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The PlayStation DualSense controller and PlayStation 5 console.

Jakub Porzycki | Nurphoto | Getty Images

The PlayStation 5 is fully stocked in stores around the world and will hit Sony’s sales target of 25 million units for the year, an executive at the company told CNBC exclusively.

“This holiday season is the first holiday season we will be fully stocked on PlayStation 5 in every geography,” Eric Lempel, Sony’s head of business operations said in an interview earlier this week.

That comes after a series of successive console shortages, because of which many players around the world were unable to get their hands on PS5 units. Poor supply volumes linked to the global chip shortage and supply chain disruptions greatly limited the availability of PS5, and Microsoft’s Xbox Series X and S.

The PS5 and Xbox Series X were notoriously hard to find in stores after their November 2020 launch. Sony, for its part, has struggled to meet demand for the PS5, facing supply shortages each year following the PS5’s release.

But that’s now over, according to Lempel, and this will be the first year in which PS5 is at full capacity at Sony, retailers, and other distribution partners around the world ahead of the holidays.

“We launched back in 2020,” Lempel told CNBC. “We suffered from the same supply chain issues that everybody was dealing with. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to deliver PS5 to ever consumer that wanted one.”

Sony had set itself a target of 25 million PS5 units shipped throughout 2023. That would make it the best year for any PlayStation machine in history.

Lempel said the company was on track to meet that target this year and expects “record-breaking sales,” thanks to the rebalancing of supply and demand and demand for titles like the newly released Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, which is exclusive to PS5.

Sony next reports earnings on Nov. 9.

Eyes on the competition

Sony’s popular PS5 device has already sold millions — and outstripped Microsoft’s Xbox Series X in terms of demand.

Microsoft is betting big on gaming becoming a more integral part of its business. That’s why the Redmond, Washington-based firm paid so much to buy Activision Blizzard.

In a $69 billion deal that has finally been agreed, Activision will be sold to Microsoft, with blockbuster titles such as “Call of Duty,” “Candy Crush” and “Crash Bandicoot” now being added to its Xbox gaming division.

Rival firms, not least Sony, had worried that this could hamper competition if Microsoft were to make games like Call of Duty exclusive to its Xbox platform. Call of Duty is a multibillion-dollar-making gaming franchise.

However, cloud gaming rights, which relate to the streaming of video games via remote data centers, will be sold to French publisher Ubisoft.

Ubisoft will own the cloud rights to Call of Duty and give people the ability to stream the game on its Ubisoft+ subscription platform after a compromise with U.K. regulators to satisfy them on the competition implications of the deal.

Sony had raised alarm at the negative impact of the Microsoft-Activision deal many times, at one point even warning that it may lead to hampered game quality on PlayStation consoles if Microsoft opts to undermine the programming in any way.

For its part, Microsoft said it has no intention to do so and that the Activision deal will be good for competition.

On the hunt for partnerships

Addressing a CNBC question on whether Sony needs to do anything in response to Microsoft’s move to catch up in the intellectual property land grab that’s been going on in gaming, Lempel said Sony is constantly on the hunt for new developer partners to build exclusive titles for PS5.

But, he added, attempts to build out Sony’s growing catalogue of first-party games further may not always mean acquisitions, stressing its interest in partnerships.

“We have a number of ways of looking at this,” Lempel said, adding that “in terms of great content, that’s where we’re focused.”

“We’ve done more M&A [mergers and acquisitions] in the past decade than we’ve ever done,” he said. “We’re always looking to work with new partners, whether that’s somebody as an external provider … or working with a developer along with the way and then acquiring them later.”

Lempel cited Insomniac Games, which developed the Marvel’s Spider-Man franchise at PlayStation, as a good example of this strategy. Insomniac was earlier a partner to Sony, making games for its PlayStation platform, but it became more integrated with Sony before the Japanese tech titan later decided to buy the firm outright.

The company’s Spider-Man 2 game sold more than 2.5 million copies in its first 24 hours, making it the fastest-selling PlayStation Studios game in history for a 24-hour period.

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Inside a Utah desert facility preparing humans for life on Mars

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Inside a Utah desert facility preparing humans for life on Mars

Hidden among the majestic canyons of the Utah desert, about 7 miles from the nearest town, is a small research facility meant to prepare humans for life on Mars.

The Mars Society, a nonprofit organization that runs the Mars Desert Research Station, or MDRS, invited CNBC to shadow one of its analog crews on a recent mission.

MDRS is the best analog astronaut environment,” said Urban Koi, who served as health and safety officer for Crew 315. “The terrain is extremely similar to the Mars terrain and the protocols, research, science and engineering that occurs here is very similar to what we would do if we were to travel to Mars.”

SpaceX CEO and Mars advocate Elon Musk has said his company can get humans to Mars as early as 2029.

The 5-person Crew 315 spent two weeks living at the research station following the same procedures that they would on Mars.

David Laude, who served as the crew’s commander, described a typical day.

