The Newsroom: OpenAI GPT-6, Gemini 3.8 Live & Microsoft Copilot on Action

The Newsroom | September 28, 2026

AI Infrastructure, Startup Funding, Semiconductors and the Enterprise Tech Shift

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has signaled it may approve purchases of Nvidia's new RTX Pro 5500 graphics processors by Alibaba and ByteDance, according to a report by The Information. Meta's Muse AI agent has reached 2.8 million downloads in its first two weeks, driving a 36% stock rally in September. Akamai has committed $11.6 billion to an Anthropic cloud infrastructure deal, while Nvidia-backed Nscale raised $3.36 billion ahead of its U.S. IPO. Citrix confirmed two critical NetScaler zero-day vulnerabilities were exploited before patches were available. And OpenAI is preparing to preview GPT-6 Cyber, a cybersecurity-focused model, at its DevDay event on September 29. The Newsroom reports what happened.

AI & Infrastructure

China May Allow Alibaba, ByteDance to Purchase Nvidia RTX Pro 5500 Chips

The Chinese government has signaled it may allow companies including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and ByteDance Ltd. to purchase Nvidia Corp.'s new RTX Pro 5500 chips, The Information reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently asked some companies to report on their plans to purchase the high-end graphics processor, which was released this month, including how many units and what they would be used for. The ministry told some of the firms it intends to approve the purchases. Reuters said it could not immediately verify the report. The RTX Pro 5500 is a workstation graphics card built on Nvidia's Blackwell design with 84GB of memory.

Akamai Commits $11.6 Billion to Anthropic Cloud Deal

Akamai signed a seven-year, $11.6 billion cloud services agreement with Anthropic, with the contract including equity warrants that allow Anthropic to acquire up to approximately 5% of Akamai's shares. Akamai has authorized Jabil to purchase approximately $1.7 billion in memory components under existing service agreements, and signed a hardware, software, and services master agreement with Lenovo Global Technologies. Akamai plans to invest approximately $5.5 billion in capital expenditure to support the contract, with 2026 capex increasing by about $1.7 billion for advance procurement of memory and other key components. The deployment will use CPUs to support the contract; whether AMD, Intel, or both will supply processors has not been confirmed.

Nscale Raises $3.36 Billion Ahead of U.S. IPO

AI cloud platform Nscale has raised $3.36 billion in convertible loan notes led by Third Point, with support from Nvidia, funds managed by Apollo, and Abu Dhabi Investment Council. The financing includes a $2.36 billion tranche at closing and an additional $1 billion commitment from Nvidia expected in mid-November. Nscale has over $103 billion in total contracted value, with a major portion coming from Anthropic, which agreed to pay Nscale $45 billion for computing capacity. The company is developing a large data center campus in Norway serving Microsoft, with another major campus planned in West Virginia. Nscale filed for an IPO on the New York Stock Exchange on September 18, which may raise as much as $3 billion.

LG Electronics Named Nvidia Partner for AI Data Center Cooling

LG Electronics has been named a preferred partner in Nvidia's official Partner Network in the "Power and Cooling" category for AI data center cooling solutions. LG aims to expand its reach into hyperscale data center and colocation markets, particularly in North America, where more than 60% of global new data center capacity demand is concentrated. The company plans to propose cooling solutions including chillers and coolant distribution units (CDUs) to customers building AI data centers based on Nvidia technology, and has received "DSX Ready CDU" certification for its 2.5MW-class CDU product.

Anthropic Negotiating 1 GW Data Center Lease

Anthropic is in early-stage talks to lease up to 1 gigawatt of computing capacity from a data center developer controlled by Apollo Global Management, with related investment expected to reach at least $40 billion, according to The Information.

