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Welcome to the Tech Brew Ride home for Wednesday, September 17, 2025. I'm Brian McCullough. Today, the framework of a TikTok deal is finally coming together. Nvidia suffers another major setback in China. Bunch of new AI stuff from YouTube, a coming MacBook with a touch screen, and a roundup of the reviews of the iPhone. Air. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech so for the fourth time, President Trump has extended ByteDance's deadline to divest TikTok's US operations until December 16th. But the fourth time might be the charm, as a deal is expected to be finalized this week, according to sources. Under that deal, a U.S. investor consortium that includes Oracle, Silver Lake and A16Z would hold an around 80% stake in in TikTok's U.S. business, quoting the Journal. This new company would also have an American dominated board with one member designated by the US Government. Existing users in the US Would be asked to shift to a new app, which TikTok has built and is testing, people familiar with the matter said. TikTok engineers will recreate a set of content recommendation algorithms for the app using technology licensed from TikTok's parent, ByteDance, the people said. US software giant Oracle, a longtime TikTok partner, would handle user data at its facilities in Texas, they said. Silverlake, a private equity firm, and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz are both longtime tech investors. Both sides are still working out the final details of the proposed deal, and terms could change. In a new executive order Tuesday, President Trump pushed back the TikTok ban until December 16, the latest of several delays for the TikTok plan. To comply with US law, tech industry executives argue its algorithms must be created and maintained by an American engineer team insulated from Chinese influence. Beyond the financial terms, deciding how to handle TikTok's algorithm has been a tricky part of the deal because it is seen as arguably the most lucrative part of the company. We've got a deal on TikTok. I've reached a deal with China. I'm going to speak to President Xi Jinping on Friday to confirm everything President Trump said outside the White House Tuesday morning before leaving for a trip to the uk. These are very big companies that want to buy it. The framework of the agreement came together during the Madrid trade talks in recent days. The contours of the deal have been under consideration since this spring. The two sides began discussions in January when Trump said he would keep TikTok from going dark under a 2024 law by executing a deal to save it in the US existing ByteDance investors, including Susquehanna International, KKR and General Atlantic would be part of the Group, owning roughly 80% of the new company. The stake of ByteDance's Chinese shareholders would dip just to under 20% to comply with a US law passed last year requir the firm to do a deal or stop operating in America. Both sides have reached a basic consensus on resolving the TikTok issue, Wang Jingtao, deputy director of China's top cyberspace regulator, told reporters in Madrid. A senior White House official said any details of the TikTok framework are pure speculation unless they are announced by this administration with the prospects of a deal in the U.S. the internal valuation of ByteDance hit a record high of around $330 billion in August, according to a share buyback tender seen by the Wall Street Journal. ByteDance's shares aren't listed on a exchange, but it has been regularly buying shares owned by employees and investors. End quote. I think this is a big deal, but the stock is only down about 1% in pre market trading right now, so maybe this was priced in as they say. But sources have told the FT that China told ByteDance, Alibaba and others to stop testing and ordering Nvidia's RTX Pro 6000 chips completely, thereby going beyond earlier guidance that focused only on Nvidia's H20 chip. The Cyberspace Administration of China told companies including ByteDance and Alibaba this week to end their testing and orders of the RTX Pro 6000D, Nvidia's tailor made product for the country, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. Several companies had indicated they would order tens of thousands of the RTX Pro 6000D and had started testing and verification work with Nvidia's server suppliers, the people said. After receiving the CAC order, the companies told their suppliers to stop the work, the people said. The ban goes beyond earlier guidance from regulators that focused on the H20, Nvidia's other China only chip widely used for AI. It comes after Chinese regulators concluded that domestic chips had attained performance comparable to those of Nvidia's models used in China. Jensen Huang, chief executive of Nvidia, told reporters in London on Wednesday that he expected to discuss the chipmaker's ability to do business in China with Donald Trump that evening during the US President's state visit to the uk. We can only be in service of a market if the country wants us to be, he said. I'm disappointed with what I see, but they have larger agendas to work out between China and the US and I'm understanding of that. We are patient about it. End quote. Beijing is putting pressure on Chinese tech companies to boost the country's homegrown semiconductor industry and break their reliance on Nvidia so it can compete in an AI race against the us. The message is now loud and clear, said an executive at one of the tech companies. Earlier, people had hopes of renewed Nvidia supply if the geopolitical situation improves. Now, all hands on deck to build the domestic system. Nvidia started producing chips tailored for the Chinese market after former U.S. president Joe Biden banned the company from exporting its most powerful products to China. In an effort to rein in Beijing's progress on AI, Beijing's regulators have recently summoned domestic chip makers such as Huawei and Capricorn, as well as Alibaba and search engine giant Baidu, which also make their own semiconductors, to report how their products compare against Nvidia's China chips. According