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0Hi~~ good evening, everyone! It's Wednesday, October 14, 2026, and welcome to Goodnight Coffee. I'm your host, An'an, and I'm super happy to meet you again through your speakers! Today we'll take a look at the latest business and tech news and talk about the new changes worth watching. So sit back, relax, and let's get started!
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According to cnBeta, Google has launched its flagship model Gemini 4 Argon. After six months of development and testing by more than 100,000 internal users, the model focuses on complex tasks such as programming, finance, law, cybersecurity, and frontier science. On Artificial Analysis's intelligence index, Argon's High tier scored 53, on par with Claude Fable 5.1 and GPT-6 Astra's Max tier. The API offers a unified 1 million input/output token cap and a new continuation protocol. Launch pricing is $2 per million input tokens and $10 per million output tokens, with a 95% discount on cached input; the Gemini API is now open. In hands-on tests, AIHubmix generated a pixel-art ancient building night scene: GPT-6 Astra took 25 minutes and cost $11, while Argon took only 3 minutes and cost $0.50. For a Tesla-style electric motor 3D animation task, Argon cost $3.83, lower than Opus 5.5's $16.36.
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According to Cailian Press and IT Home, Apple has launched HomeView, a smart home management device that supports entertainment and smart home management. It comes in a standard version and a wall-mounted version, both priced at $299, or about 2,005 yuan and HK$2,346. Pre-orders opened on October 13, with a planned launch on November 13. The first markets include Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, the UK, and the US, where pre-orders opened on October 13; Singapore will open pre-orders on October 15 and also plans to start sales on November 13. Apple unveiled the product at its Welcome Home event. HomeView will not be sold in the EU, and it is not currently available in Hong Kong either.
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According to The Verge, an OpenAI engineer has been arrested on suspicion of placing a recording device in the office. The US Department of Justice says the employee is Abdulrahman Al-Fawzan, a 35-year-old Saudi national, charged with using or attempting to use a device to intercept oral communications. OpenAI says the company found a "sophisticated recording device" and used AI models to analyze its origin, identifying an employee who had placed it several days earlier. The DOJ says the device was plugged into the USB port of a TV in an executive meeting room often used to discuss highly confidential technical, business, and strategic information; it was covered with toilet paper, installed around September 28, and had encrypted content. Al-Fawzan did not have access to the meeting room. Surveillance showed he appeared near it multiple times before the device was found and appeared to look behind the TV; company security also found a bag he left in another room containing a wallet, ID, and another recording device. OpenAI has fired him and handed the matter to the FBI, saying there is no indication he improperly accessed or leaked model weights, source code, or customer data. He was arrested on Friday, has been in custody since, made his first appearance in federal court on Tuesday, and the FBI investigation is ongoing.
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According to CNBC, ASML said on Wednesday that some customers have already expressed interest in placing orders for 2029 and 2030. The world's only EUV lithography machine maker beat profit expectations in the third quarter, with revenue of 11.66 billion euros, up 55% year over year, though below the expected 11.85 billion euros; its stock is up 56% year to date. CEO Christophe Fouquet said customers continue to raise their short- and medium-term equipment demand forecasts, mainly driven by the scale and duration of AI investment; planned supply for 2027 and 2028 cannot fully meet demand, and the company is studying raising its 2028 capacity increase to more than the 30% previously forecast. ASML updated its guidance for the third time this year, raising the low end of its 2026 net sales forecast from 43 billion euros to 44 billion, and now expects 44 billion to 45 billion euros (about $49.3 billion to $50.4 billion); fourth-quarter net sales are expected at 14.2 billion to 15.2 billion euros, with the upper end above the LSEG consensus of 14.2 billion euros. Samsung and TSMC committed this quarter to using ASML's High NA EUV equipment; China sales are expected to account for 20% of total business. The report says an unnamed Chinese company has begun manufacturing immersion DUV equipment, but analysts question its ability to scale up.
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According to The Verge, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) says it is evaluating allegations in a petition that about 1,000 Tesla Robotaxis operating with its self-driving system exceeded posted speed limits in "active school zones." NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation received a defect petition (DP) on September 23, 2026, requesting an investigation into 2026 Tesla Robotaxis, involving Model Y and Cybercab vehicles exceeding school-zone speed limits while the Automated Driving System (ADS) was engaged; the petitioner claims the ADS has this speeding behavior. The report says Waymo's Robotaxi also faces a similar investigation, involving illegally passing school buses and hitting a child near an elementary school in California. The Cybercab launched earlier this year and is already under investigation for lacking side mirrors, pedals, and a steering wheel; NHTSA has also opened an investigation into Tesla's Full Self-Driving system for traffic violations such as running red lights and driving the wrong way.
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According to Readhub, Moonshot AI has completed a Pre-IPO funding round at a valuation of about $50 billion and plans to list on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in the first quarter of 2027. The company had previously said it was in no hurry to go public in the short term, but less than a year later it quietly pushed ahead with an IPO. Recently, Moonshot AI has been moving intensively on model iteration, product launches, and commercialization, making a final sprint before listing. The narrative in the large-model industry has shifted from competing over model parameters and iteration speed to valuing practical task execution and commercialization. Investors are paying more attention to whether companies can cover computing costs and turn a profit. The falling market values of listed players Zhipu and MiniMax also show that valuations lacking fundamental support are hard to sustain, and large-model companies listing later may get a smaller slice of the capital pie. To adapt to this shift, Moonshot AI is strengthening its commercialization capabilities through model tiering, faster commercialization, deeper vertical focus, and a more complete product ecosystem. It is moving from chasing consumer scale to focusing on technical depth and B2B commercialization, trying to turn technological leadership into a sustainable business and complete its listing before the capital window closes, so it can survive to the end in industry competition.
