Tech’s Big Week: AI Billions, Chip Wars & a Security Shock

The first week of May 2026 delivered some of the biggest tech headlines of the year.
The $725B bet. Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet collectively committed roughly $725 billion in capex for 2026 — up over 75% year-over-year — almost entirely for AI infrastructure. 
Ironically, Meta is laying off 8,000 employees this month while Amazon has cut 30,000 roles in recent months.  The message: compute over headcount.
Chips & rivals unite. OpenAI, AMD, Broadcom, Intel, Microsoft, and Nvidia jointly released the MRC open protocol to boost GPU cluster performance for large-scale AI training.  Cross-competitor collaboration at this scale is unprecedented.
China’s answer. DeepSeek could hit a $45 billion valuation in its first funding round  as Beijing accelerates its push for AI independence from U.S. technology.
Education under attack. On May 7th, Canvas became fully inaccessible after an unauthorized actor tampered with the platform, potentially exposing student contact details, course materials, and assignments at universities across the country. 
The AI gold rush is real — but so are the risks that come with it.