to one of the people with knowledge of the matter, they concluded that China's AI processors had reached a level comparable to or exceeding that of the Nvidia products allowed under export controls, the person added. YouTube must have held some sort of event that I missed yesterday because they announced a whole bunch of stuff, including that they have now paid out more than $100 billion to creators over the last four years, and that the number of YouTube channels making over one from TV screens has jumped 45% year on year. Also, there are new live streaming features, including letting creators transition between public and members only streams and ads to run next to those Streams. But the AI stuff took most of the headlines like this, quoting TechCrunch. Another new feature also available early next year, will help audio podcasters turn their content into video. Using AI, these creators will be able to generate a customizable video for their podcast, the company says. However, the feature will only be available to select podcasters when it launches, with a larger expansion planned for later in 2026. In February, the company announced YouTube had surpassed 1 billion monthly podcaster viewers. Today, YouTube announced that users as of July 2025 now consume over 100 million hours of podcasts daily, with more than 30% of those hours starting as a live stream or premiere end quote. But also new generative AI tools for Shorts, including a custom version of VO3 called VO3 fast, which includes sound and an edit with AI feature. TechCrunch. Again, the custom version of VO3 called VO 3 fast, generates outputs with lower latency at 480pmaking it easy to create video clips, YouTube says, and now users can do so with sound. For the first time, YouTube is also bringing new VO capabilities to shorts, including the ability to apply motion from a video to an image. For example, you could animate a still image by making the person in it do a dance from a video, the company says. This is possible through technology that captures and transfers movement from one subject to another. Creators can now also use VEO to apply different styles to their videos, such as pop art or origami. Plus, creators now have the ability to add objects like characters or props with text descriptions. These new capabilities will roll out in the coming months. As for the new remixing tool, creators can turn the dialogue from eligible videos into catchy soundtracks for other shorts. With the new Edit With AI feature, creators can turn their raw footage into first drafts. It transforms raw camera roll footage into a first draft by finding and arranging the best moments and adding music and transitions. It can even add a voiceover that can react to what's happening in the video in either English or Hindi. The idea behind the feature is to give creators a starting point for their shorts, YouTube says. Foreign.
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We've all been there. Too many SaaS tools, not enough visibility at all, and way too much access for you to keep track of. It's the stuff security nightmares are made of. That's where Trelica by1Password comes in. They inventory every app your company uses and create app profiles to help you easily assess risks, manage access, and make sure your password security is locked down tight. With 1Password's extended access management, you can control your company's many, many SaaS tools, securely onboard and offboard your people, and actually hit your compliance goals. I've been telling you about 1Password Extended Access Management all year, and now Trelica comes along to make things even better. Sleep Easy with Trelica by 1Password Learn more at 1Password.com Ride that's 1Password.com Ride Heard of Klarna? You probably have. They burst onto the e commerce scene back in 2005 to challenge traditional credit during a time when consumer trust was at an all time low. Since then, Klarna has won the trust of 111 million customers by providing a more flexible, transparent way to shop and pay online. And now they're also listed on the New York Stock Exchange, underscoring their scale and credibility. In case you didn't know, Klarna helps consumers split the cost into four interest free payments with no hidden fees, no confusing terms and no revolving debt. Klarna has helped save consumers billions in interest. Millennials and Gen Z are also using this AI powered payment tool to help budget smarter and avoid interest fees. Learn how you can pay smarter with klarna@klarna.com and look out for the pink Klarna log at the checkout next time you shop online. That's klarna.com Ming Chi Kuo says an OLED MacBook Pro with a touch screen is set to enter mass production by late 2026, while a cheaper MacBook with an iPhone chip inside it is also coming, but that will not have the touch panel. Quoting Mac Rumors in his latest post to X, Kuo writes that Apple's much rumored OLED MacBook Pro will incorporate a touch panel using On Cell touch technology. On Cell touch technology integrates the touch sensors directly into the display panel's top layer or cell, rather than requiring a separate dedicated touch layer. Kuo says that the shift quote appears to reflect Apple's long term observation of iPad user behavior, indicating that in certain scenarios, touch controls can enhance both productivity and the overall user experience. Unsurprisingly, the analyst believes that the most recent rumored low cost MacBook, slated for mass production in the fourth quarter of this year, will not feature a touch panel, though specifications for a second generation model could include touch support. Kuo anticipates the second gen affordable MacBook model to arrive in 2027. According to a recent report by Korea's the Elec, Samsung will supply the displays for Apple's first OLED MacBook Pro. What's less certain right now is the chip architecture that Apple will adopt for its OLED models. It was previously rumored that MacBook Pro models with M5 chips would launch in late 2025. In July, however, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported that Apple was considering pushing back the release of the next