How the Latest AI Leap Is Disrupting Business Models

Back at the end of twenty twenty five, we got a set of model advances which first seemed innocuously like just the next step of an incremental gain, but which as we would discover a few weeks later when people went home for the holidays and really started to experiment, represented something totally new in terms of the capability set. Those model jumps would lead to the agentic progress that is defined 2026, and now it seems we might be in a similar moment. More than ever before, people are having success decompiling software and particularly games and reconstituting them in new ways using models like Astra and Opus five five. They were exploring what the implications are for the business model of these software and game companies and how they're responding to the new challenge. The AI Daily Brief is a daily podcast and video about the most important news and discussions in AI. Alright, friends. Quick announcements before we dive in. First of all, thank you to today's sponsors, KPMG, Harbor, Granola, and Blitzy. To get an ad free version of the show, go to patreon.com/aidailybrief, or you can subscribe in Apple Podcasts. And to learn more about sponsoring the show, send us a note at sponsors@AIdailybrief.ai. We kick off today with a category of story that is going to be frequent for some time, which is, of course, the latest pre IPO revenue numbers from Anthropic and all of the discourse that surrounds it. On Wednesday, Anthropic hosted institutional money managers at their San Francisco office for a pre IPO investor day. The event served as an opportunity to meet the executive team and learn more about the company. They reportedly handed out thinking caps and managed to avoid talking about existential risks, but all eyes were on the latest revenue figures delivered at a presentation towards the end of the day. The Financial Times reports that Anthropic told the investors they'd recorded 16,800,000,000 in revenue in q three, up 45% from their q two number. That seems to be the actual revenue generated, not an annualized run rate. However, presumably, it's still gross revenue counted before the revenue split with Amazon and other compute partners as that is Anthropic's preferred accounting model. Anthropic also said that they were profitable on an adjusted basis, are generating positive free cash flow, and had 85% adjusted gross margins and 11% adjusted operating margins. Anthropic has typically excluded stock comp, training costs, and revenue shares from their adjusted numbers. In a little preview of how things are going to be when these companies go public, the report was treated like the most important company in the world was delivering their quarterly earnings report. And in many ways, that's not too far from the truth. The stock market has been shaky throughout the summer and early fall, so a lackluster IPO from Anthropic could have some serious consequences. Still, it is certainly unprecedented to see so much focus on revenue rumors …