Samwise Tech/AI/Robotics Newsletter
Monday, May 4, 2026
Pentagon Signs AI Deals with Nvidia, Microsoft, and AWS for Classified Military Networks
The U.S. Department of Defense signed agreements on May 1 with Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and Reflection AI to deploy artificial intelligence on classified military networks. The deals expand Pentagon AI access beyond GenAI.mil, which has served more than 1.3 million DOD personnel. The announcement follows months of friction with Anthropic, whose refusal to allow weapons-related uses prompted the Pentagon to diversify its vendor base. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the agreements would give warfighters a diverse suite of AI capabilities while preventing vendor lock-in. AWS contributes classified cloud compute; Reflection AI provides reasoning-focused models; Nvidia and Microsoft bring infrastructure and existing AI platforms.
Sources: TechCrunch
Meta Acquires Humanoid Robotics Startup Assured Robot Intelligence
Meta acquired humanoid robotics startup Assured Robot Intelligence (ARI) on May 1, adding a team that builds AI enabling robots to understand, predict, and adapt to human behavior in complex environments. ARI's co-founders and staff will join Meta's Superintelligence Labs research division. The purchase price was not disclosed. ARI had been building foundation models for robots performing physical labor, including household tasks. The deal extends Meta's physical AI strategy alongside its investments in AI glasses and augmented reality. It continues a trend of major acquisitions in humanoid robotics: Amazon acquired a kid-size humanoid startup in March, and Mobileye bought Mentee Robotics for $900 million in January.
Sources: TechCrunch
Harvard Study: OpenAI's o1 Model Outperforms ER Physicians on Emergency Diagnoses
Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center found OpenAI's o1 model outperformed two internal medicine physicians on emergency room diagnoses, in a study published May 3. The research assessed 76 real patient cases using blind evaluation by four attending physicians who did not know which diagnoses came from humans or AI. The o1 model performed better or on par with the physicians, with the advantage most pronounced at initial triage, when patient information is most limited. The 4o model performed comparably to physicians. Researchers cautioned the study was small and that AI diagnostic tools would require substantial clinical validation before any hospital deployment.
Sources: TechCrunch
xAI Launches Grok 4.3 at Aggressive Price, Adds Voice Cloning Suite
xAI released Grok 4.3 on May 2, cutting API pricing to $1.25 per million input tokens — down from $2 for Grok 4.2, a 37 percent reduction that positions the model as the value option among frontier AI families. xAI simultaneously launched a voice cloning suite, including a Custom Voices API and Text-to-Speech service at $4.20 per million characters. Grok 4.3 tops the CaseLaw v2 benchmark at 79.3 percent and leads the CorpFin legal-finance evaluation, posting a 25-point gain in legal reasoning over its predecessor. The model trails Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.7 and OpenAI's GPT-5.4 on general benchmarks. Beta access began in April for SuperGrok and X Premium+ subscribers.
Sources: VentureBeat
Google Rolls Out Gemini AI Assistant to Millions of Vehicles
Google began rolling out Gemini to vehicles with Google Built-in on April 30, replacing the existing Google Assistant integration across millions of compatible cars. Drivers can invoke Gemini by voice, on-screen microphone, or steering wheel controls. The assistant handles conversational requests — such as finding a highly rated restaurant with outdoor seating along a route — drawing on Google Maps data for suggestions and follow-up queries on parking and menus. Gemini also manages climate control, music, message summarization, and vehicle information retrieval. Future updates will integrate Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Home. Drivers signed into their Google accounts in compatible vehicles will be prompted to upgrade to Gemini.
Sources: TechCrunch
Musk Admits xAI Distilled OpenAI Models to Train Grok in Court Testimony
Elon Musk testified in a California federal court on April 30 that xAI partly used distillation techniques on OpenAI models to train Grok, calling the practice common across the AI industry. Distillation involves training a new model using outputs from an existing one, allowing companies to replicate capabilities without building equivalent infrastructure. OpenAI has sued Musk and former partners, alleging breach of the nonprofit's founding mission after its shift to a for-profit structure. In court, Musk ranked AI leaders — placing Anthropic first, followed by OpenAI, Google, and open-source Chinese models. His admission could complicate xAI's legal position, as distillation may violate model providers' terms of service.
Sources: TechCrunch
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Bars AI-Generated Performances from Oscars
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released rules on May 2 barring AI-generated performances and non-human-authored screenplays from Oscar consideration. Eligible performances must be “credited in the film's legal billing and demonstrably performed by humans with their consent,” and screenplays must be human-authored. The Academy reserved the right to request documentation of a film's AI usage and human authorship. The rules came while an independent film featuring an AI-generated likeness of the late Val Kilmer was in production and AI actress Tilly Norwood continued attracting industry notice. The standards extend across craft categories, formalizing the Academy's position on machine-generated creative work.
Sources: TechCrunch
Tech Pulse
Top Frontier Models: Claude Opus 4.7 (64%) | Gemini 3.1 Pro (63%) | GPT-5.4 (60%)
Top Open Source Models: Llama 4 Maverick (55%) | Qwen 3 235B (52%) | Arcee Trinity (50%)
Top Small Models (15–50B): Llama 4 Scout 17B (45%) | Gemma 3 27B (43%) | Mistral Small 3 22B (40%)
Top Edge Models (0–15B): Phi-4 14B (37%) | Gemma 3 4B (25%) | SmolLM3 3B (15%)
AI Leaders: NVIDIA $4.9T | Microsoft $3.4T | Alphabet $2.8T
Robotics Leaders: Intuitive Surgical $210B | ABB $62B | Figure AI $39B (private est.)
Curated by JD · samwise.agency