🎉 $500B AI Investment, Perplexity API, Robots Build iPhones, AI Teachers, ChatGPT Tasks Tutorials
America First AI Infrastructure, Perplexity Launches New Search API, Robots on the iPhone Assembly Floor, AI Teaching in Nigeria, Learn ChatGPT Tasks
Welcome to this week’s edition of AImpulse, a four point summary of the most significant advancements in the world of Artificial Intelligence followed by a cool new AI tool I’m trying out this week.
Here’s the pulse on this week’s top stories:
What’s Happening: OpenAI just announced "The Stargate Project,” a new company set to invest $500B in U.S. AI infrastructure alongside SoftBank, Oracle, and other tech giants — coming alongside the repealing of Biden-era AI safety order during President Donald Trump’s first days back in office.
The details:
The venture will immediately deploy an initial $100B, starting with massive data centers in Texas before expanding nationwide.
The project aims to create “hundreds of thousands" of American jobs while securing U.S. leadership in advanced AI development.
Key technology partners include Nvidia, Microsoft, and Arm, building on existing collaborations in AI chip development and cloud infrastructure.
The initiative was unveiled following Trump's repeal of Biden’s AI EO, which required labs to share safety testing results and created the AI Safety Institute.
Why it matters: Stargate's sheer $500B scale, along with unprecedented collaboration between tech giants, could completely reshape the entire AI landscape. The move marks a defining moment in the global AI and AGI race for the U.S., and the timing also signals a clear prioritization of speed over safety — for better or worse.
What’s Happening: Perplexity just launched Sonar and Sonar Pro, two API options that make the company’s powerful search tech available to developers to bring real-time, citation-backed search capabilities to third-party applications.
The details:
The standard Sonar API focuses on speed and affordability, offering citation-backed search results with flat pricing at $1/M input and output tokens.
Pro handles more complex queries, with double the citations and larger context windows — with pricing at $3/M input tokens and $15/M output tokens.
The APIs outperform competitors in factuality benchmarks, with Sonar Pro outperforming rivals like Gemini, GPT-4o, and Claude on SimpleQA.
Why it matters: The difference between AI that hallucinates and AI that delivers reliable results can make or break user trust. With Sonar's real-time search and impressive accuracy benchmarks, Sonar is addressing a critical gap in the market and could position it as the go-to for companies looking to add AI search to their products.
What’s Happening: Foxconn, Apple's primary manufacturing partner in China, just signed a deal with UBTech to deploy humanoid robots for iPhone production, starting with the Walker S1 robot for complex assembly tasks.
The details:
UBTech's Walker S1 stands 5’6” tall, weighs 167.6 pounds, and is designed to handle tasks from quality inspection to component assembly.
The robots have already completed several months of training at Foxconn's factories in Shenzhen.
Initial deployment will prioritize tasks that impact worker health, like heavy lifting and repetitive motions.
UBTech aims to become the first company to achieve commercial mass production of humanoid robots through this partnership.
Why it matters: With Figure's humanoids in BMW factories, Apptronik's in Mercedes, and now UBTech in Foxconn's iPhone assembly lines, humanoid robots rapidly move from viral demos to real production floors. A major shift in manufacturing has begun… and the transition may happen faster than most people realize.
What’s Happening: A new study in Nigeria just revealed that students using AI as an after-school tutor made learning gains equivalent to two years of traditional education in just six weeks — showcasing the power of AI-driven learning in developing regions.
The details:
The World Bank-backed pilot combined AI tutoring with teacher guidance in an after-school setting, focusing primarily on English language skills.
Students significantly outperformed their peers in English, AI literacy, and digital skills, with the impact extending to their regular school exams.
The intervention showed huge improvements, particularly for girls who were behind, suggesting AI tutoring could help close gender gaps in education.
The program impact also increased with each additional session attended, suggesting longer programs might yield even greater benefits.
Why it matters: This represents one of the first rigorous studies showing major real-world impacts in a developing nation. The key appears to be using AI as a complement to teachers rather than a replacement — and results suggest that AI tutoring could help address the global learning crisis, particularly in regions with teacher shortages.
AI Tools to Know: ChatGPT's new Tasks feature lets you receive personalized daily news summaries highlighting key global events and surprising developments, all curated to your interests.
Step-by-step:
Select "GPT-4o with Scheduled Tasks" in ChatGPT.
Ask for a daily news brief with specific preferences and timing.
Manage and customize your summary format and focus areas through the Tasks menu.
Pro tip: Add specific topics you're interested in for more relevant news updates.