SSPAI Morning Brief: Anthropic Surpasses OpenAI in Valuation, Becomes World’s Most Valuable AI Startup

Morning Brief

Anthropic surpasses OpenAI in valuation
The Pirate Bay marks 20 years since its raid and shutdown, yet remains operational today
Qualcomm launches the Snapdragon C series to compete with MacBook Neo-class notebook PCs
Last.fm returns to independent operation
vivo unveils the vivo S60 series
Beijing Internet Court says a single case involving a minor’s in-game spending exceeded RMB 600,000
Bill Gates faces an unprecedented public image crisis
News Worth a Quick Look

Anthropic surpasses OpenAI in valuation

According to The Wall Street Journal, Anthropic recently completed a $65 billion funding round, doubling its valuation to $965 billion. This allows the company to overtake its main rival OpenAI and become the world’s most highly valued AI startup.

Unlike OpenAI, which initially focused on consumer-facing products, Anthropic has concentrated on enterprise customers and code automation. Late last year, its autonomous coding tool Claude Code sparked significant interest among developers. Thanks to this momentum, the company’s annualized revenue is expected to reach $50 billion in June, while second-quarter revenue is projected to double to $10.9 billion, marking its first profitable quarter. The pace of Anthropic’s valuation growth has already set a new record in venture capital history.

Computing power has now become the central battleground between the two AI giants. Earlier this year, OpenAI completed a $122 billion funding round and has been competing aggressively for enterprise customers with rival coding products. To keep up with stronger-than-expected business growth and break through infrastructure bottlenecks, Anthropic has reportedly signed a deal worth nearly $50 billion with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to gain access to the vast computing resources of the Colossus data center.

Financial markets are also closely watching a wave of upcoming AI-related public offerings. Reports indicate that OpenAI is expected to file for an initial public offering in the near future, while Anthropic is also aiming to go public as early as this year. In addition, SpaceX is reportedly preparing for an IPO around June 12, seeking a valuation exceeding $1.5 trillion.

The Pirate Bay marks 20 years since its raid and shutdown, yet remains operational today

According to TorrentFreak, May 31 marked the twentieth anniversary of the police raid on the infamous BitTorrent-sharing website The Pirate Bay. Despite years of pressure from the U.S. government, repeated server seizures, and prison sentences handed down to its founders, the site remains online today, living up to its self-proclaimed reputation as “the most resilient torrent site in the universe.”

On May 31, 2006, sixty-five Swedish police officers raided the Stockholm data center that hosted The Pirate Bay, attempting to permanently remove its servers. However, before the operation took place, co-founder Fredrik Neij sensed that something was wrong and rushed to back up all of the site’s critical tracker infrastructure. As a result, The Pirate Bay returned online just three days after the raid. Its homepage was renamed “Police Bay,” and it adopted a new logo depicting a phoenix rising from the ashes alongside a pirate ship firing cannons at Hollywood. The message was unmistakably mocking. Rather than destroying the site, the raid attracted widespread mainstream media coverage and triggered a surge in global traffic.

The driving force behind the operation was the U.S. government. Diplomatic cables later released to the public revealed that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPA) and the U.S. Embassy in Sweden had spent months pressuring Swedish authorities before the raid. The cables explicitly demanded firm action against what they described as a major offender openly disregarding intellectual property rights, and U.S. officials viewed the operation as a significant diplomatic achievement in the broader fight against online piracy.

As the criminal investigation progressed, several key founders were ultimately convicted and sentenced to prison. The original team subsequently severed ties with the website and transferred control to anonymous organizations registered in locations such as the Seychelles. From that point onward, The Pirate Bay adopted a lower-profile approach. Although it was forced offline for several weeks in 2014 following another data center seizure, the site continues to operate today under the stewardship of anonymous administrators working behind the scenes.

Qualcomm launches the Snapdragon C series to compete with MacBook Neo-class notebook PCs

On May 28, Qualcomm announced the Snapdragon C series of SoCs, designed specifically for entry-level Windows 11 devices with starting prices as low as $300. The first products powered by the new chips are expected to launch later in 2026, targeting lightweight productivity and media-consumption scenarios while competing against Apple’s MacBook Neo and the Chromebook laptops that have long dominated education and budget markets.

