Welcome back to your daily memorandum talking tech, business, AI, markets, and more. 🗞️

In today’s edition, we are tackling the following:

🧬 Nobel laureate John Jumper departs Google DeepMind to join rival Anthropic.
📱 iOS 27 expands landscape mode support across many more built-in Apple apps.
🕯️ Ubisoft co-founder Claude Guillemot dies aged 69 in a plane crash.
🎲 Polymarket paid creators to post fake winning bets, a WSJ investigation found.
🤝 U.S.-Iran talks end with technical negotiations set to continue this week.

TECHNOLOGY

• Nobel laureate John Jumper departs Google DeepMind to join rival Anthropic (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: The Information, Business Insider, Bloomberg}}

  • Nobel laureate John Jumper is leaving Google DeepMind for rival Anthropic after nearly nine years there.

  • He led the AlphaFold team and praised DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis for an early-career opportunity.

  • Jumper and Hassabis won the 2024 Nobel Prize in chemistry for AlphaFold, which predicts protein structures.

• iOS 27 expands landscape mode support across many more built-in Apple apps (MacRumors)
  ^{_{More: TechCrunch, Digital Trends}}

  • iOS 27 brings landscape mode to many more built-in apps, including Music, Podcasts, Health, and Home.

  • Many apps gain a left-aligned sidebar, and Live Activities now support landscape mode in the Dynamic Island.

  • The expansion could lay the groundwork for the rumored foldable 'iPhone Ultra,' which suits landscape-friendly apps well.

• Signal's Meredith Whittaker warns that AI chatbots are not your friends (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: TNW, Bloomberg, India Today}}

  • Signal President Meredith Whittaker warned that AI chatbots are "not your friends" and not sentient, conscious beings.

  • She uses AI to format documents but avoids asking questions, fearing it could eclipse her own thinking.

  • On AI shopping assistants, she warned that such pervasive access across apps would amount to a Signal backdoor.

BUSINESS

• Ubisoft co-founder Claude Guillemot dies aged 69 in plane crash (ABC)
  ^{_{More: NY Times, Reuters, TechCrunch}}

  • Claude Guillemot, co-founder of French video game company Ubisoft, died Friday in a plane crash aged 69.

  • He co-founded Ubisoft in 1986, behind franchises including Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, and Prince of Persia.

  • The Guillemot family retains control of Ubisoft, where his brother Yves remains CEO; Claude also chaired Guillemot Corp.

• Polymarket paid creators to post fake winning bets, a WSJ investigation found (WSJ)
  ^{_{More: Firstpost, Engadget, The Verge}}

  • A Wall Street Journal investigation found that Polymarket paid creators to post deceptive videos that showed fake, lucrative bets.

  • Many videos were filmed on near-perfect copies of the site, then amplified by a contractor's 'social-media army.'

  • Creators were reportedly told not to disclose payment; Polymarket says it will audit its promotional content.

• Trump blames Reflecting Pool problems on vandalism but offers no supporting evidence (PBS)
  ^{_{More: LA Times, AP, Washington Post}}

  • Trump blamed vandalism for problems with the Reflecting Pool's $14M-plus rehabilitation, but offered no supporting evidence.

  • His new blue lining quickly turned green, and the painted bottom began to peel after treatment.

  • He claimed that Park Police arrested multiple individuals, but relevant agencies did not respond to requests for comment.

MARKETS

WORLD

• U.S.-Iran talks end with technical negotiations set to continue this week (CNN)
  ^{_{More: NBC, AP, Korea Times}}

  • High-level U.S.-Iran talks in Switzerland concluded Monday, with lower-level negotiations planned for the rest of the week.

  • The sides agreed to create a 'de-confliction cell' with Lebanon to address ongoing fighting there.

  • The talks began a 60-day process for a permanent deal, though Lebanon remains a key sticking point.

• Explosion at Qatar's main LNG facility injures 54 & leaves 18 missing (Bloomberg)
  ^{_{More: Al Jazeera, Straits Times, TOI}}

  • An explosion at Qatar's main LNG processing facility injured 54 people and left 18 others missing.

  • The Interior Ministry blamed a 'technical malfunction' and said no leak posed danger to public safety.

  • Ras Laffan, north of Doha, hosts the world's largest LNG export facility, producing one-fifth of global supply.

• China hits dozens of U.S. firms with trade curbs after Pentagon blacklist (CNBC)
  ^{_{More: Firstpost, CNA, WSJ}}

  • China's Commerce Ministry added 10 American industrial suppliers to its export control list.

  • The Finance Ministry also excluded 46 U.S. companies from participating in government procurement projects.

  • The moves retaliate after the Pentagon blacklisted several Chinese tech firms it says aided Beijing's military.

