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OpenAI on Monday launched a new AI model and desktop version of ChatGPT, along with an updated user interface, the company’s latest effort to expand use of its popular chatbot.

The update brings GPT-4 to everyone, including OpenAI’s free users, technology chief Mira Murati said in a livestreamed event. She added that the new model, GPT-4o, is “much faster,” with improved capabilities in text, video and audio.

“This is the first time that we are really making a huge step forward when it comes to the ease of use,” Murati said.

OpenAI, backed by Microsoft, has been valued by more than $80 billion by investors. The company, founded in 2015, is under pressure to stay on top of the generative AI market while finding ways to make money as it spends massive sums on processors and infrastructure to build and train its models.

The new model also has improved quality and speed of ChatGPT for 50 different languages, and it will also be available via OpenAI’s API so that developers can begin building applications using the new model today, Murati said. GPT-4o is twice as fast as, and half the cost of, GPT-4 Turbo, Murati said.

OpenAI team members demonstrated the new model’s audio capabilities, asking for help calming down ahead of a public speech. OpenAI researcher Mark Chen said the model has the capability to “perceive your emotion,” adding that the model can also handle users interrupting it. The team also asked it to analyze a user’s facial expression to comment on the emotions the person may be experiencing.

“Hey there, what’s up? How can I brighten your day today?” ChatGPT’s audio mode said when a user greeted it.

Chen demonstrated the model’s ability to tell a bedtime story and asked it to change the tone of its voice to be more dramatic or robotic. He even asked it to sing the story.

OpenAI’s new model can also function as a translator, even in audio mode, the company said. Chen demonstrated the tool’s ability to listen to Murati speaking Italian while he spoke English and to translate into their respective languages as they conversed.

Team members also demonstrated the model’s ability to solve math equations and help write code, positioning it as a stronger competitor to Microsoft’s own GitHub Copilot.

For OpenAI, it’s one of the company’s biggest announcements since its August launch of ChatGPT Enterprise, the AI chatbot’s business tier. That tool was in development for “under a year” and had the help of more than 20 companies of varying sizes and industries, OpenAI COO Brad Lightcap told CNBC at the time.

OpenAI, Microsoft and Google are at the helm of a generative AI gold rush as companies in seemingly every industry race to add AI-powered chatbots and agents to key services to avoid being left behind by competitors. Earlier this month, OpenAI rival Anthropic announced its first-ever enterprise offering and a free iPhone app.

A record $29.1 billion was invested across nearly 700 generative AI deals in 2023, an increase of more than 260% from the prior year, according to PitchBook. The market is predicted to top $1 trillion in revenue within a decade.

Some in the industry have raised concerns about the speed at which untested new services are coming to market, and academics and ethicists are distressed about the technology’s tendency to propagate bias.

After ChatGPT’s launch in November 2022, it broke records at the time as the fastest-growing consumer app in history, and now has about 100 million weekly active users. OpenAI says that more than 92% of Fortune 500 companies are using the platform.

Murati said during the Monday event that OpenAI wants to “remove some of the mysticism from the technology.”

“Over the next few weeks, we’ll be rolling out these capabilities to everyone,” Murati said, adding.

She concluded by thanking Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and his company for providing the necessary graphics processing units (GPUs) to power OpenAI’s technology.

“I just want to thank the incredible OpenAI team, and also thanks to Jensen and the Nvidia team for bringing us the most advanced GPUs to make this demo possible today,” she said.

WATCH: OpenAI’s Google search competitor

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SpaceX’s Starship explodes during routine test in Texas

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SpaceX's Starship explodes during routine test in Texas

A SpaceX Starship is seen in Boca Chica, Texas in 2023.

Patrick T. Fallon | Afp | Getty Images

A SpaceX Starship rocket on Wednesday exploded at the Starbase facility in Texas during routine testing in preparation for a launch flight, according to local authorities and live stream footage.

The rocket “experienced a major anomaly while on a test stand at Starbase” at 11 p.m. local time, SpaceX said on social media, noting “a safety clear area around the site was maintained throughout the operation and all personnel are safe and accounted for.”

Local authorities said that Starship “suffered a catastrophic failure and exploded,” with no injuries reported at the time of writing and an investigation is now underway. Live stream footage of Starbase showed the rocket burst into flame, shooting a large fireball into the sky.

Another Starship launch was expected to take place by the end of this month.

It’s been a tempestuous ride for Elon Musk’s mammoth Starship, after three flight launch attempts devolved in fiery glory and air-traffic stopping debris this year to date. Notably, the rocket model has taken off successfully in previous instances, but its vast scale — standing 120 meters (394 feet) tall when factoring in the Super Heavy booster — has raised concerns over its overall reliability and requirements for orbital refueling once in flight.

