C_NCENTRATE #1037

POTATO officially hit one month old and we flipped the group into a community with ten focus groups. Not in yet? Join the waitlist here. POTATO has only 1k spots left when we pop the paywall up. If you like signal, good events, and discounts on mega events, you’ll love POTATO. Also confirmed several sponsors, and officially set up the company with Kate and Jo. Mad.

Aside from that, caught up with clients, did a BBC interview on AI search and environmental impact, interviewed WhatsApp about their recently announcements, and did a recce with the Groovy Gecko video team (utter pros!) for TNN. Speaking of which, get your tickets for Google / NotebookLM (July 17) and Shopify (Sept 18), as Oneder are about to blast their 1,500 members and we’ll likely max out.

Apple explored launching a developer cloud platform to compete with AWS and Google, while Foxconn pulled over 300 engineers from India, disrupting iPhone 17 timelines. Still, Apple’s China sales jumped 8% in Q2, the first rise in two years, and AirPod supplier Luxshare lined up banks for a Hong Kong IPO. Anthropic hit a $4B revenue run rate, while Meta and OpenAI sparked an AI salary arms race. Meta also poached Daniel Gross from Safe Superintelligence and acquired a stake in his VC firm, alongside Nat Friedman.

In Washington and Brussels, the EU rejected a pause on its AI Act rollout despite lobbying from Alphabet and others. Meanwhile, Google faced a new antitrust complaint from UK publishers over AI Overviews, and offered a price comparison box to head off DMA penalties. Trump’s latest legislation, the “Big Beautiful Bill”, expanded chip credits and included key corporate tax shifts, while a parallel draft barred federal AI regulations at the state level, and made a lot of poor people poorer.

Microsoft cut thousands of jobs across Xbox, shutting games like Perfect Dark. Meanwhile, OpenAI signed a deal with Oracle for 4.5 gigawatts (think a few large nuclear power stations worth) of compute. TikTok cut more US Shop jobs, Meta tested proactive AI chatbots, and Threads rolled out direct messaging. Meanwhile, Uber drivers in British Columbia unionised for the first time.

The Cheeto-in-Chief passed his eggregious tax grab for the rich this week. But what does it mean for the rest of the world? There’s a lot to unpack.

The “One Big Beautiful Bill,” (OBBB) signed into law by President Trump on July 4, is one of the most consequential economic policies in a generation. On its face, the bill delivers sweeping tax breaks and regulatory rollbacks for corporate America, with specific windfalls for Big Tech and US manufacturing. Beneath the celebratory branding lies a complex reshuffling of incentives, priorities, and power dynamics, both within the US and globally.

At its core, the bill allows US companies to immediately deduct the cost of domestic software R&D and manufacturing investments, making permanent many provisions from the 2017 Trump tax cuts. For companies like Google, Meta, and Microsoft, this is a substantial short-term win. AI development is intensely labour and compute-intensive, and the new tax structure incentivises more of that work to remain onshore, at least in accounting terms. However, the catch is that foreign R&D must still be paid off gradually over 15 years. Effectively this penalises multinationals for maintaining international engineering hubs, which could make overseas R&D less attractive. Global companies now face pressure to either restructure operations to maximise tax advantage or absorb rising costs, potentially weakening global research networks that underpin the modern tech stack. But it’s big, and beautiful, right? RIGHT?

While the bill favours domestic tech development, it undercuts critical infrastructure. AI model training is colliding with rising electricity demand. The bill adds pressure by removing support for renewable energy, while raising taxes on battery storage and nuclear, the two technologies Musk and others call essential for meeting AI’s future compute needs. Musk called the bill “utterly insane” and warned it will hobble AI growth. If electricity costs spike and power infrastructure lags, US-based AI development may slow, just as competition from China and Europe accelerates. Musk might have bigger problems, Trump joked(?!) he might set DOGE on Musk. These are the people in charge, folks. The likely outcome? Europe and Asia accelerate decoupling efforts to hedge against US policy volatility.

Aside from the tech impacts, OBBB targets low-income Americans and healthcare systems, with deep cuts to Medicaid, tighter SNAP (food benefits) requirements, and reduced access to insurance. Expect the mid-terms to be another mental assault while both sides push OBBB as key lines to battle on.

SO WHAT?

OBBB is a pivot that realigns the US economy back toward industrial production, fossil fuels, and domestic tech investment while shedding globalism, climate alignment, and social safety nets. For Big Tech, the bill is a tax gift and a warning. Operationally, it's easier to build in the US, but strategically, it’s harder to scale globally. Globally, the signal is clear: America is retrenching, and global AI, energy, and industrial policies will need to evolve without assuming US consistency. Europe, already wary of US data protection, will likely move faster on its own cloud and AI sovereignty goals. Asia will likely double down on chip and clean energy leadership. The dollar remains dominant, but American influence over next-gen tech infrastructure is not certain by any means.

What many fail to see is that OBBB may look patriotic and good for American business, but the risks are just as likely to trigger a rough, zero-sum global innovation environment. No doubt this will be a headache for everyone, but especially big tech, who, remember, all bent the knee and paid for the privilege...

[DO] Track shifts in European and Asian tech strategy. The global response to US retrenchment is going to create new opportunities, alliances and funding priorities. The fun is just getting started(!).

[DON’T] Underestimate the political signalling of OBBB. Consider it a roadmap for more protectionist, industry-focused US policy. Expect tighter scrutiny on foreign partnerships and more emphasis on self-sufficiency.

▲ There are no new ideas in AI - just datasets. /11 mins

+1,000 people have been arrested in London because of facial recognition technology since 2024. /3 mins

How the busiest people find joy. /6 mins

Amazon now has more robots that human workers (and it has around a million workers). /6 mins

Researchers are working on swarms of tiny nose robots to clear infected sinuses. /6 mins

Human forecasters still crush bots. /31 mins

Over-the-air computation (or AirComp) is extremely early stage but the potential is huge for how we process data. /9 mins

Grammarly just bought AI email startup Superhuman. /4 mins

LISTEN: Essay: ‘The Ascendance Of Algorithmic Tyranny’. /23 mins

Don’t let the hype of AI Agents get ahead of the reality. /22 mins

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Paul delivers actionable insights that keep companies ahead of the coming disruptions. As the founder of TBD Group and author of ‘Disruptive Technologies’, he is trusted by global brands, agencies, and when breaking news hits the FT, WSJ, BBC, and CNN ask for his analysis. Find out more and connect with him on LinkedIn and Bluesky.