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Received yesterday β€” 7 August 2025

See the largest yachts owned by tech billionaires, from Sergey Brin's new Dragonfly to Jeff Bezos's Koru

7 August 2025 at 15:14
Mark Zuckerberg/Launchpad yacht
Mark Zuckerberg's Launchpad, which set sail in 2024, cost nine figures and is one of the largest superyachts owned by a tech billionaire.

Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images; Ruben Griffeon/SuperYacht Times

  • As the rich get richer, their yachts get longer … and when it comes to boats, the bigger the better.
  • Sergey Brin, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg have spent nine figures on megayachts in recent years.
  • These are the biggest yachts owned by tech billionaires.

If you are a billionaire, you're going to need a bigger boat β€”Β or at least want a bigger boat.

Superyachts are an increasingly requisite status symbol for billionaires, providing highly secluded leisure and networking sites. They are β€” more so than real estate β€” the single most expensive asset you can own.

"It's a bit of a celebration of your success in life, of wealth," Giovanna Vitelli, the chair of the Azimut Benetti Group, one of the biggest producers of superyachts, told Business Insider.

As a marker of wealth, unofficial yachting rules say the bigger the richer. A 50-meter vessel is likely to be owned by a billionaire. Over 100 meters long? The owner probably has at least a couple of billion.

The richest tech billionaires, like Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison, have gone bigger. Their palaces at sea are decked out with amenities like gyms, spas, pools, nightclubs, and movie theaters. Chartering a yacht of this size for a week typically costs upward of $1 million.

A look at these megayachts β€” broadly defined as over 70 meters long, mostly custom-built, and often costing nine figures β€” offers a glimpse into how the world's richest live.

Here are the largest yachts owned by tech billionaires β€” or at least those we know about.

In an industry ruled by discretion, deciphering who owns what is an exercise in stringing together many clues. There are likely yachts that have not been publicly recorded or registered. Evan Spiegel, for example, is rumored to own the 94-meter megayacht Bliss. Sometimes, it seems, money can buy privacy.

Sergey Brin: Dragonfly
Butterfly, a yacht owned by Sergey Brin
Butterfly, owned by Sergey Brin, is the smaller of his two yachts.

Insider

Google cofounder Sergey BrinΒ has a flotilla of yachts, boats, and water toys known as the "Fly Fleet." The latest addition is his largest vessel yet.

At 142 meters long, Dragonfly was delivered in December 2024.

Built by the prestigious German shipyard LΓΌrssen, Dragonfly has been lauded for its design, which earned it the 2025 Yacht Style award in its length class.

It comes equipped with a full suite of amenities, including a glass-bottomed pool, cinema, spa, gym, business deck with a home office, and a helicopter hangar.

The superyacht is Brin's second of the same name. The former Dragonfly was about half the length of the new one, at 73 meters long. It was listed for sale last year with an asking price of $30 million. It has since been renamed Capricorn.

Brin's fleet also includes Butterfly, a 38-meter-long yacht. Often moored in the Bay Area, its crew members spend their downtime kitesurfing and teaching swimming lessons to local kids.

The rest of the armada, which requires a team of 50 full-time employees, consists of a smaller boat named Firefly, Jet Skis, foil boards, dinghies, and kiteboards.

Jeff Bezos: Koru and Abeona
PORTOFINO, ITALY - JUNE 13: Koru and Abeona, Jeff Bezos yachts are seen on June 13, 2023 in Portofino, Italy.
Jeff Bezos and his fiancΓ©e, Lauren Sanchez spent last summer on Koru, seen at left, with her support vessel, Abeona, seen at right.

Robino Salvatore/GC Images

Bezos' $500 million megayacht, the 127-meter Koru, made a splash when it was delivered in 2023.

The sailing yacht is hard to miss thanks to its massive size and unique design. It also travels with Abeona, its 75-meter support vessel, in tow.

"I heard back in 2018 or something that somebody had ordered a classic sailing yacht," one superyacht aficionado told Business Insider. "You order 125 meters, that's not really going to be classic. But it is. I think it's pretty cool."

