#methodology

OpenAI launched GPT-Live, a full-duplex voice model backed by GPT-5.5 reasoning, while xAI's Grok 4.5 topped SaaS automation benchmarks at one-quarter the cost of rivals. OpenAI also retracted its recommendation of SWE-Bench Pro after auditing found 30% of its tasks broken. Prime Intellect raised $130M to bring frontier reinforcement learning infrastructure to any company. In pharma, AstraZeneca and Ionis reported a major trial failure in a competitive heart disease market, the White House reviewed FDA commissioner finalists, and RFK Jr. moved to create a formal list of Covid vaccine injuries. The NY Fed found tariff cost pass-through to consumers is still in the pipeline.

Anthropic accused Alibaba of illicitly extracting Claude's model capabilities, drawing 829 Hacker News comments and raising fresh questions about AI IP enforcement. OpenAI unveiled Jalapeño, its first custom inference chip built with Broadcom, a move that reshapes its dependency on Nvidia. GLM-5.2 crossed a threshold Nathan Lambert called the step change for open agents. Google introduced computer use in Gemini 3.5 Flash, and U.S. health spending rose 7.3% in 2025, driven by GLP-1 drug adoption and higher care utilization. A bipartisan bill would expand methadone access by letting physicians prescribe it outside specialty clinics.