The Snapdragon C series emphasizes energy efficiency, fanless silent operation, and all-day battery life. Together with the premium Snapdragon X2 lineup, it forms part of Qualcomm’s next-generation PC processor portfolio. Unlike the high-performance Snapdragon X family, however, Snapdragon C does not utilize Qualcomm’s custom Oryon CPU architecture. In addition, while the chip still includes an integrated neural processing unit (NPU), cost considerations mean that most Snapdragon C laptops are expected to ship with only 4GB or 8GB of memory. This falls short of Microsoft’s 16GB requirement for Copilot+ PC certification, meaning these devices will not be able to fully support Windows’ advanced AI features.

Acer, HP, and Lenovo have already confirmed their participation as launch partners and are expected to introduce low-cost Windows 11 devices powered by Snapdragon C.

Last.fm returns to independent operation

On May 27, veteran music platform Last.fm announced on its official forum that it had formally separated from Paramount Skydance and returned to independent ownership nearly two decades after being acquired. The company emphasized that despite the ownership change, its products, services, and operating team will remain unchanged.

Addressing concerns that might arise from the transition, Last.fm assured users that all accounts, listening histories, subscription statuses, and linked payment information would remain fully intact. The company stated that additional details regarding the transition period and future plans will be shared in the coming weeks.

Founded in 2002, Last.fm originally began as an internet radio service. In 2007, CBS Interactive—later folded into Paramount Skydance through corporate mergers—acquired the company for $280 million. In 2014, responding to shifts in the streaming market, Last.fm shut down its $3-per-month subscription radio service and refocused entirely on cross-platform music tracking and listening-data analysis.

As a cross-platform music tracking tool, Last.fm allows users to connect services such as Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube. Every song played generates a listening record known as a “Scrobble.” Using this Scrobble data, Last.fm can accurately collect and analyze users’ listening habits in real time, helping it maintain a loyal and dedicated user base over the years.

vivo unveils the vivo S60 series

On May 29, vivo officially launched the vivo S60 series. The lineup is built around a design language dubbed “Starlight Aesthetics,” featuring a unibody floating-light cold-carved glass finish. Its signature colorway, “Starry Sea,” employs a three-dimensional starlight lithography process that layers patterns onto the film surface, combined with lithographic de-metallization techniques and triangular prism etching to create varying shimmering effects under different lighting conditions.

The vivo S60 measures as thin as 7.79mm in certain color variants. All models feature a 6.59-inch display with a 144Hz eye-comfort panel, hardware-level low blue light technology, and support for brightness as low as 1 nit. The series also introduces Wet Finger Ultrasonic Fingerprint 2.0, capable of reliably recognizing sweaty or wet fingers in everyday unlocking scenarios.

For imaging, vivo has reworked its algorithms to address common Live Photo shortcomings such as soft image quality, inadequate stabilization, and inconsistent color reproduction. The result is 4K output for every frame of a Live Photo sequence. Combined with a gimbal-level primary camera system, the phones achieve CIPA 5.0 professional-grade stabilization. The series also includes “Starlight Live” lighting enhancement features and creative collage tools. In addition, it becomes the first smartphone lineup to support glasses-free 3D spatial image sharing directly to Xiaohongshu, expanding social photography possibilities.

The standard S60 model is powered by Qualcomm’s third-generation Snapdragon 8s mobile platform. Every model in the lineup comes equipped with a 7200mAh Blue Ocean battery, 90W fast charging, a VC liquid-cooling system, IP69 and IP68 dust and water resistance ratings, and SGS-certified drop and impact resistance.

The vivo S60 series is now available for pre-order and will officially go on sale on June 3. The lineup includes a Standard Edition and a Vitality Edition. Pricing starts at RMB 3,599 for the vivo S60 Standard Edition (12GB + 256GB) and RMB 2,899 for the Vitality Edition (8GB + 256GB).

vivo also introduced several new IoT ecosystem products. The new vivo over-ear noise-canceling headphones support up to 58dB active noise cancellation and seamless triple-device connectivity across ecosystems, priced at RMB 499. The vivo TWS 5e earbuds, focused on long battery life and low latency, are priced at RMB 229. Meanwhile, the vivo WATCH GT 2 smart watch has also received an upgrade.

