General AI News (Sep 25): Oracle, Copilot Super App & Akamai
AI news for September 25, 2026: Oracle files force majeure on its Stargate data center, Microsoft merges Copilot, and Anthropic signs an $11.6B Akamai deal.
Oracle tried to walk away from a signed data center lease. Microsoft pushed chat, code and agents into one Copilot app. Anthropic signed a seven-year compute deal that repriced Akamai by more than 10% in a day. That is the AI news for September 25, 2026: the buildout met its first contractual escape hatch, and consolidation started in earnest.
Top Stories
Oracle files force majeure on its New Mexico Stargate data center
Oracle sent a force majeure notice on Sept 24 to the developer of Project Jupiter, a New Mexico campus being built by a unit of Blue Owl Capital, citing potential delays in securing power for the site. Bloomberg reported it first and Reuters and CNBC confirmed. Oracle shares fell more than 3% on Sept 24, and roughly $18 billion of Oracle debt tied to the campus is trading at stressed levels, according to the FT.
Force majeure lets a party suspend obligations when events outside its control make performance impossible, and using it on a power delay is unusual because these leases normally carve permitting and utility risk out. The campus is slated to run more than 2.4 gigawatts, and Bloom Energy, lined up to supply fuel cells, fell about 3%. Oracle says "Project Jupiter remains on our planned schedule."
It is the first time a hyperscaler has reached for a legal exit on an AI infrastructure commitment. Source: Reuters Source: CNBC
Microsoft merges Copilot into one super app with Code and Autopilot
On Sept 25 Microsoft launched a rebuilt Copilot app with three tabs: Home, which holds Copilot Chat and Cowork; Code; and Autopilot, the rebrand of the Scout assistant shown at Build. Chief marketing officer Jared Spataro said Home is where "you get your bearings," with a Today dashboard for email and Teams threads planned next. The Verge reports Microsoft is pitching the merged app as "as influential as Office."
The merger puts hundreds of millions of seats on one agentic surface. It squeezes standalone coding tools, and it hands security teams a new problem: autonomous agents now ship by default in the same app that reads corporate mail. Microsoft announcement Source: The Verge
Washington backs Musk's appeal against the EU's 120 million euro fine on X
US government lawyers filed a motion on Sept 24 to join Elon Musk's challenge to the 120 million euro Digital Services Act penalty the European Commission levied on X in December. The filing argues the Commission "inappropriately attempted to expand its regulatory authority to reach American companies not present or operating within its jurisdiction," per Reuters.
The DSA is the EU's platform rulebook, and the AI Act borrows its enforcement machinery. Washington litigating against it on behalf of a US AI and social company raises the cost for Brussels to keep enforcing it against American labs. Source: Reuters Source: The Verge
Chips, Data Centers & Energy
Anthropic signs a seven-year, $11.6 billion compute deal with Akamai
Anthropic committed to buy $11.6 billion of compute from Akamai over seven years, and Akamai issued a warrant for up to 5% of its shares at $111.33 that could stretch the arrangement toward $20 billion. Bloomberg, Reuters and the WSJ reported the terms, and Akamai shares rose about 12%, with gains of as much as 20% after hours.
Akamai is a content delivery and edge computing company that has spent three years repositioning itself as a distributed inference provider. The size matters more than the vendor: labs are locking multi-year capacity outside the three big clouds, paying with commitments that look like debt. Source: Bloomberg Anthropic
New Jersey fines a data center operator $1.1 million over 62 gas generators
New Jersey's Department of Environmental Protection ordered DataOne to pay $1.1 million for running unpermitted gas generators at a 2.6 million square foot Vineland complex that powers Microsoft AI workloads. Thermal drone footage collected for a Guardian and Floodlight investigation showed 45 of 62 generators running without permits required above 37 kilowatts, while operating at 1,982 kilowatts, more than 50 times the threshold.
DEP commissioner Ed Potosnak called it "by far the largest ever taken against a data center in New Jersey." DataOne has 45 days to apply for permits, may keep running the generators meanwhile, and says it disagrees with the fine. Source: Ars Technica NJ DEP order
Models & Products
Google ships Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar to enterprise
Google made Gemini 3.8 Live with Live Avatar generally available in Gemini Enterprise on Sept 24, with US and EU endpoints, provisioned throughput and enterprise compliance. The upgrade adds near real-time generated video with lip sync to its speech-to-speech live models, switches across 97 languages mid-conversation, and runs tool calls asynchronously so an API or CRM lookup happens while the agent keeps talking.