The yacht has hosted several ofΒ Bezos and Lauren SΓ‘nchez Bezos' famous friends for various occasions, including an engagement party that drew Bill Gates and Leonardo DiCaprio on board and a pre-wedding foam party to celebrate SΓ‘nchez Bezos' son's birthday.

Before its completion, Koru made headlines for drawing the ire of some Dutch people, who vowed to hurl eggs at it after it was announced that a historic bridge in Rotterdam might be taken apart to allow the Oceanco-built boat through. (The shipyard made alternative plans, and an egg crisis was averted.)

The yacht has since been criticized for the liberal use of teak on its decks and interiors. The wood has gained a reputation for its connection to Myanmar, a country with a checkered human rights record.

In 2024, Oceanco was fined for violating the European Timber Regulation and not properly tracing the teak used to craft some of Koru's furniture and interiors.

"Oceanco deeply regrets these oversights," and never intended to violate the regulations, a company spokesperson said in a statement to Business Insider. "We have enhanced our due diligence processes to ensure this does not occur again."

Mark Zuckerberg: Launchpad
Launchpad Yacht
Mark Zuckerberg's Launchpad is among the largest superyachts owned by techbillionaires.

Ruben Griffioen/SuperYachtTimes

Following months of rumors, Zuckerberg debuted Launchpad in 2024. The 118-meter superyacht was originally designed for a sanctioned Russian businessman.

The ship made its maiden voyage in March 2024, going from Gibraltar to St. Maarten and mooring in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. It has since visited Panama for Zuckerberg's 40th birthday and spent summers in the Mediterranean.

Little is known about its interior, but photos show a large swimming pool and helipad, and its shipyard, Feadship, has written about its "fully enclosed pod-like observation lounge" and two helipads.

Its price has been kept under wraps, but a yacht of that size would typically cost nine figures.

Eric Schmidt: Whisper
The yacht "Kismet" is located in central London on the banks of the Thames. The yacht is adorned with a sculpture of a jaguar on the bow. Photo: Jan Woitas/dpa (Photo by Jan Woitas/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Eric Schmidt bought Kismet from the Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shahid Khan β€” hence the figurehead β€” last year and renamed her Whisper.

Jan Woitas/picture alliance via Getty Images

Former Google CEO Eric SchmidtΒ purchased Kismet, a 95-meter-long superyacht formerly owned by the Jacksonville Jaguars' billionaire owner Shahid Khan, in 2023, and renamed the LΓΌrssen-built vessel Whisper.

He'd originally agreed to purchase the Alfa Nero, the yacht of a sanctioned Russian oligarch, for $67 million in an auction conducted by Antigua and Barbuda. But he backed out of the deal following legal issues over its true ownership.

The ship can accommodate 12 guests and a crew of 28, according to Moran Yacht & Ship, which oversaw its construction. It features a master deck with a private jacuzzi, full-service spa, lap pool, movie theater, and outdoor fireplace.

While its final sale price was not public, it was listed for 149 million euros, or about $158 million at the time of the sale.

Schmidt charters the yacht for about $1.4 million a week β€” an opportunity his fellow billionaire, Magic Johnson, has taken advantage of. In the summer of 2025, he posted videos and photos from a weekslong Mediterranean vacation aboard Whisper, including workouts in the outdoor gym and a toga party with the crew.

Barry Diller: Eos
Eos yacht
Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg's Eos yacht has become a popular destination for celebrities.

Horacio Villalobos / Getty Images

Billionaire Barry Diller, the chairman of digital media company IAC, co-owns the megayacht Eos with his wife, fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg, who is immortalized by a figurehead sculpture by Anh Duong.

One of the largest private sailing yachts in the world, the three-masted LΓΌrssen schooner measures 93 meters long. It took three years to build before being delivered to Diller in 2009, and little has been revealed about its interior and features since then.

The power couple has hosted many celebrities on the Eos, which spends its summers crisscrossing the Mediterranean and New Year's Eve in St. Barts. Over the years, guests have included Oprah Winfrey, Emma Thompson, Anderson Cooper, and Bezos, leading some to believe it provided inspiration for his Koru.