“So we all gather around by 7 a.m. around a common table in the upper deck and we have breakfast,” he said. “Around 8:00 we have our first meeting of the day where we plan out the day. And then in the morning, we usually have an EVA of two or three people and usually another one in the afternoon.”

An EVA refers to extravehicular activity. In NASA speak, EVAs refer to spacewalks, when astronauts leave the pressurized space station and must wear spacesuits to survive in space.

“I think the most challenging thing about these analog missions is just getting into a rhythm. … Although here the risk is lower, on Mars performing those daily tasks are what keeps us alive,” said Michael Andrews, the engineer for Crew 315.

Watch the video to find out more.

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Apple scores big victory with ‘F1,’ but AI is still a major problem in Cupertino

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Apple scores big victory with 'F1,' but AI is still a major problem in Cupertino

Formula One F1 – United States Grand Prix – Circuit of the Americas, Austin, Texas, U.S. – October 23, 2022 Tim Cook waves the chequered flag to the race winner Red Bull’s Max Verstappen 

Mike Segar | Reuters

Apple had two major launches last month. They couldn’t have been more different.

First, Apple revealed some of the artificial intelligence advancements it had been working on in the past year when it released developer versions of its operating systems to muted applause at its annual developer’s conference, WWDC. Then, at the end of the month, Apple hit the red carpet as its first true blockbuster movie, “F1,” debuted to over $155 million — and glowing reviews — in its first weekend.

While “F1” was a victory lap for Apple, highlighting the strength of its long-term outlook, the growth of its services business and its ability to tap into culture, Wall Street’s reaction to the company’s AI announcements at WWDC suggest there’s some trouble underneath the hood.

“F1” showed Apple at its best — in particular, its ability to invest in new, long-term projects. When Apple TV+ launched in 2019, it had only a handful of original shows and one movie, a film festival darling called “Hala” that didn’t even share its box office revenue.

Despite Apple TV+ being written off as a costly side-project, Apple stuck with its plan over the years, expanding its staff and operation in Culver City, California. That allowed the company to build up Hollywood connections, especially for TV shows, and build an entertainment track record. Now, an Apple Original can lead the box office on a summer weekend, the prime season for blockbuster films.

The success of “F1” also highlights Apple’s significant marketing machine and ability to get big-name talent to appear with its leadership. Apple pulled out all the stops to market the movie, including using its Wallet app to send a push notification with a discount for tickets to the film. To promote “F1,” Cook appeared with movie star Brad Pitt at an Apple store in New York and posted a video with actual F1 racer Lewis Hamilton, who was one of the film’s producers.

(L-R) Brad Pitt, Lewis Hamilton, Tim Cook, and Damson Idris attend the World Premiere of “F1: The Movie” in Times Square on June 16, 2025 in New York City.

Jamie Mccarthy | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images

Although Apple services chief Eddy Cue said in a recent interview that Apple needs the its film business to be profitable to “continue to do great things,” “F1” isn’t just about the bottom line for the company.

Apple’s Hollywood productions are perhaps the most prominent face of the company’s services business, a profit engine that has been an investor favorite since the iPhone maker started highlighting the division in 2016.

Films will only ever be a small fraction of the services unit, which also includes payments, iCloud subscriptions, magazine bundles, Apple Music, game bundles, warranties, fees related to digital payments and ad sales. Plus, even the biggest box office smashes would be small on Apple’s scale — the company does over $1 billion in sales on average every day.

But movies are the only services component that can get celebrities like Pitt or George Clooney to appear next to an Apple logo — and the success of “F1” means that Apple could do more big popcorn films in the future.

“Nothing breeds success or inspires future investment like a current success,” said Comscore senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian.

But if “F1” is a sign that Apple’s services business is in full throttle, the company’s AI struggles are a “check engine” light that won’t turn off.

Replacing Siri’s engine

At WWDC last month, Wall Street was eager to hear about the company’s plans for Apple Intelligence, its suite of AI features that it first revealed in 2024. Apple Intelligence, which is a key tenet of the company’s hardware products, had a rollout marred by delays and underwhelming features.

Apple spent most of WWDC going over smaller machine learning features, but did not reveal what investors and consumers increasingly want: A sophisticated Siri that can converse fluidly and get stuff done, like making a restaurant reservation. In the age of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini, the expectation of AI assistants among consumers is growing beyond “Siri, how’s the weather?”

The company had previewed a significantly improved Siri in the summer of 2024, but earlier this year, those features were delayed to sometime in 2026. At WWDC, Apple didn’t offer any updates about the improved Siri beyond that the company was “continuing its work to deliver” the features in the “coming year.” Some observers reduced their expectations for Apple’s AI after the conference.

“Current expectations for Apple Intelligence to kickstart a super upgrade cycle are too high, in our view,” wrote Jefferies analysts this week.

Siri should be an example of how Apple’s ability to improve products and projects over the long-term makes it tough to compete with.