MacBook Pro model with the M5 series of chips until early 2026. Gurman has since said he expects the MacBook Pro to gain an OLED display between the end of 2026 and early 2027. That would mean Apple updating the MacBook Pro line twice in the same year. However, there is precedent for such a scenario. Apple released models with the M2 Pro and M2 Max in January 2023, followed by models with M3, M3 Pro and M3 Max chips in October 2023. So we could get the M5 generation in January 2026, followed by the OLED panel equipped M6 generation in October. Either way, the OLED MacBook Pro models are expected to feature more significant changes, including a thinner design and a smaller notch. Apparently we can now add touch screen support to that list too. Quick interesting raise for you. Grok, which sells AI chips and data center compute powered by those chips, raised $750 million, led by Disruptive at a post money valuation of $6.9 billion. Quoting Bloomberg, the company will use the funds to expand its data center capacity, including new locations this year and next, according to Jonathan Ross, chief executive officer, plans to announce its first Asia Pacific location this year. He said. Nvidia, which dominates the market for processors that train AI models, is trying to keep a large lead in the market for inference running models once they have been developed. Startups including Grok and companies like Google are developing their own rival chips and in some cases selling computing services that use them. We've had customers come to us asking for more capacity than we can satisfy at the moment, ross said in an interview. Grok, which sells chips and data center computing power fueled by its processors, operates 13 facilities in the U.S. canada, Europe and the Middle East. The company powers some of the Saudi AI company Humane's services, including the newly released Humane Chat product, according to Ross. Grok also supported the release of OpenAI's GPT OSS model in Saudi Arabia. The company has expanded its capacity by more than 10% in the last month and all of that is already in use, Ross said. He declined to say how much capacity the company has in total. The funding round was originally closed at about $600 million. Grok then asked investors to reopen it for additional participants. Finally today the iPhone Air reviews are out, so I read about five of them so you don't have to. Everyone I read agreed. The Air's calling card is its impossibly thin and light build. Remember around 5.6mm, titanium frame, ceramic shield, all that. They say it feels fantastic in the hand and looks like a statement piece. For the first time in a while, expect people to stop you and say is that the new iPhone? It's meant to be admired and carried. And on that brief, Apple has apparently nailed it. But the design does come with trade offs. That narrows down. See what I did there? Who should maybe consider buying it? Battery life is the biggest question mark, the Verge says. It's just okay. It's fine for light to moderate use, but heavy days can induce battery anxiety, with the meter dipping earlier than you'd like in Gadget's take aligns with that, you give up endurance for the thinness you've gotten. Mac Rumors Roundup echoes the split verte across many outlets. They say that the battery life was acceptable for many but short of the Pro phones noticeably, and notes that Apple's own claims of up to 27 hours of video battery life sits well below the 17 and 17 Pro Max claims. The Camera Camera is another obvious trade off. Image quality for the single 48 megapixel rear shooter on the Air is good, sometimes very good, but versatility is limited. CNET's reviewer missed the ultra wide lens most of all. There's no telephoto either, so you lean on the 2x crop and software. If you often shoot landscapes or want optical zoom, you'll feel the compromise. Video quality is strong and the upgraded selfie camera is a nice bump, but overall this is not the photographer's iPhone. Performance is apparently plenty fast for everyday use. Remember the A19 Pro chip with a slightly cut down GPU is inside the Air and sustained performance and thermals weren't disastrous in early testing. Tom's Guide even saw solid stability and cooler surface temps than the Pro Max in one run. Still, the Pro models remain the better pick for long gaming sessions, for example. Other compromises reviewers flagged a single speaker instead of stereo, slower USB C transfer speed, slightly lower wireless charging ceilings and no mm wave 5G. Then there's the price versus value ratio at $999 and gadget points out that's $200 more than a base iPhone 17 that has fewer compromises and better battery life, making the Air a luxury design play rather than the mainstream choice. Bottom line seems to be if you prize thinness, lightness and a premium feel above all else and your usage is light to moderate the iPhone Air delivers a uniquely delightful hardware experience. If you care more about all day battery, camera versatility and maximum compatibility per dollar, most reviewers steer you toward the iPhone 17 and 17 Pro instead. One last request to fill out the podcast listener survey. Thanks to all of you who have already done so and have said such nice and constructive things. I might add. For example, 95% of you said you rely on the show for industry trends and news. You can trust. And 93% of you said you get news and insights from the show that you hadn't seen elsewhere. So super. That's the job of this show as I conceived it. So glad to know I'm hitting the mark again. Bottom link in the show notes today is a link to the survey. Talk to you tomorrow.
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Olivia loves a challenge. It's why she lifts heavy weights and likes complicated recipes. But for booking her trip to Paris, Olivia chose the easy way. With Expedia, she bundled her flight with a hotel to save more. Of course, she still climbed all 674 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower. You were made to take the easy route. We were made to easily package your trip. Expedia made to travel flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.