Meta plays chess with OpenAI

Plus: TSMC's US expansion; Waymo & Toyota are talking

Joey Padgett
May 01, 2025

In partnership with

Welcome back to Forests Over Trees, your tech strategy newsletter. It’s time to zoom-out, connect dots, and (try to) predict the future.

Here’s today’s plan:

Photo by Anastassia Anufrieva

Ready to transform artificial intelligence from a buzzword into your personal revenue generator

HubSpot’s groundbreaking guide "200+ AI-Powered Income Ideas" is your gateway to financial innovation in the digital age.

Inside you'll discover:

A curated collection of 200+ profitable opportunities spanning content creation, e-commerce, gaming, and emerging digital markets—each vetted for real-world potential
Step-by-step implementation guides designed for beginners, making AI accessible regardless of your technical background
Cutting-edge strategies aligned with current market trends, ensuring your ventures stay ahead of the curve

Download your guide today and unlock a future where artificial intelligence powers your success. Your next income stream is waiting.

What’s up: Meta launched a standalone ChatGPT competitor, featuring a new “Discover” feed where users can share, like, remix, and comment on others’ AI prompts. The assistant, powered by Llama 4, also personalizes responses using your Facebook and Instagram data. While Meta AI is now a dedicated app, Meta expects most usage to still come from platforms like Instagram search, where it says nearly 1 billion users have already engaged with the assistant.
So what: This is smart. First, they’re beating OpenAI to the punch. Sam Altman had floated the idea of standing up a social app based on the Studio Ghibli bonanza… Second, they’re giving the chance to increase adoption even for users not addicted to Instagram, WhatsApp, or (god forbid) Facebook.

What’s up: TSMC has broken ground on its third semiconductor fab in Arizona, with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick visiting on President Trump’s 100th day in office. The new facility, part of TSMC’s expanded $165B U.S. investment, will support 2nm and advanced chip processes by 2030. Major customers like Apple, Nvidia, and AMD praised the move as vital to U.S. innovation and AI infrastructure. The first fab has started 4nm production, while the second—targeting 3nm, 2nm, and A16—is on track for 2028.
So what: TSMC is doing a good job “playing the game” with the Trump administration here. This announcement is really just a continuation of their prior plans. So it’s good, but not groundbreaking. And as we’ve discussed before, TSMC still won’t produce cutting edge chips in the US. By the time the 2nd fab gets built, the cutting edge will not be 2nm… (and the same logic applies for the 3rd fab). Keeping cutting edge chips in Taiwan means keeping the US interested in protecting Taiwan from a Chinese invasion.

What’s up: Waymo and Toyota have signed a preliminary deal to explore building a self-driving vehicle platform for both robotaxi services and future consumer cars. If finalized, the partnership would combine Waymo’s AV tech with Toyota’s next-gen vehicles, supporting both ride-hailing and private ownership use cases. The announcement follows Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai’s hint that Waymo may soon enter the consumer AV market. It also reflects Waymo’s broader shift toward partnerships, including recent collaborations with Uber and Moove for robotaxi operations.
So what: This is pretty cool, even if scant on details. To date, Waymo has been pursuing a robotaxi-or-bust strategy, but what I like about these latest plans is that they’re teasing the idea of consumer-owned, self-driving cars. I would guess that Toyota is pushing for that, given that their business model depends on it today… but it’s an opportunity for Waymo to have a win-win too, diversifying revenue and cutting off Tesla (and their consumer + robotaxi threat) at the knees.

What’s up: A draft of the EU’s upcoming International Digital Strategy, obtained by Politico, acknowledges that decoupling from dominant U.S. tech firms like Amazon, Microsoft, and Google is “unrealistic,” despite…

Awesome (long) read — great piece about the chaos we’re in, and the silver lining of opportunity it brings. There are references to Norse gods, Game of Thrones, and ant colonies. What more could you want?
Quick wisdom from Rick Rubin — enjoyed this little diversion with Rick Rubin. He vamps on following your dreams, changing your thinking, etc.

The forest is growing.
Feel free to share this post.

If you have feedback…

If you want to advertise to our 15,000+ smart, curious readers,
reply to this email or send me a note.