Plus, Polymarket blocks users in France from placing new bets. And the U.K.’s competition watchdog recommends investigating Apple and Google’s mobile ecosystems. Belle Lin hosts.
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[00:00:31] Here's your TNB Tech Minute for Friday, November 22nd. I'm Belle Lin for The Wall Street Journal.
[00:00:38] Amazon is investing an additional $4 billion in artificial intelligence startup Anthropic, doubling its investment to $8 billion as it aims to compete in the AI arms race.
[00:00:52] Amazon is a minority owner of San Francisco-based Anthropic, which describes itself as an AI safety and research company. With Amazon's new investment, Anthropic said it planned to work on machine learning hardware and further develop its AI assistant Claude. The Journal reported last year that Anthropic committed to spend $4 billion on Amazon's cloud platform over the next five years.
[00:01:18] Polymarket, a crypto-based prediction market says that it's blocking users in France from placing new bets. The move comes two weeks after the country's national gambling regulator said it was investigating the startup over its compliance with French laws.
[00:01:34] The change also highlights polymarked. The change also highlights polymarked market's mounting legal difficulties after it drew widespread attention for its betters' correct call that Donald Trump would win the U.S. presidential election.
[00:01:47] A mystery trader known as the Trump will, whom Polymarket identified as a French national, made a profit of around $85 million with his massive bets on a Trump victory.
[00:02:00] Polymarket is off-limits to U.S. users under the terms of a 2022 settlement with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, although traders say the ban can be circumvented.
[00:02:12] And the UK's competition and markets authority says that its experts recommended investigating Apple and Google's dominance in smartphones under the country's new digital competition rules.
[00:02:25] The CMA alleges that the two tech giants can manipulate users into choosing their own apps and services over that of their rivals.
[00:02:34] The regulator also said Apple and Google have an effective duopoly on mobile ecosystems through the market dominance of their smartphone operating systems, app stores, and mobile web browsers.
[00:02:47] Apple said it disagreed with the findings. Both Apple and Google said they would continue to engage constructively with the regulator.
[00:02:56] For a deeper dive into what's happening in tech, check out Monday's Tech News Briefing podcast.