EP 129: Capex to the Moon 2.0! Bubble Debate, and QCOM and Arm Earnings

The Circuit · 4 Aug 2025 · 57m · Episode 129

What this episode covers

Ben Bajarin and Jay Goldberg analyze recent earnings from cloud providers, noting that Meta's aggressive Capex spending is justified by strong ad monetization, whereas Google and Amazon face scrutiny over their AI ROI. They discuss the competitive landscape among hyperscalers, highlighting Microsoft's GPU advantage and Amazon's struggle to secure Nvidia allocations, which may benefit AMD. The hosts also examine Qualcomm and Arm, discussing Arm's potential move into custom chip design and Qualcomm's risks from handset vendors like Xiaomi building in-house modems.

Mentioned

Companies
Meta, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Nvidia, AMD, Arm, Qualcomm, Xiaomi, Apple, TSMC, OpenAI, Oracle, Broadcom, SoftBank, Ampere, Graphcore, Huawei, MediaTek

Other shows on the same ground, closest first.

  • EE Times Current · 29m

    How Much is Enough for Hyperscale Companies?

    Brian Santo hosts a discussion on how hyperscale companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft are reshaping the semiconductor industry by demanding extreme power efficiency and designing custom AI accelerators. Experts Rick Merritt, Gary Hilson, and Dylan McGrath explain that these giants are pushing beyond standard roadmaps, collaborating directly with equipment vendors like Applied Materials, and leveraging their vast capital to drive innovation in memory and process technology. The episode concludes with Wally Rhines' insight that these companies' ultimate goal is owning the data and systems rather than just selling silicon, raising concerns about their growing societal power.

  • EE Times Current · 45m

    CEO Interview: Mike Henry of Mythic | The Biggest Chip Deal Ever | Do Androids Dream of Electric Smartphones?

    Mythic co-founder and CEO Mike Henry explains how the company's analog AI accelerator chips use onboard flash memory to achieve best-in-class performance-per-watt for inference tasks like security video analytics and drone depth estimation, avoiding the high power and cost of digital GPUs. Nvidia analyst Kevin Krewell discusses the $40 billion acquisition of Arm by Nvidia, analyzing Jensen Huang's strategic move to control the CPU/GPU ecosystem and the significant regulatory hurdles regarding Arm's monopoly in the smartphone market.

  • EE Times Current · 25m

    Fear & Loathing on the M&A Trail

    Industry analyst Mike Feibus joins EE Times to discuss the perils of Nvidia's proposed $40 billion acquisition of Arm, noting that while opposition from companies like Apple, Qualcomm, and Alphabet is rumored, public resistance is muted due to fear of retribution. Feibus explains that Nvidia’s goal is to control the data center architecture by tying Arm cores to its GPUs, which threatens to drain cloud vendors' motivation to invest in their own silicon designs. The episode also covers the automotive industry's struggle with sensor integration, highlighting the Kronos group's effort to establish standard APIs to allow developers to access data from diverse sensor suppliers without proprietary barriers.

  • The Amp Hour · 1h 19m

    Amazon Moves In, Dave Says Run

    Dave Jones and Chris Gammell discuss Amazon's entry into the IoT cloud space with AWS, debating whether established hardware platforms like Electric Imp and SparkFun can compete with Amazon's scale and longevity. They analyze the semiconductor industry's consolidation, specifically the rumored merger between Analog Devices and Maxim Integrated, and the implications of TI discontinuing legacy parts like the LM386. The hosts also critique the SCARP laser razor Kickstarter campaign for its lack of a viable prototype and discuss the challenges of global travel for engineers.

  • Built 2 Scale · 1h 11m

    Inside the emerging frontier of models, machines and manufacturing hell.

    Hosts Matt Perrott and Scott Wilcox discuss OpenAI's strategic pivot to hardware by hiring 40 Apple engineers, analyzing whether this signals a competition with Google's compute advantage or a setup for an Apple acquisition. They examine Meta's aggressive acquisition of Limitless Pendant and its privacy policy changes as evidence of a lack of clear vision compared to Elon Musk, while also covering Boom Supersonic's $300M pivot from jet turbines to natural gas energy for AI data centers. The episode further explores the impact of data center demand on construction wages, Travis Kalanick's Cloud Kitchens automating food production with point-solution robots, and the emerging Private Equity playbook of injecting AI logic into traditional businesses to 10x margins.

The summary, chapters and topics are generated from the episode’s audio by this directory, not written by The Circuit. The episode itself belongs to its publisher.