A man demonstrates the uSens Inc. Impression Pi virtual reality and augmented reality interactive device at CES Unveiled, a media preview event for CES International, Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, in Las Vegas.
John Locher | AP
The so-called metaverse has a “big time” investment case, according to Puerto Rican billionaire businessman Orlando Bravo.
Bravo, co-founder and managing partner of private equity firm Thoma Bravo, told CNBC that he thinks “metaverse” is the big word of 2021.
“It’s investable and it’s going to be very big,” Bravo said in an interview with CNBC’s Annette Weisbach on Friday.
The metaverse is a sci-fi concept whereby humans put on some sort of headset or smart glasses that allows them to live, work and play in a virtual world much like the one depicted in the “Ready Player One” novel and movie. Depending on your point of view, it’s either a utopian dream or a dystopian nightmare.
The term metaverse was thrust into the spotlight this month by Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg when he changed Facebook’s name to Meta and said the new company was going to focus on the metaverse.
“The metaverse is the next frontier just like social networking was when we got started,” he said at the time.
Dozens of other companies including Microsoft, Roblox, Nvidia and Britain’s Improbable are already trying to build the software and hardware that could power the metaverse.
Thoma Bravo has over $83 billion in assets under managements and a portfolio that comprises more than 40 software companies. It has invested in the likes of cybersecurity firms McAfee and Barracuda, as well as enterprise software firm Dynatrace.
In addition to the metaverse, Bravo is also bullish on crypto and he owns an undisclosed amount of bitcoin.
“How could you not love crypto?” Bravo said at CNBC’s Delivering Alpha conference in September. “Crypto is just a great system. It’s frictionless. It’s decentralized. And young people want their own financial system. So it is here to stay.”
A 300mm wafer on display at the booth of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company during the 2023 World Semiconductor Conference at Nanjing International Expo Center on July 19, 2023, in Nanjing, China.
Vcg | Visual China Group | Getty Images
The U.S. has revoked a waiver that allowed Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. to export key chipmaking equipment and technology to its manufacturing plant in Nanjing, China, as Washington continues to ramp up efforts to limit Beijing’s semiconductor advancement.
The change will remove a fast-track export privilege known as validated end user (VEU) status, effective Dec. 31, TSMC confirmed to CNBC on Wednesday.
The world’s largest contract chipmaker had received the exemption soon after the Commerce Department launched its initial restrictions on the sale of U.S.-origin chipmaking tools in 2022.
Under the new policy, shipments of chipmaking tools with American origins to TSMC’s manufacturing facilities in Nanjing, China, will require U.S. export licenses.
“While we are evaluating the situation and taking appropriate measures, including communicating with the US government, we remain fully committed to ensuring the uninterrupted operation of TSMC Nanjing,” the company said.
South Korean memory chipmakers SK Hynix and Samsung also had their VEU privileges revoked on Friday, according to a statement on the Federal Register. Both companies run China-based memory chip facilities.
At the same time, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security said in a statement that it was closing the VEU “Biden-era loophole” for all foreign semiconductor manufacturers.
It added that it intends to grant export license applications to allow former VEU participants to operate their existing manufacturing facilities in China, but not to expand capacity or upgrade technology in China.
Jeffrey Kessler, under secretary of commerce for industry and security, stated that the Trump administration is “committed to closing export control loopholes — particularly those that put U.S. companies at a competitive disadvantage. Today’s decision is an important step towards fulfilling this commitment.”
According to Brady Wang, associate director at Counterpoint Research, the policy changes “reflect Washington’s broader push to tighten control over semiconductor equipment and technology exports to China, strengthening U.S. power over chip production in China,” he said.
TSMC operates two manufacturing sites in China, one in Shanghai and Nanjing, with the latter facility more advanced. To power its fabrication plants, the company uses hardware from several U.S. chip equipment suppliers, including Applied Materials and KLA Corp.
However, according to Wang, as TSMC’s Nanjing fab contributes less than 3% of TSMC’s total revenue and represents a minor share of its global capacity, the financial impact on the company “should be minor.”
Renewed crackdown?
The recent VEU reversals may come as a surprise to some, as they follow the Trump administration’s announcement that it would ease controls on the export of some American artificial intelligence chips.
Last month, the U.S. said Nvidia and AMD would be allowed to resume exports of some of their previously banned made-for-China AI chips, and signaled that the policy could be expanded.
