Inklings #013 📧

Timing is rarely a coincidence. It's an opportunity. And we're clearly seeing quite a bit of jockeying right now amongst the three Big AI companies looking to go public. Over the next several months, we're about to see endless attempts to frame their own narratives so see what the public will buy. Quite literally.

The Great AI IPO RaceSpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic are all angling…SpyglassM.G. Siegler

Happy long weekend (both Memorial Day and Bank Holiday). I'll be on the road next week. 🍻

Inklings is a newsletter featuring links and commentary from M.G. Siegler on timely topics found around the web.

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Thoughts On...

💸 OpenAI's IPO Hedge**–** Beyond the obvious optics of leaking that you're going to file to go public right before your hated rival flips their S-1 public, assuming OpenAI does actually (confidentially) file today or early next week, it's clearly a maneuver to stay ahead of a would-be Anthropic listing. And a necessary one. If Anthropic goes out first, assuming their better growth and better margins hold, OpenAI's IPO is in a lot of trouble. The comp would have already been challenging from a bottom line perspective, as I detailed last year, but now that Anthropic has seemingly surged ahead in top line too... yeah. So the race is on. But as Sam Altman's comments to staff make clear, it's not a sure thing they're going to go public this year – many elements will factor in, including how SpaceX is received, overall macro sentiment, oh yes, and how their actual business_is doing_ – but this clearly gives them optionality just in case they need to beat Anthropic to market (or, perhaps, if it looks like the market is about to collapse which could slam the IPO window shut for a long time, and as such, limit access to continued capital, which obviously would be very bad for OpenAI). [ Information**🔒]**

🎞️ IMAX Explores a Sale**–** Last summer, I had a new idea for Skydance following their purchase of Paramount: buying IMAX. As it turns out, they took my older, much larger idea, and bought Warner Bros Discovery instead. Still, given IMAX's relative price ($1.8B market cap before the pop on today's news), it could makes sense. Or it could make sense for the company that Paramount just paid a $3B breakup fee to in order to secure WBD. You know, the one that suddenly and surprisingly (except to me) loves movie theaters: Netflix. Certainly selling to someone right now makes some sense for IMAX, they're continuing to eat into box office share and 2026 is likely to be the best year for movies in quite some time (and perhaps for quite time after that). Sell high, as it were. [ WSJ**🔒]**

👶 Can Baby Yoda Save Star Wars? – Speaking of the box office. Sadly, signs are pointing towards "no" here as we head into the holiday weekend. An opening in the $80M range would be great for pretty much any movie, but sadly a Star Wars movie is not one of them. For context, Solo did $103M over the same weekend 8 years ago – and that movie was considered a disaster for Disney (it was fine, but unnecessary). Also, $103M is almost $140M in 2026 dollars. A bigger disaster for Disney (though not at the box office, but perception-wise) was what came next: The Rise of Skywalker. The last of the last trilogy and the last Star Wars movie we've seen until now was a retconning mess. Forget pent-up demand, it's wild that Disney let that after-taste linger all this time. And it's just going to be a hard sell trying to cleanse the palate while also trying to translate a Star Wars movie from streaming to the big screen for the first time. Anyway, Kathleen Kennedy is gone (though this is still obviously her Baby Yoda) and Dave Filoni is in place; a good transition as he co-wrote this film. His animated work has been generally excellent (including the current Maul!) but it's also a bit too in-the-weeds for the mass audience. Can he keep Star Wars truly mainstream? Next summer's Starfighter – well-timed for the 50th anniversary of the original movie, seems to have a decidedly better vibe around it. Could it be the start of a new trilogy? Something else? Moar Andor! Filoni (and Josh D'Amaro) is going to need to tackle it at some point... [ Bloomberg**🔒]**

I Wrote...

Did NVIDIA just post the most profitable quarter in corporate history? Let's dive in...

NVIDIA’s Profit CrownJensen Huang just took the throne from Apple, at least in the US…SpyglassM.G. Siegler

I Quote...

"I have a million ideas, from lab drug discovery to game design. I'd love to have some free engineers to go and do those kinds of things. I think it's a lack of imagination — and a lack of understanding of what's really going to happen."

– Demis Hassabis , talking about the movement to lay off engineers and replace their productivity with AI.

It's one of those quotes you certainly hope doesn't come back to bite if Google itself feels the need to follow much of the rest of the industry and do such layoffs (at some point, there will probably be pressure from Wall Street if nothing else).

Asides...

• Perhaps not the best omen that SpaceX had to postpone the Starship launch, clearly timed around the S-1 launch. [ FT**🔒]**
• Xbox, sorry XBOX , keeps making fast, smart moves to save the business, bringing on Matthew Ball and Scott Van Vliet. [ Verge**]**
• More equity for the government , this time in quantum computing stocks – including, most notably, IBM (though they'll be making a new, standalone quantum company, Anderon)... [ CNBC**]**
• In the latest twist on the long and winding road to unwind Manus from Meta , the co-founders may raise $1B+ to try to buy it back. Still sounds... extremely complicated. [ Bloomberg**🔒]**
• In other "hackquisition " news, Google is still at it, paying "roughly" $100M to buy some Contextual AI staff and naturally, license their technology. [ Bloomberg**🔒]**
• Even Apple has been dipping their toes in such waters, buying some talent and "non-exclusive license" rights from Animato for virtual avatars. [ 9to5Mac**]**
• I've long wondered if/when Andrej Karpathy might join the OpenAI "Constellation" of companies and raise his own mega round. As it turns out, he's joining Anthropic instead. Obviously huge validation for them. And a big black eye for both OpenAI and Elon Musk. [ @karpathy**]**

I Quote...

"I didn’t want the second or the third in the company, I wanted only the top, and they’re here today to pay respects to you and to China."

– US President Donald Trump to Chinese president Xi Jinping during their meeting in Beijing with yes, many tech CEOs in tow.

Just a few days ago, I wondered if the tech company CEOs weren't starting to "outsource" their dealings with Trump to other "emissaries" on their teams, and if that in turn might annoy Trump. Well, I think we have our answer...

See also: the notion that Trump may have postponed the AI model executive order signing in part because a lot of the CEOs wouldn't be there and were sending "lower executives" in their place...

Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:

• SpaceX's 'Fast Entry' to the Market • Bezos on the Melania Doc • SpaceX to Act Fast to Complete Cursor • Murdoch Buys Vox

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