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Here's what we're serving up today:

• Is AI Really Beefing up Big Tech’s Wallets? 💰

• Palantir’s A+ Earnings Report Card 💯

• Trending Tools ⚒️

• Wednesday Wires 💰

Is AI Really Beefing up Big Tech’s Wallets? 💰

GenAI is the hottest thing in tech in 2023. The technology has birthed 35,295,693 revolutionary startups (*cough ChatGPT wrappers *cough) in the past 8 months.

From the guy in the coffee shop with a startup plan on a napkin to Big Tech, AI’s the buzzword on everyone’s lips and has been the primary driver of the tech bull market this year.

However, if we look past the dense cloud of hype, we don’t really know what AI is doing for Big Tech’s actual wallet.

1/ Microsoft

The company can arguably be credited with the start of the AI arms race when it announced its mammoth $10B investment in OpenAI and claimed to put all their existing products on AI steroids.

The company has announced plans for AI-driven copilots for their existing offerings as well as AI-specialized cloud support but it’s important to know that they’re still only plans.

Their CFO has urged analysts stating that Patience is the name of the game and it’s going to take a few quarters for the AI fruit to become ripe.

2/ Alphabet

The company had to put their war-shield on at the beginning of the year when it was threatened by Bing.

Google retaliated by discussing a number of efforts to incorporate genAI into its search and advertising biz.

However, fast-forward a couple of months, nobody still uses Bing and we still are Googl-ing our searches instead of Bard-ing them.

The company did mention that AI has helped their cloud offering business where more than 70% of the generative AI unicorns are Google Cloud customers.

The case is similar for other Tech Giants such as Meta, Amazon and Apple where AI is the shiny new toy that everyone’s talking about but it seems like the Tech Titans are still figuring out how to make it pay rent.

Palantir’s A+ Earnings Report Card 💯

Earnings Szn classes are in session these days and Palantir’s looking like that ambitious student who's got all the attention due to their impressive performance.

This week was Palantir’s second report card showing for the year and they seemed to have passed with flying colors, AGAIN. Here’s a quick look at their scores:

1. Total Revenue: $533 Million (+13%)

2. Government Revenue: $302 Million (+15%)

3. Government Revenue: $232 Million (+10%)

4. Net Income: $45 Million 

Seeing their revenue trend this year, the company even raised its annual forecast for adjusted profit and authorized a $1 billion share buyback. Can you guess the reason behind the company’s growth?

No points for guessing the most obvious answer to literally every single question this year - AI.

CEO Alex Karp said that their AI Platform (AIP) is seeing unprecedented demand with over 100 existing customers and 300 more in the sales pipeline.

The company bagged 66 multi-million dollar deals this quarter with some really huge wins in the commercial and government sector.

• They announced a multi-year contract with the US Special Operations Command worth $463 million to support their AI-enabled mission platform.

• Novartis CEO further strengthened their support with Palantir by adopting their AI platform for their R&D.

The company even hinted they’re ready for the big leagues, aiming for inclusion in the S&P 500 which requires at least 4 consecutive profitable quarters.

Palantir has been profitable for the past 3 ones and it seems like they’re not planning to stop anytime soon.

☄️ Asteroids ☄️

Lyft is cutting fares and reducing surge pricing, resulting in more riders but less revenue per rider. With a 5% decrease in revenue per rider, they're staying competitive with Uber, but at a literal cost. 🚗💸

YouTube's new update lets users turn off video recommendations by disabling watch history. Meanwhile, iOS users face buffering issues on live content. 📺✨

Google has launched Project IDX, a browser-based development environment for building apps. It's integrated with Visual Studio Code and offers AI-powered features like smart code completion. 🧠💻

 ⚒️ Trending Tools ⚒️

Heptabase - The visual note-taking tool for learning complex topics

ADXL - Sell on Google, FB, Insta, Amazon in one ad campaign

Continue - The open-source autopilot for software development

💰 Wednesday Wires 💰

Endowus, a Singapore-based investment app, has raised $35 million in a funding round. The money will fuel expansion in Singapore and Hong Kong and further serve clients' financial lives, from personal wealth to pensions. 💰📈

Simon Data, a customer data platform that offers out-of-the-box applications, has raised $54 million in Series D funding. The company's focus on more than just data collection is paying off, as it allows marketers to put that data to real use. 📊🎉

Chargeflow, a startup using AI to battle chargeback fraud, has raised $11 million in a seed round. The Chens' innovative solution is making waves in the e-commerce world, promising to save time and money for merchants! 💼💲

📰 Recommended Reading 📰

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