Beijing Internet Court says a single case involving a minor’s in-game spending exceeded RMB 600,000

According to Beijing Daily, on May 28 the Beijing Internet Court held a press conference to release the White Paper on Judicial Protection of Minors in Cyberspace (2021–2026). The report shows that disputes involving minors have expanded beyond traditional gaming-related issues into emerging sectors such as blind-box purchases and online social interaction services. It also notes that some online products continue to encourage excessive spending, while unclear responsibility among platforms, streamers, and other stakeholders makes it more difficult for minors to defend their rights.

In May 2021, the Beijing Internet Court established China’s first internet juvenile tribunal. By May 2026, the court had handled 2,581 internet-related disputes involving minors, with an average annual increase of approximately 237 cases. According to the report, disputes have gradually expanded beyond gaming top-ups and livestream tipping into areas such as social networking, digital comics, blind-box consumption, online companionship services, and casual mobile games.

Online consumption disputes remain the most common category of cases. Individual livestream tipping disputes have involved amounts exceeding RMB 6.5 million, while the largest gaming top-up case surpassed RMB 640,000. In some cases, minors spent hundreds of thousands of yuan within a short period on lottery-style mini-games and blind-box purchases. The report argues that these disputes reflect both insufficient parental supervision and shortcomings in platform mechanisms related to anti-addiction systems, spending limits, and content moderation.

Bill Gates faces an unprecedented public image crisis

According to The Wall Street Journal, the carefully cultivated public image of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is facing an unprecedented challenge. Ongoing revelations regarding his relationship with the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, along with reports of multiple extramarital affairs, have reportedly led to growing isolation for the 70-year-old billionaire in both business and philanthropic circles. Gates was absent from this year’s Microsoft CEO Summit and Berkshire Hathaway’s shareholder meeting, and is expected to face questioning from a U.S. congressional committee later this month regarding his ties to Epstein.

The controversy has reportedly weakened both Gates’ reputation and his network among influential figures. In addition to Microsoft distancing itself from him, longtime friend and renowned investor Warren Buffett is said to have become increasingly reserved. Buffett reportedly skipped a recent annual charitable gathering organized by Gates and stated that he would temporarily pause his annual large-scale donations to the Gates Foundation until he had fully reviewed recently released Epstein-related documents from the U.S. Department of Justice.

Within the Gates Foundation and affiliated organizations, employee concerns and uncertainty have also intensified. At an internal foundation meeting in February, Gates reportedly acknowledged having extramarital relationships with two Russian women, one of whom had worked for a nuclear energy company in which he invested. According to internal documents cited by The Wall Street Journal, critical media coverage of Gates and the foundation has increased by more than 40% since the release of the Epstein files. Governments in countries such as India have also reportedly canceled keynote speaking invitations due to concerns about negative publicity.

During his tenure leading Microsoft, Gates developed a reputation for aggressive behavior during antitrust battles. In response, his team spent years investing heavily in reshaping his image into that of a thoughtful philanthropist focused on global health and development. These efforts reportedly extended to details as specific as the style of sweaters he wore in public appearances, and even included attempts to influence or request changes to footage used in Netflix documentaries about him.

News Worth a Quick Look

According to Axios, Nvidia and Microsoft are expected to announce the first Windows PCs powered by Nvidia CPUs this week, including Microsoft Surface devices and products from third-party manufacturers such as Dell.

On May 29, Apple leaker Sonny Dickson shared a series of iPhone 18 Pro dummy-unit photos, providing the first physical look at four color options: Light Blue, Black (or Dark Gray), Silver, and a new Dark Cherry finish. Based on multiple earlier reports, the Dark Cherry color is expected to be relatively understated. The leaked dummy units are largely consistent with descriptions previously shared by Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman and other supply-chain sources. Chinese leaker @刹那数码 previously described the color as resembling the tone of red wine.

Mark Gurman also claims that:

Apple’s first smart glasses are now expected to launch in late 2027, with a target price between $200 and $500.
Apple has begun development of iOS 28 and macOS 28 (internally codenamed “Boppy”) as part of preparations for the 20th anniversary of the iPhone next year, with more substantial system updates planned.
New versions of Apple TV and HomePod mini are currently undergoing internal testing at Apple headquarters. The new HomePod mini is expected to receive an upgraded processor capable of supporting Apple’s latest AI features. Both devices were previously delayed while Apple continued work on the next-generation Siri and Apple Intelligence platform, but they are now reportedly scheduled for release this fall.