Last week's tariff drama sent tech stocks on a roller coaster.
The Magnificent 7 (Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, Meta, and Tesla) gained $1.5T in value on Wednesday after President Trump announced a 90-day pause on certain tariffs — only to slump Thursday when China-specific tariffs spiked to 145%.
Mag 7 stocks regained some ground yesterday following the announcement of a tariff exemption for electronic devices like smartphones.
Why it matters: Trade tensions introduce uncertainty precisely when tech giants are committing unprecedented capital to AI infrastructure. The escalating trade war threatens the supply chains and cost structures underlying one of the most ambitious tech spending cycles in history.
Despite the volatility, big tech is pursuing its AI ambitions through two parallel tracks:
Massive data center infrastructure investments
Strategic investments + M&A in the burgeoning AI ecosystem
We break down each track below using CB Insights data.
1. Massive data center infrastructure investments
On the infrastructure front, big tech’s spending has been staggering.
Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Meta spent a record-breaking $70B+ on capex in Q4'24.
As AI model costs drop, cloud providers in particular expect they will benefit from the expanding market.
The big 3 have been planning major infrastructure investments:
Amazon projects $100B in capex in 2025, up from $83B in 2024
Microsoft has committed $80B in fiscal 2025 (ending June 30) to build out AI data centers
Google expects $75B in capex in 2025
All told, US tech giants will likely surpass $300B in capex this year alone.
2. Strategic investments + M&A in the burgeoning AI ecosystem
The AI boom combined with a potentially more favorable regulatory environment is starting to reinvigorate big tech’s appetite for M&A after a years-long slump.
While Google’s $33B acquisition of Wiz has dominated headlines, Nvidia has emerged as the most active acquirer by deal count — especially in AI. It’s scooped up 5 AI startups in the last year alone, according to CB Insights’ M&A transaction data.
Just last week, it acquired Lepton AI — a cloud-native service that rents out servers powered by Nvidia chips — to vertically integrate more of the AI stack and gain control over GPU distribution.
Nvidia’s venture arm has also leapfrogged other big tech companies like Microsoft and Amazon in AI startup investments.
The chip leader’s AI startup investments nearly 5x’d between 2022 and 2023. Last year, it tied Google with 49 total AI equity investments, per CB Insights’ financing data.
This dual strategy — owning more of the AI infra stack while diversifying venture bets across the AI ecosystem — could help Nvidia hedge against short-term market volatility.
The question remains whether other tech giants will match Nvidia’s pace of investments or acquisitions.
So far in 2025, while Nvidia leads the way in acquisitions, one tech giant has outpaced Nvidia on AI investments.
Can you guess who it is?
Bonus points if you can guess how many AI companies it’s backed. (Note: We’re including deals made by strategic venture arms.)
Answer in the PS below.
TLDR — Tech loves drama, right?
Here's a roundup of recent tech drama:
Crosswalk chaos: Over the weekend, audio-enabled crosswalk buttons across Silicon Valleywere hacked to play AI-generated clips mimicking the voices of Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. In videos from Menlo Park and Palo Alto, the buttons spewed satirical soundbites — including a fake Musk voice saying “F—k, I’m so alone” and a faux Zuckerberg voice declaring that there’s nothing passersby can do to stop the rise of AI. The devices, meant to assist visually impaired pedestrians, may have been compromised using default passwords.
AIMLess: Apple’s long-delayed Siri upgrades were reportedly stalled by poor leadership inside its AI and machine learning (AI/ML) group — dubbed “AIMLess” by some employees. A 2023 demo had no real functionality behind it, according to The Information. But change is underway: Craig Federighi’s software org, credited with delivering Apple Intelligence, now leads Siri’s revamp via a new “Intelligent Systems” team. Engineers are also newly allowed to use open-source AI models, which is a departure from Apple’s strict in-house-only policy.
Mr. Worldwide: Deel CEO Alex Bouaziz still hasn’t been officially served in Rippling’s lawsuit because French bailiffs can’t find him in Paris. The case — which centers on ex-Rippling employee Keith O’Brien, who says Deel paid him $6K a month to spy — now spans multiple countries. Rippling may ask the court to serve Bouaziz and other execs by email after failed attempts in France, the UK, and Dubai. O’Brien is under 24/7 security at his home in Dublin, with Rippling reportedly covering both the cost of the private guards and recent safety upgrades to the property. Meanwhile, Deel has yet to file a legal response.
Fake AI, real charges: The Justice Department has indicted Albert Saniger, former CEO of shopping app Nate, for fraud — alleging he misled investors by claiming the company’s checkout tech was powered by AI, when in fact, nearly all transactions were handled manually by workers in the Philippines and Romania. The indictment says the automation was “effectively zero percent,” despite Nate’s marketing pitch that users could “skip the checkout” with one click. Saniger faces up to 40 years in prison for securities and wire fraud.
Pilates > prison: Charlie Javice, the ex-startup CEO convicted of defrauding JPMorgan out of $175M, is pushing back on court-ordered ankle monitoring — because it’s cramping her Pilates teaching. Her legal team argued in court that the device would interfere with her “challenging and dynamic” instruction, her only current source of income. The judge didn’t buy it, noting the monitor “probably weighs a pound,” and ruled she’ll have to wear it while awaiting sentencing. Javice, out on a $2M bond, is now facing decades behind bars for falsifying customer data at her student-finance startup, Frank.
P.S. Google takes the cake for most AI equity investments year-to-date. Across Google, GV, and Gradient Ventures, the tech giant has backed 17 AI companies in total.
