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2. ⚡️Pentagon stops using Anthropic
3. 💼 The Deployment Report
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5. 🗞️ The News Bulletin
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The US Department of Defence has confirmed it is no longer using Anthropic's AI tools, months after Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth designated the company a supply chain risk on national security grounds. Claude had remained embedded in Pentagon operations until this week.
Multiple sources told BBC that Claude was still being used as recently as last week for research, analysis, intelligence gathering, and military operations against Iran.
Claude was integrated into Palantir's Maven Smart System, the Pentagon's primary intelligence platform, making removal "painful" according to a former defence official.
Anthropic refused Pentagon demands to remove safety guardrails from Claude for military use, citing concerns over mass surveillance and autonomous weapons.
For enterprise leaders evaluating AI vendors, this signals a widening split between safety-focused AI companies and government buyers demanding unrestricted access. Anthropic's refusal to compromise its guardrails cost it a major government contract, but the company is suing the Trump administration to overturn the designation. Meanwhile, OpenAI and Google have expanded Pentagon adoption, raising questions about where the line sits between commercial AI safety policies and national security demands.
THE DEPLOYMENT REPORT
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OpenAI's CEO argued for a regulatory light touch in a Politico interview, saying society needs to tolerate hacks, scams, and other harms because the "good stuff" will outweigh them by "orders of magnitude." The comments landed as another OpenAI safety researcher resigned, warning that "the companies building this technology aren't being nearly careful enough."
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis pushed back sharply, rejecting the idea that "a handful of tech oligarchs get to make that decision for the rest of us." His state has asked a judge to block OpenAI from developing new models without third-party safety guardrails.
Why it matters: Altman's stance signals OpenAI's positioning ahead of its IPO and comes just days after AI executives signed a laissez-faire safety pact at the White House. For enterprise leaders, it raises questions about who bears the cost when AI deployments go wrong.
THE MONEY
Capital is flooding inference providers at valuations that would have seemed absurd six months ago. Modal Labs is closing a $750M round at $15.75B, tripling its valuation from four months prior. Baseten is reportedly nearing $26B. The pattern is clear: investors see inference as the next bottleneck, not model training.
Deals to know:
Etched (Funding talks, $40B-$50B valuation) -- Custom AI inference chips challenging Nvidia with $1B in customer orders secured, including Jane Street. Investors: Top-tier VCs fielding offers
Modal Labs (Series round, $750M at $15.75B) -- Inference infrastructure for open source models, $300M+ ARR as of May. Investors: Accel (lead)
Signal: The compute constraint has shifted from training to inference. Investors are betting enterprise AI adoption will drive inference demand faster than hyperscalers can build capacity.
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AI NEWS
🎙️ Mike Flynn, who leads EY's technology sector, joins Liam to discuss why companies must redesign workflows around AI rather than bolt it on, covering EY's "Design for Zero" approach and the shift to usage-based AI pricing. WATCH HERE
🔌 POLICY: Italy activates real-time facial recognition for law enforcement under new AI Act decree, permitting live biometric identification in public spaces with strict limits on database retention and web scraping prohibitions. LEARN MORE
💰 ECON NEWS: Goldman Sachs raised 2026 US data center capacity forecast to 64 GW despite rising political opposition, projecting 38% power demand growth as only 14% of Americans support local AI infrastructure construction. FULL STORY
💻 MEDIA NEWS: Sony demanded removal of 260,000 AI-generated deepfake tracks from streaming platforms, double its previous takedown requests for unauthorized AI imitations of Harry Styles, Adele, and Britney Spears. FULL STORY
🛡️ SECURITY NEWS: Enterprise buyers diversify away from OpenAI and Anthropic over IP leakage concerns, with companies increasingly adopting open-source models and "sovereign AI" infrastructure despite added technical complexity. FULL STORY
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Until next time, The AI Report Team.
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