It beat nearly every other voice assistant to market when it first debuted on iPhones in 2011. Fourteen years later, Siri remains essentially the same one-off, rigid, question-and-answer system that struggles with open-ended questions and dates, even after the invention in recent years of sophisticated voice bots based on generative AI technology that can hold a conversation.

Apple’s strongest rivals, including Android parent Google, have done way more to integrate sophisticated AI assistants into their devices than Apple has. And Google doesn’t have the same reflex against collecting data and cloud processing as privacy-obsessed Apple.

Some analysts have said they believe Apple has a few years before the company’s lack of competitive AI features will start to show up in device sales, given the company’s large installed base and high customer loyalty. But Apple can’t get lapped before it re-enters the race, and its former design guru Jony Ive is now working on new hardware with OpenAI, ramping up the pressure in Cupertino.

“The three-year problem, which is within an investment time frame, is that Android is racing ahead,” Needham senior internet analyst Laura Martin said on CNBC this week.

Apple’s services success with projects like “F1” is an example of what the company can do when it sets clear goals in public and then executes them over extended time-frames.

Its AI strategy could use a similar long-term plan, as customers and investors wonder when Apple will fully embrace the technology that has captivated Silicon Valley.

Wall Street’s anxiety over Apple’s AI struggles was evident this week after Bloomberg reported that Apple was considering replacing Siri’s engine with Anthropic or OpenAI’s technology, as opposed to its own foundation models.

The move, if it were to happen, would contradict one of Apple’s most important strategies in the Cook era: Apple wants to own its core technologies, like the touchscreen, processor, modem and maps software, not buy them from suppliers.

Using external technology would be an admission that Apple Foundation Models aren’t good enough yet for what the company wants to do with Siri.

“They’ve fallen farther and farther behind, and they need to supercharge their generative AI efforts” Martin said. “They can’t do that internally.”

Apple might even pay billions for the use of Anthropic’s AI software, according to the Bloomberg report. If Apple were to pay for AI, it would be a reversal from current services deals, like the search deal with Alphabet where the Cupertino company gets paid $20 billion per year to push iPhone traffic to Google Search.

The company didn’t confirm the report and declined comment, but Wall Street welcomed the report and Apple shares rose.

In the world of AI in Silicon Valley, signing bonuses for the kinds of engineers that can develop new models can range up to $100 million, according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

“I can’t see Apple doing that,” Martin said.

Earlier this week, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sent a memo bragging about hiring 11 AI experts from companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google’s DeepMind. That came after Zuckerberg hired Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang to lead a new AI division as part of a $14.3 billion deal.

Meta’s not the only company to spend hundreds of millions on AI celebrities to get them in the building. Google spent big to hire away the founders of Character.AI, Microsoft got its AI leader by striking a deal with Inflection and Amazon hired the executive team of Adept to bulk up its AI roster.

Apple, on the other hand, hasn’t announced any big AI hires in recent years. While Cook rubs shoulders with Pitt, the actual race may be passing Apple by.

WATCH: Jefferies upgrades Apple to ‘Hold’

Jefferies upgrades Apple to 'Hold'

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Musk backs Sen. Paul’s criticism of Trump’s megabill in first comment since it passed

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Musk backs Sen. Paul's criticism of Trump's megabill in first comment since it passed

Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks alongside U.S. President Donald Trump to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on May 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.

Kevin Dietsch | Getty Images

Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who bombarded President Donald Trump‘s signature spending bill for weeks, on Friday made his first comments since the legislation passed.

Musk backed a post on X by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who said the bill’s budget “explodes the deficit” and continues a pattern of “short-term politicking over long-term sustainability.”

The House of Representatives narrowly passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on Thursday, sending it to Trump to sign into law.

Paul and Musk have been vocal opponents of Trump’s tax and spending bill, and repeatedly called out the potential for the spending package to increase the national debt.

On Monday, Musk called it the “DEBT SLAVERY bill.”

The independent Congressional Budget Office has said the bill could add $3.4 trillion to the $36.2 trillion of U.S. debt over the next decade. The White House has labeled the agency as “partisan” and continuously refuted the CBO’s estimates.

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The bill includes trillions of dollars in tax cuts, increased spending for immigration enforcement and large cuts to funding for Medicaid and other programs.

It also cuts tax credits and support for solar and wind energy and electric vehicles, a particularly sore spot for Musk, who has several companies that benefit from the programs.

“I took away his EV Mandate that forced everyone to buy Electric Cars that nobody else wanted (that he knew for months I was going to do!), and he just went CRAZY!” Trump wrote in a social media post in early June as the pair traded insults and threats.

Shares of Tesla plummeted as the feud intensified, with the company losing $152 billion in market cap on June 5 and putting the company below $1 trillion in value. The stock has largely rebounded since, but is still below where it was trading before the ruckus with Trump.

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Tesla one-month stock chart.

— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger and Erin Doherty contributed to this article.

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