Jim Clark: Athena
Athena yacht
Netscape founder Jim Clark has listed Athena for sale but is yet to find a buyer.

Burgess

Netscape founder Jim Clark purchased the 90-meter sailing yacht Athena in 2004.

"I could easily have built a 50- or 60-meter motor yacht that would have had the same space as Athena, but I was never really interested in building a motor yacht," he told Boat International in 2016. "To my eye, she's one of the most gorgeous large sailing yachts, maybe the most gorgeous large sailing yacht in the world."

Athena has room for 10 guests and 21 crew members.

"If I was forced to change something, I would convert the office on the lower deck into a children's room," he said.

The former Stanford professor tried to sell it at various points β€”Β listing it for $95 million in 2012, $69 million in 2016, and $59 million in 2017 β€”Β but it has yet to change hands.

Larry Ellison: Musashi
Super Yacht Musashi owned by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison
The Mushashi superyacht, seen here in Venice, is owned by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison.

Marco Secchi/Corbis via Getty Images

Oracle founder Larry Ellison has owned several superyachts over the years, including the Katana, the Ronin, and the Rising Sun, which he sold to fellow billionaire David Geffen.

He purchased his current boat, Musashi, in 2011 for a reported $160 million from custom-yacht giant Feadship.

Named after a famous samurai warrior, the 88-meter-long yacht has both Japanese and Art Deco-inspired design elements. It also boasts amenities such as an elevator, swimming pool, beauty salon, gym, and basketball court.

Ellison is known for his extravagant spending β€” private islands, jets, a tennis tournament β€” and yachting is among his favorite and most expensive hobbies. He took up racing them in the 1990s and financed the America's Cup-winning BMW Oracle Racing team.

Laurene Powell Jobs: Venus
A superyacht at sea.
Venus was originally designed for Steve Jobs, though he never stepped foot on her.

Valery Hache/AFP via Getty Images

Steve Jobs' widow, investor and philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, inherited a nearly finished 78-meter yacht named Venus when the Apple cofounder died in 2011.

After spending years vacationing on Ellison's yachts β€” Venus and Musashi come from the same shipyard, Feadship β€” Jobs wanted one for himself. He designed Venus with French starchitect and decorator Philippe Starck, and it was worth $130 million at completion.

"Venus comes from the philosophy of minimum," Starck said of its design. "The elegance of the minimum, approaching dematerialization."

Jobs and Starck began working together in 2007, the designer told Vanity Fair, and held monthly meetings over four years. Venus was delivered in 2012 to Jobs' specification: six identical cabins, a design to ensure spaces of absolute silence, and the most up-to-date technology.

"There will never again be a boat of that quality again. Because never again will two madmen come together to accomplish such a task," Starck told the magazine. "It was not a yacht that Steve and I were constructing, we were embarked on a philosophical action, implemented according to a quasi-religious process. We formed a single brain with four lobes."

Charles Simonyi: Norn
harles Simonyis luxury yacht 'Skat' sits in the harbour on November 21, 2008 in Gothenburg, Sweden.
Early Microsoft employee Charles Simonyi traded in his first yacht Skat, pictured here, for the bigger Norn.

Christopher Hunt/Getty Images

Early Microsoft employee Charles Simonyi has purchased two megayachts from the German shipyard LΓΌrssen: the 90-meter Norn and 71-meter Skat.

Delivered in 2023, Norn is full of luxe features, including an outdoor cinema and a pool floor that lifts to become a light-up dancefloor. It shares a militaristic style with Skat, which Simonyi sold in 2021 after listing it for 56.5 million euros.

"The yacht is to be home away from my home in Seattle, and its style should match the style of the house, adapted for the practicalities of the sea," Simonyi once said of Skat.

Sindhu Sundar contributed to an earlier version of this story.

Correction: May 6, 2024 β€” An earlier version of this story misstated Giovanna Vitelli's title. She is the chair of the Azimut Benetti Group, not a vice president.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Received before yesterday

Mark Zuckerberg sees a future where not wearing AI glasses would be considered a 'cognitive disadvantage'

31 July 2025 at 01:47
Meta Connect annual event at the company's headquarters in Menlo Park
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg predicts that not having smart glasses will become a "cognitive disadvantage."