Prior to that, the administration had also struck down the Biden-era AI diffusion rule, a move that could’ve seen the expansion of export controls on advanced AI chips.
The rollbacks of advanced chip restrictions have been posed by U.S. officials as a way for the U.S. to maintain the supremacy of the AI technology stack globally, including in China.
However, the removal of the VEU exemptions shows that the same logic is unlikely to be applied to memory and chipmaking technologies.
According to Ray Wang, research director for semiconductors, supply chain and emerging technology at Futurum Group, the policies show that Washington remains committed to preventing China from boosting its local chip production capacity and cultivating its local know-how and talent.
“Zooming out, another underlying goal may be to constrain companies’ ability to expand their supply chain footprint in China—particularly in strategic sectors such as semiconductors, which the administration is keen to prevent,” he said.
Conversely, the Trump administration has been working to attract more of the semiconductor supply chain to the shores of the U.S. through tariff threats.
This year, TSMC, SK Hynix and Samsung have committed new investments into their American manufacturing plans.
On Monday, shares of SK Hynix and Samsung fell on the VEU news. However, shares of TSMC traded flat on Wednesday after news of its VEU reversal.
The Google logo is seen outside a building housing Google offices in Beijing on February 4, 2025. China on February 4 said it would probe US tech giant Google over violations of anti-monopoly laws after Washington slapped 10 percent levies on Chinese goods.
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) had proposed a sort of break-up of Google, which included divesting its Chrome browser, in an antitrust case that began in September 2023.
While Google was last year found to hold an illegal monopoly in its core market of internet search, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled against the most severe consequences that were proposed by the DOJ.
Google will not have to divest Chrome. The company can also still make payments to companies to preload products, but it cannot have exclusive contracts that condition payments or licensing.
That means Google will still be able to pay Apple the billions of dollars it does to be the default search engine on iPhones.
“This is a monster win for Cupertino and for Google its a home run ruling that removes a huge overhang on the stock,” Daniel Ives, global head of technology research at Wedbush Securities, said in a note on Tuesday.
Google has been facing rising competition to its core search business from the likes of Perplexity and OpenAI. But the company has so far fended off challenges with its advertising business still growing.
Google has pinned its hopes of becoming a major artificial intelligence player on Gemini, its suite of AI models and the chatbot that goes by the same name.
“Following today’s announcement, we are increasingly constructive in the longer-term durability of Google’s Search business and are raising our estimates accordingly,” Ives said, adding that he now has a new price target of $245 for Alphabet’s stock.
The ruling also means Google will not have to divest the Android operating system that it develops.
Android is seen as a key tool for Google to increase the number of users for Gemini given that around 70% of smartphones globally run the operating system, giving the U.S. technology giant an existing base of users.
— CNBC’s Jennifer Elias contributed to this report.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff participates in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 22, 2025.
Chris Ratcliffe | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Salesforce has cut 4,000 of its customer support roles, CEO Marc Benioff recently said while discussing how artificial intelligence has helped reduce the company headcount.
Benioff revealed the layoffs during an interview published Friday on The Logan Bartlett Show podcast.
“I’ve reduced it from 9,000 heads to about 5,000, because I need less heads,” Benioff said while discussing the impact of AI on Salesforce operations.
Salesforce has been on the front lines of the AI revolution and has built what it calls an “Agentforce” of customer service bots.
“Because of the benefits and efficiencies of Agentforce, we’ve seen the number of support cases we handle decline and we no longer need to actively backfill support engineer roles,” Salesforce said in a statement Tuesday to NBC Bay Area.
Laurie Ruettimann, a human resources consultant, said AI is affecting jobs in several industries.
“There have been layoffs all over America directly attributed to AI,” Ruettimann said, adding anyone who wants to stay employed or looking for work needs to learn new skills.
“If your network could get you a job, it would have done it already. It would have done it yesterday,” Ruettimann said. “It’s on you to expand your vision, to expand your horizons and to meet new people.”
Analyst Ed Zitron said AI is being blamed by tech companies that over hired during the pandemic. The companies are now looking to lure investors by claiming to be more efficient, Zitron said.
“It’s just a growth at all costs mindset,” Zitron said. “The only thing that’s important is growth, even if it ruins people’s lives. Even if it makes the company worse and provides an inferior product.”