AI layoffs, mega funding rounds & more (January 28, 2026)

Good morning,

AI spending, layoffs, and discovery all moved fast overnight. Big Tech is shrinking headcount, frontier labs are absorbing historic capital, and AI is quietly rewriting how science and enterprise work gets done. This is the signal.

Let’s dive in 👇

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🧠 AI Money & Power Shifts

🔻 Amazon lays off 16,000 as AI scales

Amazon is laying off more employees as it shifts headcount toward AI infrastructure and automation. The cuts are framed as efficiency moves, but the pattern is clear, AI leverage is replacing operational roles. This mirrors a wider Big Tech trend of rising AI capex alongside shrinking payrolls.

💰 SoftBank eyes another massive OpenAI check

SoftBank is in talks to invest up to $30B more into OpenAI, potentially deepening one of the largest private AI bets ever. The move reinforces SoftBank’s belief that frontier models are the platform layer of the next decade. It also increases concentration risk around a small set of dominant labs.

📈 Anthropic reportedly boosts raise to $20B

Anthropic has reportedly increased its latest fundraising target to $20B amid strong enterprise and government demand. The scale puts Anthropic in direct capital competition with OpenAI and Google. Frontier AI development is now firmly a megafund game.

🔬 AI Goes Deeper Into Science & Work

🧪 OpenAI launches Prism for scientists

OpenAI has introduced Prism as a collaborative AI workspace built for research teams. It combines data analysis, simulations, and model-assisted discovery in one environment. This marks OpenAI’s push beyond chat into domain-specific productivity software.

🧠 Enterprise RAG moves into production

Contextual AI has launched Agent Composer to help enterprises deploy RAG systems reliably. The focus is orchestration, evaluation, and monitoring rather than model novelty. This signals the RAG hype cycle moving from demos to operations.

🌌 Astronomers use AI to find hidden cosmic anomalies

Astronomers are using AI to analyze decades of Hubble data and uncover previously missed anomalies. The discoveries come from new analysis, not new telescopes. AI is expanding scientific discovery without new hardware.

🧰 Tools of the Day

→ Imagine – AI-native visual concept generation
→ Kimi AI Assistant – Long-context research and reading assistant
→ Polyglotta – Multilingual AI writing and translation tool

⚡ Quick Hits

→ China approves first Nvidia H200 imports
→ Waabi raises for autonomous trucking
→ Gemini 3 upgrades AI Overviews
→ Google smart glasses software details leak
→ Gemini targets India’s toughest exam
→ Sword buys Kaia Health
→ Anduril launches drone hiring contest

🧠 TLDR

Big Tech is cutting jobs while AI spending accelerates. Capital is concentrating around a few frontier labs with historic funding rounds. At the same time, AI is quietly transforming science and enterprise work through deeper, more practical tools.

Cheers,
David