Alphabet stock surges on Gemini 3 AI model optimism
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Alphabet stock jumped 5% on Wednesday after Google debuted its latest artificial intelligence model, Gemini 3, sparking optimism from investors.
The new model is an improvement on its predecessor, Gemini 2.5, which Google released about eight months ago.
Google said Gemini 3 allows users to get better answers to more complex questions and doesn’t need as much prompting to determine the context and intent behind their requests.
Gemini 3 will be integrated into Google’s search products, the Gemini app and enterprise services.
Analysts at D.A. Davidson said in a Tuesday note that they were quickly impressed by Gemini 3, calling it a “genuinely strong model” and “the current state-of-the-art” based on preliminary testing and how it scored against AI benchmarks.
“We’d go as far to say that this latest model from [Google DeepMind] meaningfully moves the frontier forward, with capabilities that in certain areas far exceed what we’ve typically come to expect from this generation of frontier models,” the analysts wrote. The firm has a neutral rating on Alphabet shares.
With Gemini 3, Google is competing against OpenAI, which kicked off the generative AI boom with the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, and offers its GPT-5 model.
Other players like Anthropic, the creator of the Claude chatbot and Sonnet 4.5 model, have gained popularity.
Bank of America Securities analysts said Gemini 3 represents “another positive step” for Google to close any “perceived LLM performance gap” to its AI competitors.
“Healthy adoption metrics for AI Overviews and Gemini indicate Google is successfully funneling users into its AI surfaces, despite growing competition, and should help ease concerns around potential search disruption,” according to the analysts, which have a buy rating on Alphabet stock. “While still early to assess the full capabilities of the new model, a few early reviews were positive.”
Alphabet’s stock has also rallied in recent days after Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway disclosed a new stake in the Google parent, marking one of the conglomerate’s most sizable technology bets in years.
Shares of Alphabet are up more than 55% so far this year.
Technology
Figure AI sued by whistleblower who warned that startup’s robots could ‘fracture a human skull’
Startup Figure AI is developing general-purpose humanoid robots.
Figure AI
Figure AI, an Nvidia-backed developer of humanoid robots, was sued by the startup’s former head of product safety who alleged that he was wrongfully terminated after warning top executives that the company’s robots “were powerful enough to fracture a human skull.”
Robert Gruendel, a principal robotic safety engineer, is the plaintiff in the suit filed Friday in a federal court in the Northern District of California. Gruendel’s attorneys describe their client as a whistleblower who was fired in September, days after lodging his “most direct and documented safety complaints.”
The suit lands two months after Figure was valued at $39 billion in a funding round led by Parkway Venture Capital. That’s a 15-fold increase in valuation from early 2024, when the company raised a round from investors including Jeff Bezos, Nvidia, and Microsoft.
In the complaint, Gruendel’s lawyers say the plaintiff warned Figure CEO Brett Adcock and Kyle Edelberg, chief engineer, about the robot’s lethal capabilities, and said one “had already carved a ¼-inch gash into a steel refrigerator door during a malfunction.”
The complaint also says Gruendel warned company leaders not to “downgrade” a “safety road map” that he had been asked to present to two prospective investors who ended up funding the company.
Gruendel worried that a “product safety plan which contributed to their decision to invest” had been “gutted” the same month Figure closed the investment round, a move that “could be interpreted as fraudulent,” the suit says.
The plaintiff’s concerns were “treated as obstacles, not obligations,” and the company cited a “vague ‘change in business direction’ as the pretext” for his termination, according to the suit.
Gruendel is seeking economic, compensatory and punitive damages and demanding a jury trial.
Figure didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Nor did attorneys for Gruendel.
The humanoid robot market remains nascent today, with companies like Tesla and Boston Dynamics pursuing futuristic offerings, alongside Figure, while China’s Unitree Robotics is preparing for an IPO. Morgan Stanley said in a report in May that adoption is “likely to accelerate in the 2030s” and could top $5 trillion by 2050.
Read the filing here:
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