Manuel Orbegozo/REUTERS

  • Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg predicts not wearing smart glasses will become a "cognitive disadvantage."
  • Zuckerberg sees glasses as the "ideal form factor" for AI.
  • Meta has been ramping up its glasses business by partnering with Ray-Ban and Oakley.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg thinks smart glasses are the future.

During Meta's second-quarter earnings call, Zuckerberg doubled down on the idea that smart glasses will soon become the main way people interact with AI and replace other devices as "primary computing devices."

"I continue to think that glasses are basically going to be the ideal form factor for AI," he told investors on Wednesday's call, adding that wearables with cameras, microphones, and displays will unlock new levels of utility.

"I think in the future, if you don't have glasses that have AI or some way to interact with AI, I think you'd probably be at a pretty significant cognitive disadvantage compared to other people," Zuckerberg said.

Zuckerberg's bullish sentiments on AI wearables echo his letter earlier in the day, which predicted the rise of "personal superintelligence."

"Personal superintelligence that knows us deeply, understands our goals, and can help us achieve them will be by far the most useful," wrote Zuckerberg in the letter published on Meta's blog.

Meta has been ramping up its wearables business with its Ray-Ban smart glasses and a recent partnership with Oakley. The devices let users stream music, take photos, record video, and ask Meta's chatbot about what they're seeing.

Sales have been "accelerating," according to the earnings report, and helped drive a revenue increase of nearly 5% for the Reality Labs division.

Meta has also been investing billions in acquiring AI talent, often from competing companies with jaw-dropping offers. Zuckerberg invested $15 billion in Scale AI to bring its CEO,Β Alexandr Wang,Β into the fold and lured at least four employees from OpenAI, one of whom is a co-creator of ChatGPT.

Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Welcome aboard the 'AI crazy train'

25 July 2025 at 18:29
Ozzy Osbourne with a bat between his teeth
Ozzy Osbourne with a bat between his teeth

MAGO/MediaPunch via Reuters

There's a fear in investing when a sector swells rapidly. Booming stock prices and aggressive spending feel great, until things inevitably cool off. Then comes the reckoning: Who overdid it in irreversible ways?

Big Tech is in an AI arms race, each company trying to outspend the others on data centers, GPUs, networking gear, and talent. Engineers can be let go. But the infrastructure? That's permanent. If the AGI dream fades, you're stuck with massive, costly assets.

So when Google announced it would hike capex by $10 billion to $85 billion in 2025 eyebrows went up. Most of it is for things you can't walk back: chips, data centers, and networking.

Google is "jumping aboard the AI crazy train," Bernstein Research analyst Mark Shmulik wrote, referencing a song by the late bat biter Ozzy Osbourne.

Meta's Mark Zuckerberg brags about Manhattan-sized data centers. And Elon Musk keeps hoarding GPUs. While Sam Altman is building mega-data centers with partners. JPMorgan dubbed this "vibe spending," warning OpenAI might burn $46 billion in four years.

It's no shock when Elon, Zuck, and Sam flex on capex. But Google? That's surprising. "Google doesn't do this," Shmulik said. The company has been viewed as measured in recent years, prioritizing investment intensity with care. Not anymore.

Now investors want to know: Will these swelling bets pay off?

There are promising signs. Since May, Google's monthly token processing (the currency of generative AI) has doubled from 480 trillion to nearly a quadrillion. Search grew 12% in Q2, beating forecasts. Cloud sales surged 32%. CEO Sundar Pichai said Google is ramping up capex to support all this growth.

But it's still a huge gamble. "Does the current return on invested capital seen in both Search and Cloud hold up at higher [capex] intensity levels," Shmulik asked, "or is the spend a very expensive piece of gum trying to plug an AI-sized hole?" He leans optimistic.

Still, Google shares rose just 1% after these results. Not exactly a resounding endorsement.

Sign up for BI's Tech Memo newsletter here. Reach out to me via email at [email protected].