AI Companies & Models

Meta's Muse Reaches 2.8 Million Downloads

Meta's Muse AI agent recorded 2.8 million downloads within two weeks of its September 8 launch, posting an average daily download growth of 55% in the first 10 days, according to Sensor Tower. The app reached No. 1 on Apple's U.S. App Store and accumulated 642,000 daily active users in the United States. Meta shares have jumped 36% in September through Thursday's close, putting the stock on pace for its best month since July 2013 and within striking distance of a $2 trillion market capitalization. Capital spending is expected to be nearly $140 billion this year, double the roughly $70 billion spent in 2025.

OpenAI Prepares GPT-6 Cyber Preview at DevDay

OpenAI is preparing to preview GPT-6 Cyber, a model built for cybersecurity work, in the coming weeks, Fortune reported, citing multiple people familiar with the plans. The most likely venue is OpenAI's DevDay event in San Francisco on September 29, though OpenAI has not confirmed the model or the announcement. GPT-6 Cyber would be OpenAI's fourth cybersecurity-focused model released this year. OpenAI also plans to launch at least 12 other products at DevDay. OpenAI recently introduced GPT-6 Sol and GPT-6 Luna, two models designed to bring GPT-6 capabilities to a wider range of professional and everyday applications at approximately 50% lower API prices than predecessors.

Anthropic's Claude Completes 9-Loop Physics Calculation

Anthropic announced that its Claude AI system completed a nine-loop scattering amplitude calculation for the planar (N=4) super-Yang-Mills theory, breaking the previous eight-loop record achieved by physicists including Lance Dixon at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in 2023. The system ran continuously for several days with minimal human intervention, with one calculation using 96 CPUs running for approximately one week. Anthropic also announced Claude Opus 5.5, the first model in a new Claude 5.5 family.

Google Launches Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar

Google announced the general availability of Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar in Gemini Enterprise. The feature brings interactive visual presence to conversational video agents across web, mobile, and interactive kiosks. It supports 97 languages with automatic language detection, executes tool and API calls in the background, and can process live camera feeds and screen shares alongside audio. Custom avatar creation is gated behind an enterprise allowlisting and verification process, and all generated audio and video streams carry imperceptible SynthID watermarks.

Microsoft Redesigns Copilot with Autopilot Agent

Microsoft announced a major Copilot redesign introducing three destinations: Home (combining Chat with Cowork), Code (generating applications from written instructions), and Autopilot (a persistent agent that monitors projects and coordinates with employees). Autopilot agents receive their own Entra identity and user account. "Every agent has to have an identity. Everything it does needs to be observed," Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said during a September 23 presentation. Autopilot is expanding to private preview at the end of September, while Home and Code begin rolling out through the Frontier program in the coming weeks.

Alibaba Unveils Zhenwu V900 AI Chip

Alibaba's T-Head semiconductor unit unveiled the Zhenwu V900 AI chip, which delivers three times the performance of its predecessor M890 and features 216GB of memory with 1,200GB/s inter-chip interconnect bandwidth. Mass production is planned for Q1 2027. Alibaba Cloud also announced plans to exceed 20GW in data center scale by 2032 and to train a model with 5 trillion to 10 trillion parameters.

Semiconductors

Nvidia Evaluating Glass Substrate Technology

Nvidia is evaluating the adoption of glass substrate technology and collaborating with German equipment manufacturer SCHMID and other companies. SCHMID disclosed in its half-year earnings presentation that it is working with key suppliers in the supply chains of Intel, Nvidia, and AMD to jointly develop glass core substrate equipment. SCHMID Chief Strategy Officer Roland Rettenmeier said metallization of through-glass vias (TGV) remains a technical difficulty and customer certification has not been completed. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang previously met with SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, and the company is urging the supply chain to complete development within two years. Glass substrates could improve AI chip performance by 40% while halving power consumption.

Qualcomm Acquires PickNik Robotics

Qualcomm announced the acquisition of robotics software company PickNik on September 27. PickNik maintains the open-source MoveIt framework for robotic manipulation. The acquisition is a strategic step to bolster Qualcomm's presence in physical AI and robotics technologies, complementing its existing strengths in semiconductor technology and wireless communications.

