the United States has positively affected its business in its fourth quarter. "We're not trying to draw too many conclusions from some of the engagement lift we saw when [TikTok] went dark for that brief period of time," CEO Evan Spiegel told analysts during the company's earnings call on Tuesday. "I would say that the overall environment of uncertainty is benefiting our business." The company reported an increase of 39 million daily active users in its fourth quarter year-over-year, with Spiegel added that the app "reached a billion public posts a month on Snapchat," during the quarter. "The public content ecosystem is growing in a really nice and healthy way, and so we're just going to continue our focus there when it comes to our strategy and participation," Spiegel said.

The European Union formally began enforcement of its artificial intelligence law, called the AI Act, on Sunday, launching restrictions and potential fines for violations for AI applications that it deems pose an "unacceptable risk" to citizens. These unacceptable AI activities include those used: for social scoring; to manipulate a person's decisions either subliminally or deceptively; to exploit social vulnerabilities like age, disability, or socioeconomic status; to attempt to predict crimes based on a person's appearance; to collect biometric data in public places for the purposes of law enforcement; to infer people's emotions or characteristics; to create or expand facial recognition databases by scraping images for security cameras or online. Companies can face fines of as much as 35 million euros or 7% of their global annual revenues (whichever amount is higher) for breaches of the AI Act, with the penalties depending on the infringement.

Once known only for its hardware, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has posted major growth in its Services division, home to its App Store, iCloud, Music, TV+, and other subscriptions, which recorded an all-time revenue record of $26.3 billion in its fiscal first quarter, rising 14% annually. CEO Tim Cook highlighted in the company's earnings call on Thursday that Services generated roughly $100 billion in revenue over the past year, driven in-part by Apple garnering more than 1 billion subscriptions across its software offerings, including through third-party apps in the App Store. Cook added that Apple also recorded a new record install base of over 2.35 billion active devices, spurred by enthusiasm surrounding the rollout of Apple Intelligence. The company's generative AI service, "opens up an exciting new frontier and is already elevating experiences across iPhone, iPad, and Mac," Cook said.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META) CEO Mark Zuckerberg teased a "return of OG Facebook" as part of the company's goals for 2025 during its fourth-quarter earnings call with investors late Wednesday. "I think there are a lot of opportunities to make [Facebook] way more culturally influential than it is today," Zuckerberg told analysts, saying the social media platform is something the company plans to invest more in this year. A 2024 survey by Pew Research found that U.S. teens has declined sharply from 71% in 2014-2015 to just 33% last year, as platforms such as TikTok, Snapchat (NYSE: SNAP) and Instagram appear to be more attractive to younger Americans.