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Another Chinese model takes on o1
ALSO: How to use AI for networking

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If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. Samsung is rolling out the red carpet for Alphabet by making Gemini the default AI assistant on upcoming Galaxy phones — plus, much more from Galaxy Unpacked. And: Find out how ByteDance’s latest model fares against OpenAI’s o1.
Today’s Insights
Today in AI: Microsoft’s compromise, ByteDance’s o1 rival, and Alphabet’s big bet
Tutorial: How to use AI for networking
Samsung’s new slate of Gemini-powered phones
Everything else you should know today
5 new AI tools to boost your productivity
TODAY IN AI

OpenAI and Microsoft are adjusting their partnership. Source: Getty Images
1. Microsoft gives OpenAI some breathing room: While the pair will keep their tight-knit relationship alive through at least 2030, Microsoft has agreed to let OpenAI look elsewhere for its infrastructure needs. Until now, the ChatGPT-maker had to use Azure exclusively for compute, which limited its ability to train new models. The new arrangement comes as both companies back Stargate, a $500B deal to build new data centers across the US.
2. Another Chinese reasoning model takes on o1: This time, it’s ByteDance who’s hot on OpenAI’s heels. The TikTok owner unveiled Doubao-1.5-pro, which it says outperforms o1 on the leading AIME benchmark. It's the second major reasoning model to come out of China this week, with DeepSeek’s open-source R1 allegedly sweeping o1 across multiple tests on Monday. That lead might not last for long though as the US cracks down on the flow of powerful AI chips into the country.
3. Alphabet doubles down on Anthropic bet: Anthropic has kept surprisingly quiet lately, but that’s finally changed with reports that Alphabet is pumping a fresh $1B into the Claude-maker, helping it boost its computing power. Still, Alphabet’s $3B stake in one of OpenAI’s biggest rivals trails Amazon’s $8B bet. With Lina Khan no longer at the FTC, this could be just the start, with more deals between Big Tech companies expected in the coming months.
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THE AI ACADEMY
How to find people in your network using AI

Go to Happenstance AI’s website and sign up.
Now connect your source account to search your data.
You can connect your LinkedIn, Twitter, or Gmail account.
Select ‘LinkedIn’, click on ‘Download your LinkedIn data’, and follow the instructions.
Wait for your CSV file to be ready. Once done, download it.
Upload your ‘Connections.csv’ file to Happenstance, wait for it to process.
When completed, enter your prompt to search for anything.
Sample Prompt: ‘I am looking for a React developer with 2 years of experience in New York’
You’ll get a list of people from your network with listed expertise.
You can directly access their profiles and save yourself a lot of time.
FROM THE FRONTIER
Gemini takes center stage at Galaxy Unpacked

Samsung showed off three new phones at its Galaxy Unpacked event. Source: Samsung
Samsung sent Bixby packing. While its proprietary virtual assistant can still be accessed through an app, Samsung’s taking a cue from Apple and making a third-party platform, Alphabet’s Gemini, the default AI assistant on future Galaxy phones. That’s just a small taste of all of the AI features announced at Wednesday’s Galaxy Unpacked event.
Here’s what else we learned:
AI-first phones: Available Feb 7, the new Galaxy S25, S25+, and S25 Ultra are priced the same as last year’s offerings, but with 12GB of RAM (up from 8GB last year), a new AI-capable Snapdragon chip, and six free months of Gemini Advanced.
Personalized AI: Samsung’s new Personal Data Engine, sounds a bit like Microsoft’s Recall feature, hopefully minus the security concerns. It takes in data from multiple apps to personalize your home screen and helps you easily surface things you’ve lost track of.
Fully multimodal: Gemini can now work seamlessly across apps, giving many users their first taste of agentic AI. For example, you can ask the assistant to find details about an upcoming NFL, invite your friend, and add the game to your calendar all in one go.
Project Astra is here: You’ll soon be able to share your screen or a live video feed with Gemini for real-time help.
On the horizon: Samsung and Alphabet teased an XR headset codenamed Project Moohan as they look to fend off Meta and Apple’s offerings. Plus, a mysterious, ultra-slim S25 Edge is coming soon, although we’ll have to wait to hear more.
AI & TECH NEWS
Everything else you need to know today

Tencent’s new model can transform 2D images into 3D models. Source: Tencent
🖥️ On Deck: The Information reports that OpenAI’s long-awaited Operator tool, which lets ChatGPT take on agentic tasks like ordering dinner or planning vacations, is set to be released by the end of the week.
🥊 Bad Blood: Elon Musk and Sam Altman traded blows (while weaving in at least one compliment) on X after Musk suggested OpenAI and its partners “don’t actually have the money” to make their new $500B infrastructure deal a reality.
🧑🎨 Master Sculptor: Chinese tech giant Tencent announced an open-source model called Hunyuan3D 2.0 that can generate 3D objects from images or text descriptions in seconds.
🎥 Clip Compass: Adobe Premiere Pro’s new Media Intelligence feature uses AI to help you search video clips by simply describing them. This comes alongside a translation feature for video captions that supports 17 languages.
🧑💻 Face First: Alphabet just rolled out a new ChromeOS feature that lets you control your Chromebook using head movements and facial expressions — designed to assist users with motor impairments.
💰️ Funding:
SF-based Databricks, which uses AI to help businesses make sense of their data, raised $10B in a Series J, setting its valuation at $62B. It now has backing from JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and for the first time, Meta.
AI-powered sales platform Clay raised $40M in a Series B expansion round, garnering a $1.25B valuation.
London’s Lindus Health, which uses AI to speed up clinical trials, raised $55M in a Series B, with backing from billionaire entrepreneur Peter Thiel.
StackBlitz, the startup behind the text-to-code platform Bolt.new, is set to raise $83.5M in a funding round that would value the company at $700M.
PRODUCTIVITY
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PROMPT OF THE DAY
Identify the customer journey for your product
Prompt: Can you map out the customer journey for [product/service]? This should cover a customer’s interactions at different stages, like pre-awareness, awareness, consideration, purchase, and post-purchase. Include things like email marketing, social media ads, and landing pages. For each stage, suggest messaging and content that would work well with [target audience] to lead them toward a subscription.
What type of prompt would you like to see Friday? |
Source: Podium
AI-GENERATED IMAGES
Snow Day

Source: Inspired by @trilldad on Midjourney
Midjourney Prompt: A picture taken from an iPhone 16, landscape pov, a suburban park after a fresh snow, a sunny day with community members and kids sledding on the hill happily. The bill reaches a height that seems impossible, sloping uo gradually at first but then climbing ever higher and higher with children seen somehow cwreenng madly down it at all stages
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Zain & the Superhuman AI team