Startup Funding

Company	Round / Valuation	Lead Investor
Snorkel AI	$350M Series E / $3.5B valuation	Insight Partners, S32
Ema	$77M Series B	Creaegis
PicoJool	$27.5M Series A	Socratic Partners

Snorkel AI raised a $350 million Series E at a $3.5 billion valuation, led by Insight Partners and S32, with participation from Addition, Greylock Partners, and Wells Fargo. The valuation is nearly triple the $1.3 billion from its Series D approximately 17 months ago. The company reports annualized revenue exceeding $350 million and 18x revenue growth in roughly one year.

Ema, an enterprise AI startup, raised $77 million in Series B funding led by Creaegis, with Accel, S32, and Prosus increasing existing investments. The deal takes Ema's total capital raised to $140 million and lifts its valuation to more than four times the level set in its earlier round. Ema develops AI employees for enterprise functions including HR, IT, and finance.

PicoJool, a provider of optical connectivity solutions for AI infrastructure backed by former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, raised $27.5 million in Series A funding led by Socratic Partners. The company develops high-speed VCSEL and microVCSEL platforms enabling 800G to 1.6T connectivity for hyperscale data centers. The Series A follows PicoJool's June unveiling of its 200G VCSEL and microVCSEL product family.

Enterprise Technology

KT Launches Agentic On Platform

KT unveiled Agentic On, an agentic AI platform that helps businesses create AI agents and apply and run them in actual operations. The platform allows enterprises to build and manage multiple AI agents that can divide work among themselves.

Gartner: $234 Billion in SaaS Spending at Risk from Agentic AI

Gartner forecasts that up to $234 billion in enterprise application spending will be affected by "agentic arbitrage" between now and 2030, representing about 20% of enterprise application SaaS spending. The firm predicts that by 2028, 33% of enterprise software applications will include agentic AI, up from less than 1% in 2024.

M&A & Strategic Deals

Acquirer	Target	Strategic Rationale
Qualcomm	PickNik Robotics	Physical AI and robotics; owns MoveIt open-source framework
RPM International	Volteco	Italian waterproofing technology; construction materials expansion
LiveKit	Loophole Labs	Sub-3-second AI agent startup times; agent infrastructure

Anthropic has dropped its pursuit of AI startup Decart, which develops AI infrastructure and optimization technology and has built models including its Lucy live-video editing model and Oasis simulation platform, according to Bloomberg News.

IPO & Capital Markets

Oura IPO Draws 4x Oversubscription

Smart ring maker Oura's U.S. IPO has drawn approximately four times oversubscription, with cornerstone investors subscribing $400 million. The company plans to offer 50 million shares at $40–44 per share, targeting a raise of up to $2.2 billion. Oura expects to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker "OURA," with pricing expected on September 29 and trading to begin around September 30. Oura reported approximately 5.7 million paid members at the end of fiscal 2026, representing 96% year-over-year growth.

GCash Plans October IPO

Philippine mobile wallet GCash plans to raise approximately $1.3 billion in an IPO on the Philippine Stock Exchange, with the public offer running from October 6 to October 12 and listing scheduled for October 20 under the ticker "GCASH".

Nscale Files for NYSE IPO

AI cloud platform Nscale filed for an IPO on the New York Stock Exchange on September 18, which may raise as much as $3 billion. Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and Morgan Stanley are leading the IPO, with 19 other banks working on it. The company's board includes former Meta executives Sheryl Sandberg and Nick Clegg.

