The Anthropic-Physical Intelligence rumor roiling AI Twitter

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It’s been a big year for AI acquisitions — so big that most of them barely register anymore. Anthropic and OpenAI have each gone on buying sprees, snapping up developer tooling, AI services shops, and product-testing startups to convert model capability into enterprise revenue and extend their reach faster than the other. Which is what made a weekend rumor about Anthropic acquiring robotics startup Physical Intelligence stand out. It spread exceedingly fast, even after a denial from Physical Intelligence’s CEO

Part of that ties to who’s involved. Physical Intelligence isn’t some obscure robotics shop. It was co-founded by Lachy Groom, an investor-operator whose star has been on the rise in Silicon Valley in recent years; it has raised more than $1 billion (and was reportedly in talks this spring for another $1 billion round at an $11 billion valuation); and its π0.5 modelis apparently among of the more widely...

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