Custom avatars sit behind enterprise allowlisting and identity verification, and generated audio and video carry SynthID watermarks. Autotrader, Salesforce Agentforce and Specs are named early deployments. Source: Google Google Cloud
Policy & Regulation
OpenAI, Anthropic and Google move ahead on a private frontier AI standards body
The Information reported on Sept 24 that the three largest US labs have tentatively named their planned self-regulator the Standards Authority for Frontier AI, or SAFA, targeting launch in late 2026 or early 2027. Former White House AI adviser Sriram Krishnan and former OSTP director Arati Prabhakar have been approached to run it, with Condoleezza Rice and David Friedberg on the chair shortlist.
SAFA would write practical benchmarks for the labs' public safety commitments, set incident reporting rules and qualify independent auditors, and members are debating whether it should run its own model testing alongside the government's CAISI, which they reportedly consider under-resourced. It is the regulator the industry would rather have, built before anyone legislates one. Source: The Information
The Pentagon requests $30.3 million for an AI lie detector
MIT Technology Review reported on Sept 25 that the Pentagon's FY2027 budget justification requests $30.3 million over five years for Polygraph+, run by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency. The program funds AI and machine learning scoring algorithms plus standoff sensing, meaning physiological readings taken without attaching anything to the subject, for pre-employment vetting and insider threat detection.
It lands during a leak investigation under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, after the New York Times reported that roughly 50 Joint Staff officers were polygraphed. Polygraph accuracy is poor, so automating it adds a false-accusation risk. Source: MIT Technology Review
Quick Comparison
| Entity | Key Metric | What Changed | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oracle | $18B debt stressed, shares -3% | Force majeure filed on the 2.4 GW New Mexico campus | Reuters |
| Akamai / Anthropic | $11.6B over 7 years | Warrant for 5% of Akamai at $111.33 | Bloomberg |
| Microsoft | 3 tabs, one app | Copilot Chat, Code and Autopilot merged | The Verge |
| DataOne | $1.1M fine | 62 unpermitted generators at 1,982 kW | Ars Technica |
| 97 languages, SynthID | Live Avatar reached general availability | Google Blog |
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the top AI news today?
Oracle filing a force majeure notice on its New Mexico Stargate data center is the top AI news of September 25, 2026. The filing, reported by Bloomberg and confirmed by Reuters and CNBC, is the first time a hyperscaler has moved to suspend obligations on a signed AI infrastructure project, and it knocked Oracle shares down more than 3%.
Why did Oracle file force majeure on its New Mexico data center?
Oracle cited potential delays in securing power for the Project Jupiter campus and moved to defer payments if the site is not online by 2028. Force majeure normally covers events outside a party's control, so analysts question whether a permitting and utility delay qualifies, especially when these leases usually carve that risk out.
Why is Anthropic paying Akamai $11.6 billion?
Anthropic is locking up seven years of distributed inference capacity outside the three largest clouds, and Akamai is paying for the contract with equity exposure. Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant for up to 5% of its shares at $111.33, a structure that can push the total deal value toward $20 billion.
Bottom Line
Two of today's stories are about the same thing: what happens when money committed to AI infrastructure meets physics and paperwork. Oracle reached for a legal exit, and New Jersey priced an unpermitted generator at $1.1 million. Watch the Oct 1 Suncatcher launch and OpenAI DevDay on Sept 29. Yesterday's edition and the full AI News archive collect the rest.
Related reading
Related reading from earlier coverage, with the numbers behind each one:
- Viral AI News (Sep 23): Super Intelligence & Meta's Muse
- OpenRouter's Stripe deal, a robot IPO up 629%, Copilot's self-snitching flaw, and a $6.5B chip bet. The viral AI news worth: Viral AI News for August 20, 2026
- General AI News (Oct 4): Jay Clayton, OpenAI Exit & Amazon
- General AI News (Oct 3): Nvidia Smuggling, Apple & Broadcom
Building an AI agent, automation, or backend workflow? AsaanKaroobar builds custom AI solutions, apps, and digital experiences. Get in touch →