Cybersecurity

Citrix Confirms Two NetScaler Zero-Days Exploited

Citrix confirmed that two critical zero-day vulnerabilities in NetScaler ADC and NetScaler Gateway were exploited before the company released patches. CISA added CVE-2026-88771 and CVE-2026-88772 to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities Catalog. Both are critical vulnerabilities that can independently enable remote code execution, with CISA receiving reports and partner threat intelligence confirming active exploitation globally. Citrix disclosed eight new vulnerabilities total affecting NetScaler ADC and Gateway products. Security firm watchTowr initially reported the unpatched zero-days based on forensic investigations.

Singapore Deploys AI Security Tools After UNC3886 Attacks

Singapore's Cyber Security Agency is shifting toward active threat hunting after the UNC3886 attack on four major telcos and has deployed AI-assisted penetration testing and source-code scanning across approximately 2,000 government systems. CSA and GovTech are also scanning critical-information-infrastructure operators' internet-facing systems and are evaluating whether to expand the AI tools to other CII sectors.

ShinyHunters Uses WAF Bypass in Oracle PeopleSoft Attacks

Google Mandiant and GTIG observed ShinyHunters percent-encoding the P in /PSEMHUB/ to bypass WAF rules protecting unpatched Oracle PeopleSoft CVE-2026-35273, an unauthenticated RCE flaw. The renewed activity deployed web shells on dozens of systems and enabled data theft and potential lateral movement. Mandiant recommended applying Oracle's update rather than relying on a WAF rule.

SpyCloud Finds Credential Exposure at U.S. Water Utilities

SpyCloud's review of approximately 10,000 U.S. water and wastewater organizations found infostealer-collected credentials from 1,787 organizations, nearly 20% of the sample. Credentials from at least 250 organizations appeared capable of reaching operational networks and remote-access tools used to run pumps and control water movement.

Tech Layoffs Continue Amid AI Spending

Oracle cut 546 employees in its America Cloud Infrastructure organization, as Cloud Infrastructure revenue jumped 121%. Amazon, which cut more than 30,000 workers over the past year, is now rehiring former employees due to AI talent shortages. Cloudflare cut more than 1,100 jobs globally, reducing about 20% of its workforce, as it restructures operations around adopting AI tools.

What to Watch Next Week

Event	What to Watch
OpenAI DevDay (Sept. 29)	GPT-6 Cyber preview and at least 12 other product launches
Oura IPO pricing (Sept. 29–30)	Nasdaq listing under ticker OURA; test of consumer hardware IPO demand
Anthropic CEO dinner with Trump (Sept. 27)	Private dinner to discuss AI use and safety
SpaceX Starship Flight 14 (Sept. 28)	Expected to attempt true Earth orbit for the first time
Jensen Huang receives Van Fleet Award (Sept. 28)	Samsung and SK Group chairmen expected to attend
Trump-Xi AI safety notification mechanism	Follow-up discussions after the Sept. 24 state dinner

Related CODEW Coverage

• Daily Tech Briefing — The day's most important technology signal, analyzed
• AI Watch — Agent platforms, model releases, and consumer AI adoption
• AI Infrastructure Watch — Data-center economics, GPU financing, and cloud capacity
• Semiconductor Watch — Memory, packaging, foundry capacity, and pricing trends
• Cybersecurity Watch — AI agent security, machine identity, and data-layer controls
• Startup Funding Watch — Deal structures and capital flows in AI infrastructure
• Tech M&A Watch — Acquisitions, mergers, and strategic investments

SOURCES

AI & Infrastructure: Bloomberg — "China May Let Alibaba Buy New Nvidia Chips, The Information Says" (Sept. 27, 2026) · The Next Web — "China reportedly may let Alibaba and ByteDance buy new Nvidia's RTX Pro 5500" (Sept. 27, 2026) · Reuters — "China weighs allowing ByteDance, Alibaba to buy new Nvidia chips" (Sept. 27, 2026) · CNBC — "China weighs allowing ByteDance, Alibaba to buy new Nvidia chips" (Sept. 27, 2026) · UAnalyze — Akamai $11.6B contract coverage (Sept. 27, 2026) · Business Insider — "Nvidia-Backed AI Cloud Platform Nscale Raises $3.36B Ahead of IPO" (Sept. 25, 2026) · Korea Herald — "LG Electronics named Nvidia partner for AI data center cooling" (Sept. 27, 2026).

