Axios

The Trump administration has ambitious deadlines to accelerate scientific discovery, Energy Department undersecretary Darío Gil and Dell CEO Michael Dell told Axios in an interview.

Why it matters: Government agencies and companies are mobilizing to use AI for energy, drug discovery and national security, all while promising new jobs.

The Justice Department's settlement with Ticketmaster this week marks a new chapter of the MAGA antitrust movement that may look different than some were expecting.

Why it matters: The deal offers a window into how Trump-era antitrust works, signaling that aggressive corporate breakups are out of favor.

Tinder on Thursday announced new AI and non-AI powered features in an effort to connect with Gen Z singletons.

Why it matters: Users increasingly struggle to tell the difference between real connections and the bots.

A video of McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski awkwardly eating a burger went viral and united the internet for a few days.

• It also led to an increase in sales.

Why it matters: Many aim to go viral, few know how to manage it once they do, and even fewer see it drive revenue.

Microsoft on Thursday announced Copilot Health, a new AI service that lets users upload electronic health records and data from fitness trackers and other devices.

Why it matters: Microsoft is entering one of AI's fastest-growing arenas — health care — as OpenAI, Amazon and others expand their medical chatbot offerings.

Senate Democrats are drafting legislation to codify federal guardrails around the use of AI in fully autonomous weapons and domestic mass surveillance, Axios has learned.

Why it matters: The issue is at the heart of the Trump administration's standoff with Anthropic over the government's access to the company's AI models.

U.S. and Israeli military strikes on Iran are playing out in the air and at sea, while a parallel fight is unfolding online.

Why it matters: Iranian actors — both state-linked and loosely affiliated — have a history of cyberattacks against the U.S., but the U.S. and Israeli governments are now using similar tactics.

Perplexity used its first developer conference on Wednesday to announce new AI agent tools and software that can turn a spare computer into a locally controlled AI system similar to OpenClaw.

Why it matters: Perplexity — a company without its own frontier models — needs to justify why customers should pay it a monthly fee rather than go directly to OpenAI, Anthropic or Google.

Yahoo on Wednesday unveiled a new, personalized homepage powered by its new AI answer engine, Yahoo Scout.

Why it matters: Yahoo says MyScout is the first personalized homepage built off of an AI-driven answer engine.

OpenAI is partnering with North America's Building Trades Unions as it ramps up U.S. data center construction.

Why it matters: OpenAI's AI ambitions depend on legions of skilled construction workers to build new data centers.