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Mark Zuckerberg says AI researchers want 2 things apart from money

15 July 2025 at 16:19
Mark Zuckerberg
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been personally involved in his company's AI hiring spree.

Jeff Chiu/AP

  • Meta is in the midst of a massive AI hiring spree to build its Superintelligence Labs.
  • It spent $15 billion to hire Scale founder Alexandr Wang and announced plans for a data center nearly the size of Manhattan.
  • Mark Zuckerberg says two factors besides pay help attract top AI researchers when recruiting.

What's on an AI researcher's wish list when being courted by a Big Tech firm?

Sure, money plays a part. But Mark Zuckerberg says the AI talent he's talked to is also interested in two other things.

"Historically, when I was recruiting people to different parts of the company, people are like, 'Okay, what's my scope going to be?'" he said on an episode of The Information's TITV on Monday. "Here, people say, 'I want the fewest number of people reporting to me and the most GPUs.'"

AI GPUs, or graphical processing units, are the chips that researchers use to build, train, and run foundational AI models and the products they power. Nvidia, whose H100 GPU became a hot commodity as the AI race kicked off, is viewed as the leader in the space and has since launched more powerful chips.

"Having basically the most compute per researcher is definitely a strategic advantage, not just for doing the work but for attracting the best people," the Meta CEO said.

Others hiring in AI have attested to the same phenomenon.

Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas last year recalled trying to poach an AI researcher from Meta who shot him down, saying, "Come back to me when you have 10,000 H100 GPUs."

"You have to offer such amazing incentives and immediate availability of compute," Srinivas said. "And we're not talking of small compute clusters here."

Big Tech companies and artificial intelligence startups alike are clamoring for the best talent in AI right now, with some like Meta offering multimillion-dollar pay packages.

Meta has turbocharged its plans to build out its AI infrastructure. The company recently announced plans for new data centers, including one almost as big as Manhattan. Meta also shelled out $15 billion to buy a 49% stake in Scale AI, founded by Alexandr Wang, who joined as Meta's chief AI officer as part of the deal.

Zuckerberg has also been personally involved in recruiting top AI talent.

And if a limited managerial scope and access to vast computing power aren't enough to lure top talent, there's always money β€” and Meta has plenty to offer its AI recruits.

The company has poached talent from rivals like Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman saying Meta is offering recruits $100 million signing bonuses.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Telegram CEO gives his view on Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and Mark Zuckerberg

20 June 2025 at 17:04
Pavel Durov with a microphone on a stage
Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov.

AOP.Press/Corbis/Getty Images

  • Telegram CEO Pavel Durov said he and Elon Musk are "very different," and that Musk can be "emotional."
  • Durov also revealed what he sees as Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerberg's defining qualities and flaws.
  • The Telegram leader also questioned whether ChatGPT will be able to stay ahead in the AI race.

Telegram cofounder and CEO Pavel Durov offered a quick personality assessment of some of his biggest tech rivals in a recent interview, calling Elon Musk "very emotional" and saying Sam Altman may not have the technical chops.

Durov, who was arrested last year after French authorities accused him of being complicit in letting criminal activity thrive on Telegram, pushed against the comparison some make between himself and Musk.

"We are very different. Elon runs several companies at once, while I only run one," he told the French outlet Le Point. "Elon can be very emotional, while I try to think deeply before acting." He added that Musk's perceived weaknesses, however, could also contribute to his strengths.

Both men have fathered many children β€”Β Musk has at least 11 known kids, and Durov told Le Point that he has more than 100 through sperm donation. All of them, Durov said, will get a sliver of his billions (he's worth nearly $14 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index).

When asked about Mark Zuckerberg's qualities and flaws, Durov said the Meta CEO "adapts well and quickly follows trends, but he seems to lack fundamental values that he would remain faithful to, regardless of changes in political climate or fashion in the tech sector."

Zuckerberg has made notable changes at Meta in recent months and since President Donald Trump came back into office, including ending diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts and third-party fact-checking. Durov has recently criticized the Meta-owned rival WhatsApp, calling it a "cheap, watered-down imitation of Telegram." A spokesperson for WhatsApp previously told BI that the app was "born with privacy in our DNA long before Telegram came along."