FUTURISM

• Founders Fund backs Shinkei, a startup building humane robotic fish-harvesting tech (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: Tech Buzz, Yahoo!}}

  • Shinkei Systems builds Poseidon, a fridge-sized robot that uses computer vision to humanely kill fish onboard boats.

  • It scans each fish, locates its brain, and then pierces it, causing the fish to die without thrashing.

  • The method automates ike jime, a Japanese technique that preserves flavor and extends shelf life for sashimi.

• VLC's lead developer is now building real-time control infrastructure for robots (TNW)
  ^{_{More: Indian Express, TechCrunch}}

  • VLC lead developer Jean-Baptiste Kempf is building Kyber, an infrastructure layer for controlling remote devices.

  • Its core SDK synchronizes video, audio, sensor data, and control inputs in real time with minimal latency.

  • The Paris startup raised a $5M round led by Lightspeed, which also backed Anthropic and Mistral.

• A new AI robotaxi index ranks China ahead of global rivals (TechCrunch)
  ^{_{More: MSN, Yahoo!}}

  • Startup Autnmy AI launched its Road to Autonomy Index, ranking autonomous vehicle companies using public data.

  • The system weighs operations, scale, revenue, partnerships, manufacturing, and safety, updating its four rankings every 12 hours.

  • Co-founder Rob Grant said the platform never scrapes data, and China ranked strongly across multiple categories.

• Hunting for AI roles eats hours across careers pages, internal referrals, group chats, and a dozen overlapping boards*

  • The Athyna AI Job Board does the watching for you and matches openings to your profile in the background.

  • When a role hits a 75% matching index or higher, we notify you with details and a direct apply link.

CONTENT

• Anthropic's Fiona Fung discusses what happens after coding is fully solved (Lenny's Podcast)

  • Fiona Fung leads the teams behind Claude Code and Cowork at Anthropic, overseeing engineering and product.

  • Previously, she spent 11 years at Microsoft, then launched Facebook Marketplace and led Instagram infrastructure teams.

  • With 25 years of experience, she discusses managing a team now shipping 8x more code than before.

• Flexport's Ryan Peterson reveals two key questions every founder should ask (20VC)

  • Ryan Peterson is the founder and CEO of Flexport, which has raised $900M+ at an $8B valuation.

  • The logistics company now generates $450M in annual revenue, growing 30% year over year, he said.

  • He covers venture capital, AI-driven productivity in logistics, hiring, and comparisons between OpenAI and Anthropic.

• How media, communication & influence are changing in the internet era (a16z)

  • Marc Andreessen, Ben Horowitz, and others discuss how media, communication, and influence are changing online.

  • They explore the shift from legacy media to creator-led platforms, where authenticity becomes a competitive advantage.

  • They argue that founders should go direct, build audiences themselves, and treat the founder as the brand.

EXTRAS

• UK's Keir Starmer weighs his political future & could decide Monday (BBC)
  ^{_{More: CNBC, CNA, The Guardian}}

  • UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is weighing his future after rival Andy Burnham's decisive parliamentary election win.

  • Facing low popularity, he could decide Monday whether to step aside or fight a leadership contest.

  • Dozens of Labour lawmakers want him to set a departure timetable; Trump predicted Starmer will resign.

• Right-wing candidate Abelardo De La Espriella narrowly wins Colombia's presidential election (Reuters)
  ^{_{More: CNN, BBC, The Guardian}}

  • Right-wing candidate Abelardo De La Espriella narrowly won Colombia's presidential runoff with about 49.66% of the votes.

  • Leftist rival Ivan Cepeda trailed with 48.70% and urged supporters to await the final vote verification.

  • Trump-endorsed De La Espriella pledged to crack down on crime but faces high debt and a divided Congress.

• Taiwanese brothers amass a $1B fortune from booming display-chip demand (Business Times)
  ^{_{More: Bloomberg, Japan Times}}

  • Brothers Biing-seng and Jordan Wu founded Himax Technologies 25 years ago to make display-driver chips.

  • Their 24% stake, plus dividends and stock sales, gives them a combined net worth of $1B.

  • Himax holds a 40% share of automotive display chips, supplying Ferrari, Volkswagen, Porsche, and others.

AND MORE

• Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon discusses the emerging world of AI agents.

• From PGP to Mythos, a brief history of ineffective export controls.

• Explore all the tools and more here to outperform the competition.*

• South Korea's chip-worker bonuses put the central bank on inflation alert.

• In the Weights is a new AI-centric tool for vanity searches.

• Musk's SpaceX stake tops $1T, alongside other billionaire shareholders.

• Who benefits when the Trump administration cracks down on Anthropic?