Yet Musk has clinched his hopes on Starship as the key vehicle for both NASA’s third and fourth Artemis missions — part of a broader plan to return humans to the Moon — due to take place over 2027-2028. The rocket is also set to play a role in launching the Starlab private space station in the transition to commercial space orbiting labs once the International Space Station retires after 2030.

Critically, Starship is also central to Musk’s — and former ally U.S. President Donald Trump’s — broader ambitions to colonize Mars. The rocket is set to ferry Optimus robots to the red planet by the end of 2026, with Musk in March saying, “If those landings go well, then human landings may start as soon as 2029, although 2031 is more likely.”

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Apple looking to make ‘premium’ priced folding iPhones starting next year, analyst says

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Apple looking to make 'premium' priced folding iPhones starting next year, analyst says

People look at iPhones at the Apple Fifth Avenue store in New York City on May 23, 2025.

Adam Gray | Reuters

Apple has plans to make a folding iPhone starting next year, reliable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said on Wednesday.

Kuo said Apple’s folding phone could have a display made by Samsung Display, which is planning to produce as many as eight million foldable panels for the device next year. However, other components haven’t been finalized, including the device’s hinge, Kuo wrote. He expects it to have “premium pricing.”

Kuo is an analyst for TF International Securities, and focuses on the Asian electronics supply chain and often discusses Apple products before they’re launched.

He wrote in a post on social media site X that Apple’s plans for the foldable iPhone aren’t locked in yet and are subject to change. Apple did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

Apple’s iPhone makes up over half of Apple’s business and remains an incredibly profitable product, accounting for $201 billion in sales in the company’s fiscal 2024. But iPhone revenue peaked in 2022, and Apple is constantly looking for ways to attract new customers and convince its current customers to upgrade to more expensive devices.

The Flex S is another concept device Samsung showed off at MWC. It folds in a more zigzag-like way to make an “S” shape.

Ryan Browne | CNBC

Several of Apple’s rivals, including Huawei and Samsung, have been releasing folding smartphones since 2019.

The devices promise the screen size of a tablet in a format that can be stored in pants pockets. But folding phones still have hardware issues, including creases in the display where it is folded.

Folding phones also have yet to prove they drive significant demand after the novelty wears off.

Research firm TrendForce said last year that only 1.5% of all smartphones sold can fold. Counterpoint, another research firm tracking smartphone sales, said earlier this year that the folding market only grew about 3% in 2024 and is expected to shrink in 2025.

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Scale AI not ‘winding down’ following Meta deal, interim CEO tells employees and customers

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Scale AI not 'winding down' following Meta deal, interim CEO tells employees and customers

FILE PHOTO: Jason Droege speaks at the WSJTECH live conference in Laguna Beach, California, U.S. October 22, 2019.

Mike Blake | Reuters

Scale AI’s Interim CEO Jason Droege said in a memo on Wednesday that the artificial intelligence startup is not changing course following Meta’s multibillion-dollar investment in the company last week.

“Unlike some other recent tech deals you might have heard about in the AI space, this is not a pivot or a winding down,” Droege wrote in a post directed at customers, employees and investors.

Meta has a 49% stake in Scale after its $14.3 billion investment, though the social media company will not have any voting power. Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang, along with a small number of other Scale employees, will join Meta as part of the agreement.

“Scale remains, unequivocally, an independent company,” Droege wrote. “This deal rewards many of the people who helped build Scale into what it is today, but more importantly to me, it’s also a validation of the course we’re on.”

Scale AI appointed Droege, the company’s chief strategy officer, to serve as its interim chief executive following the deal. Droege wrote that Scale AI is still “a well-resourced company” that has “multiple promising lines of business.”

Founded in 2016, Scale AI rose to prominence by helping major tech companies like OpenAI, Google and Microsoft prepare data they use to train cutting-edge AI models. Meta has been one of Scale AI’s biggest customers.

Droege said the company is “not slowing down” and remains committed to its data and application business units. Scale will also continue to be model agnostic, he added.

“The need for high-quality data for AI models remains significant, and with the largest network of experts training AI, we are set up well to help model builders keep pushing the frontier of what’s possible,” Droege wrote.

But some of Scale AI’s tech customers may be having doubts.

OpenAI confirmed to CNBC on Wednesday that it has been wrapping up its work with Scale AI over the past six to 12 months. The company said it’s looking to work with other data providers that have kept pace with innovation, and that its decision to wind down its work with Scale wasn’t influenced by the Meta partnership.

Google is also reportedly cutting ties with Scale following the company’s deal with Meta, according to a report from Reuters. Google declined to comment.

WATCH: Scale AI CEO departs for Meta in Zuckerberg’s latest AI gambit

Scale AI CEO departs for Meta in Zuckerberg’s latest AI gambit

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