AI Companies & Models: LiveMint / Bloomberg — "Meta's Muse-fuelled rally: Stock jumps 36% in September" (Sept. 27, 2026) · FBC News — "Meta's Muse app tops US downloads, shakes up stock market" (Sept. 24, 2026) · The Next Web — "OpenAI is reportedly preparing to preview a GPT-6 Cyber security model" (Sept. 25, 2026) · TechCrunch — "Google tests buying from Walmart-owned Flipkart through Gemini and AI Mode in India" (Sept. 27, 2026) · Google Cloud Blog — "Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar is now generally available" (Sept. 25, 2026) · VentureBeat — "Microsoft revamps its Copilot AI with a persistent Autopilot agent" (Sept. 25, 2026) · Yahoo Finance — "Alibaba is Betting Bigger on AI as the Race for Scale Intensifies" (Sept. 27, 2026).

Semiconductors: GuruFocus — "Qualcomm (QCOM) Expands Robotics Software Capabilities with PickNik Acquisition" (Sept. 27, 2026).

Startup Funding: TechCrunch — "Snorkel AI triples valuation to $3.5B as demand for AI training data booms" (Sept. 22, 2026) · Ema — "Ema Raises $77M Series B to Scale AI Employees" (Sept. 23, 2026) · SiliconANGLE — "Pat Gelsinger-backed startup PicoJool raises $27.5M" (Sept. 24, 2026).

Enterprise Technology: Gartner — "Gartner Says $234 Billion in Enterprise Application Software Spend Is at Risk from Agentic AI" (July 1, 2026) · Fortune — "Microsoft VP: SaaS isn't dying" (Sept. 26, 2026).

M&A: GuruFocus — "Qualcomm (QCOM) Expands Robotics Software Capabilities with PickNik Acquisition" (Sept. 27, 2026) · Fidelity — "Anthropic drops pursuit of AI startup Decart, Bloomberg News reports" (Sept. 27, 2026).

IPO & Capital Markets: Fierce Healthcare — "Smart ring maker Oura and its backers aim to raise $2.2B in IPO" (Sept. 22, 2026) · Investing.com — "Oura IPO said to draw four times demand as orders near close" (Sept. 25, 2026) · Business Insider — "Nvidia-Backed AI Cloud Platform Nscale Raises $3.36B Ahead of IPO" (Sept. 25, 2026).

Cybersecurity: CISA — "Critical Zero-Day Vulnerabilities Exploited in Citrix NetScaler ADC, Gateway" (Sept. 27, 2026) · Security Boulevard — "Daily OT Security News: September 27, 2026" (Sept. 27, 2026) · Tenable — "Citrix NetScaler Zero-Day RCE vulnerabilities: FAQ" (Sept. 27, 2026) · BleepingComputer — "Citrix confirms two NetScaler RCE zero-days exploited in attacks" (Sept. 27, 2026) · The Hindu BusinessLine — "Oracle layoffs underscore shift from hiring at scale to AI-led productivity" (Sept. 15, 2026) · Business Standard — "Cloudflare cuts 1,100 jobs" (Sept. 14, 2026).

THE CODEW · THE NEWSROOM

Editorial Note

The CODEW Newsroom reports what happened. Daily Tech Briefing explains what it means. Watch Tech analyzes the strategic implications. This edition covers the most important technology, AI, infrastructure, startup, funding, cybersecurity, semiconductor, enterprise software, and market developments for September 28, 2026.

Coverage is based on company announcements, public disclosures, industry reporting, and other publicly available information. Reported figures and sourced-but-unconfirmed details are noted as such. Analysis reflects the reporting period and should be considered in the context of the sources and developments cited.