FT: “The benefits of the AI transformation might well be enormous, even if they are as yet mostly unproven. But in the meantime, the rest of society cannot remain passive passengers in the back of the AGI car, like children on a hot holiday trip, frustratedly asking: are we there yet? The AI companies are intent on driving humanity to a destination that has not been fully discussed, let alone agreed. It is time for the rest of us to acquire more agency over our human future. ”
Khachan: “There’s an Italian saying that all the pieces are equal inside the chess box. The same thing applies to people around the chessboard.” [from an FT article on why chess clubs are sweeping the board]
Akash Prakash: “The introduction of AI models with Mythos-level capability has changed the game for cybersecurity. When attackers can reverse engineer a patch and weaponise it in minutes, speed of response has become critical. At the moment, enterprises are notoriously slow in implementing patches as they try to optimise system uptime and avoid patch-related disruptions. Talking to experts, one gets the sense that India has to urgently upgrade its software, especially in the states and the small and medium enterprise sector. Much of it is very old.”
NYTimes: “As of June 30, private equity firms had 33,575 unsold companies in their portfolios, according to PitchBook, an industry data firm. That’s up from 32,451 companies at the end of last year and 15,923 companies a decade ago. The growing backlog is a challenge for private equity’s core business model. Typically, such firms aim to buy a company, often add large amounts of debt to its balance sheet, improve its financial performance and then sell it for a profit, usually within five to seven years.”
