Deputy Editor
Alex Heath is Deputy Editor for The Verge and the author of Command Line, a newsletter about the tech industry’s inside conversation. Since joining The Verge in 2021, he has broken agenda-setting scoops like Facebook’s rebrand to Meta and been at the forefront of tech’s biggest storylines, from Elon Musk’s chaotic takeover of Twitter to the failed boardroom coup at OpenAI.
Heath has been covering tech for more than a decade in previous roles at The Information, Business Insider, and other outlets. His work has been cited in congressional hearings and been recognized by the Livingston Awards and the Society of American Business Editors and Writers. He has appeared onstage at events like the Code Conference, SXSW, and Web Summit. He regularly appears as an expert voice on programs like CNBC, NPR, BBC, and CNN. He lives with his wife and two dogs in Los Angeles, where he likes to play ultimate frisbee and poker in his free time.
This is Big Tech’s playbook for swallowing the AI industry
With Amazon’s hiring of the team behind a buzzy AI startup, a pattern is emerging: the reverse acquihire.
In case you missed it: Kylie Robison and I were recently on Decoder to talk about the companies and incentives driving the AI boom. We covered a lot of ground, from AI raves in San Francisco to open vs. closed source. Listen wherever you get your podcasts!
During a recent talk at Dartmouth’s school of engineering, OpenAI CTO Mira Murati said the quiet part out loud. I’ll let you watch and be the judge:
Meta forms new Wearables group and lays off some employees
Meta’s Reality Labs is undergoing its biggest restructuring in years by separating into two orgs: Wearables and Metaverse. A small number of employees have been laid off as a result.
What went wrong at BeReal and what comes next
BeReal wanted to be the next Instagram. What happens now that it has been acquired?
The company is on track to make about $3.4 billion in revenue this year, which is about double what it brought in last year, according to a new report by The Information.
CEO Sam Altman reportedly told employees that $200 million of that revenue is the cut OpenAI gets from Microsoft selling its models through Azure. That means the vast majority of OpenAI’s revenue is coming from ChatGPT subscriptions and its own developer platform.
[The Information]
Kevin Weil, a Facebook product veteran, is joining in the newly-created role of chief product officer. Ex-Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar is also joining as chief financial officer.
“Sarah and Kevin bring a depth of experience that will enable OpenAI to scale our operations, set a strategy for the next phase of growth, and ensure that our teams have the resources they need to continue to thrive,” CEO Sam Altman says.