Good morning. Three forces dominated AI news this weekend: OpenAI, NVIDIA and SB Energy agreed to build one of the largest AI compute sites ever planned, in Ohio; Anthropic is reportedly preparing a $2 trillion IPO, which would be the largest in history; and Unitree, the humanoid robot maker, is set to debut on Shanghai's STAR Market this week after a gray-market frenzy. Missed the weekend? Catch up on the August 17 briefing.
Top 3 Highlights
1. OpenAI, NVIDIA and SB Energy make a mega bet on Ohio's PORTS-Pike site
OpenAI will anchor a new AI factory in Pike County, Ohio, with NVIDIA investing $1.5 billion in SB Energy and serving as the exclusive AI compute infrastructure provider for roughly 8GW of capacity. NVIDIA says the pipeline could represent about $600 billion of its compute revenue by 2030; the initial 4.25GW deployment alone could account for around 1.5 million GPUs.
Sources: OpenAI and NVIDIA expand compute deal (CN) · OpenAI joins PORTS-Pike (CN) · NVIDIA invests $1.5B in SB Energy (CN)
2. Anthropic reportedly targets a $2 trillion IPO
Fortune reports Anthropic plans to go public in October 2026 at a $2 trillion valuation, which would top SpaceX's record listing. The numbers back the ambition: Q2 revenue exceeded $11.5 billion, up at least 13x year over year, and adjusted operating profit turned positive.
Source: 36Kr morning digest (CN)
3. Unitree lists on the STAR Market amid a gray-market frenzy
Unitree shares start trading on Shanghai's STAR Market on Aug 19. Ahead of the debut, gray-market intermediaries were bidding up to 520 yuan per share, more than 3x the 150.8 yuan IPO price. The company also unveiled "Superman," a humanoid robot with a 2-meter standing jump and a top speed of 12.66 m/s.
Sources: Unitree listing announcement (CN) · 36Kr digest (CN)
More News
- World models get ears: A new world model generates 24FPS video with 48kHz stereo audio in real time, and a full open-source release is on the way. (QbitAI, CN)
- Fei-Fei Li on AI and jobs: In a new interview, the Stanford professor argues AI is an amplifier of human capability, not a replacement. (QbitAI, CN)
- Robot force sensors raise a big round: BluePoint Touch, whose six-axis force sensors hold a 72.6% share of China's humanoid robot market, closed a Series D led by GAC Capital. (36Kr, CN)
- Alipay launches China's first agent commerce stack: A full-stack agent commerce base plus the AHA cross-device protocol, co-built with Alibaba Qwen, Huawei, OPPO, BYD and 20+ partners. (36Kr, CN)
- GLM-5.3 goes live on more fronts: Zhipu's GLM-5.3 debuts on FanShi PhanRouter, while Alibaba's Qianwen Office now offers GLM-5.3 and DeepSeek V4 Pro as first-launch models. (QbitAI, CN)
Trend Watch
Two structural shifts stand out today. First, the compute arms race is consolidating into mega-deals: NVIDIA, OpenAI and SB Energy are effectively building a national-scale AI power grid in Ohio, with roughly $100 billion in credit support reportedly under discussion. Second, the robotics supply chain is maturing into a real capital market — Unitree goes public while component makers like BluePoint raise at scale, and Chinese humanoid hardware is moving from demo stage to factory floor. Also worth watching: multimodal world models crossed the audio threshold this week, a sign that real-time synthetic media is closing in on production quality.
Disclaimer: This briefing aggregates publicly available news from Chinese and international sources. It is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