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cnBeta, citing CNBC, reports that ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) announced over the weekend progress in developing a new DRAM architecture that can increase memory density, sending shares of global memory giants lower. On Tuesday, Micron fell 3.62%, SK Hynix closed down 10%, and Samsung Electronics dropped 7.4%; SanDisk, Seagate, and Western Digital also declined. ChangXin president Cao Kanyu introduced the 4F² DRAM architecture on October 10 and said the company expects to launch a new-generation DDR5 RDIMM using the technology by the end of the year. Its VSG transistor vertically surrounds the channel, enabling stronger gate control, solving leakage and short-channel effects; the vertical transistor helps shrink area and increase memory density. SK Hynix is also advancing a 4F² design and published a roadmap in 2025. A HSBC report last Thursday showed ChangXin's global DRAM share at about 10%, up from about 4% a year earlier. In July, the Financial Times, citing people familiar with the matter, said Apple had tested ChangXin DRAM chips for devices sold in China and lobbied the US government to allow broader use. ChangXin rose nearly 466% on its first day of trading on the STAR Market in July, briefly becoming the most valuable Chinese listed company at the time.
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TechWeb reports that, according to media reports, DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng has recently been in frequent contact with embodied AI entrepreneurs to discuss robotics, large models, and interaction with the real world, fueling rumors that DeepSeek plans to enter the field. People familiar with the matter say Liang is evaluating a move into the sector and may personally build a research team or invest in related companies; he does not have much experience and is learning intensively. In August, DeepSeek was allocated 933,400 shares in Unitree Robotics' STAR Market IPO strategic placement for 141 million yuan, with a 36-month lock-up period. The two sides signed a strategic cooperation memorandum covering deep collaboration in three areas: artificial general intelligence, high-performance general-purpose robots, and AI large models. Separately, DeepSeek plans to lead the seed round of Winverse AI, a robotics company founded by former Tencent AI scientist Hu Han, with funding in the tens of millions of dollars and a post-money valuation of about $400 million. Meituan Longzhu and others have made investment commitments, but the deal has not been finalized. Phoenix Technology, however, says Winverse AI is more focused on underlying infrastructure, mainly model acceleration, and is not strictly an embodied AI company. As of publication, DeepSeek had not responded.
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According to Sina Tech, the official account of Doubao Mobile Assistant posted that the 30-day public comment period for its Screen Automation Declaration Protocol (SAEP) has ended, and it will now gradually open screen automation permissions for third-party apps. After the comment period ends, developers can still declare a refusal at any time, and Doubao will promptly disable the relevant operations. Doubao Mobile Assistant also listed the apps that have explicitly refused so far and said the list will be updated regularly. Apps that have explicitly refused to grant screen automation permissions include Kuaishou and its affiliated ecosystem apps, Meituan and its affiliated ecosystem apps, Ezviz and its affiliated ecosystem apps, Alibaba and its affiliated ecosystem apps, Tencent and its affiliated ecosystem apps, as well as Didi, Pinduoduo, Kimi, DeepSeek, Xiaohongshu, Qunar, NetEase Cloud Music, Baidu Maps, Boss Zhipin, China Telecom, China Unicom, China Mobile, China Merchants Bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, and others—about 150 apps in total.
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According to Sina Tech, on the evening of October 13, BYD's Dynasty series flash-charging luxury flagship sedan, the Da Han, officially launched with three trims: the 1,008 km RWD LiDAR Premium, the 1,008 km RWD LiDAR Flagship, and the 880 km AWD LiDAR Flagship, priced from 235,900 to 275,900 yuan. The Da Han is more than 5.2 meters long with a wheelbase of over 3.1 meters, and has an interior space utilization rate of 90.8%. It features dual zero-gravity seats, 31 Devialet speakers, and a rear roof-mounted screen, among other features. The new car is equipped with a second-generation Blade Battery. The RWD version has a range of 1,008 km and a drag coefficient of 0.197, with flash charging as standard; by the end of this year, BYD will have built 20,000 flash-charging stations. The chassis supports ±7 degrees of rear-wheel steering and has a turning radius of 4.95 meters. DiSus-A dual-chamber air suspension is standard across the lineup. In terms of intelligence, the Da Han comes standard with God's Eye B LiDAR-assisted driving, supporting highway and urban navigation assist and all-scenario smart parking, and includes the AI super agent "Didi Xia" as standard. The RWD version accelerates from 0 to 100 km/h in 4.9 seconds, while the AWD version does it in 3.3 seconds; its 100-0 km/h braking distance is 32.83 meters. All trims come standard with the TBC high-speed tire blowout stability system, which supports blowout stability control at up to 200 km/h in a straight line and 150 km/h in curves. It has 11 airbags and a heavy-rain parking guard that can raise the suspension and remind the driver via the app to move the car.
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