In terms of Altman's qualities and flaws, Durov praised his social skills, saying they've allowed him to make crucial alliances related to ChatGPT.

"But some wonder if his technical expertise is still sufficient, now that his co-founder Ilya and many other scientists have left OpenAI," Durov said, referring to the company's co-founder and former chief scientist Ilya Sutskever. He added that it will "be interesting" to track whether ChatGPT can stay ahead in the competitive world of AI chatbots.

Representatives for Musk, Zuckerberg, and Altman did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Facebook's new downvote button is just a test

26 April 2025 at 15:34
Facebook test for downvoting comments
Facebook's test for downvoting comments.

Meta

  • Facebook is testing a downvote feature for comment sections. It's designed to cut down on spam.
  • It would allow you to downvote comments that aren't "useful."
  • Facebook has tested a dislike or downvote button before, but it never stuck. Will this be different?

Mark Zuckerberg has vowed to make Facebook great again, and Meta announced a tiny new feature that might be a step toward that goal.

As part of a series of features and policies aiming to cut down on spammy content, Facebook is testing a "downvote" button for comment sections. This would allow people to anonymously downvote comments that they deem less "useful."

This wouldn't be the first time something like this has come up. For nearly as long as the "like" button has existed (since 2009), the masses have yearned for a "dislike" button. Meta has toyed around with testing a feature like this, but ultimately has never done it.

Back in 2016, Facebook added the extra "reaction" emojis (smiling, laughing, hugging, loving). Geoff Teehan, a product design director at Facebook at the time, wrote a Medium post in 2016: "About a year ago, Mark [Zuckerberg] brought together a team of people to start thinking seriously about how to make the Like button more expressive."

Teehan explained why they went with additional reactions instead of just a "thumbs down" emoji:

We first needed to consider how many different reactions we should include. This might seem like a pretty straightforward task: Just slap a thumbs down next to the Like button and ship it. It's not nearly that simple though.

People need a much higher degree of sophistication and richness in what choices we provide for their communications. Binary 'like' and 'dislike' doesn't properly reflect how we react to the vast array of things we encounter in our real lives.

In 2017, Facebook also tested out a "thumbs down" reaction button for Messenger. This would've been similar to the Apple iMessage reactions that launched in the fall of 2016 and included a thumbs-down emoji.

Instagram has also considered something like this. In February of this year, Instagram head Adam Mosseri posted about a test of downvoting Instagram comments:

But will people understand what the downvote arrow actually means? Will they use it on comments that are extraneous and actually not "useful," or will they use it to try to crush comments they don't agree with or don't like?

I asked Meta about this, and a spokesperson told me that, unlike past tests of a dislike or thumbs-down button, this test will explicitly tell users that it's about being useful β€”a little text bubble below the button will say, "Let us know which comments aren't useful."

The test is still just a test. It might not actually end up being rolled out. Personally, I think that less-useful comments are less of a burning issue than some of the other AI-slop stuff on Facebook. (Facebook is working on combating some of that, too.) But hey, that's just my questionably useful comment.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Tech billionaires courted Trump ahead of his return to office. Here's how their relationships have changed since.

26 April 2025 at 15:20
Tech company CEOs at Trump's inauguration day.
Many tech company CEOs attended Trump's inauguration, from Mark Zuckerberg to Jeff Bezos.

SHAWN THEW/via REUTERS

  • Many tech leaders tried to get close to Trump after the election, donating to his inaugural fund.
  • One expert told BI that, since then, it's been a "rocky road" for Silicon Valley leaders and Trump.
  • Here's where some of tech's big names β€”Β and businesses β€” stand with the president a few months in.

Some of the biggest tech leaders tried to get in President Donald Trump's good graces before he took office for a second time, meeting with him at his Mar-a-Lago resort and snagging prime spots at Trump's inauguration.

A few months into his presidency, many of those tech leaders are now dealing with tariffs and other disruptive policies, like immigration restrictions and funding cuts, that could impact their bottom lines.

At the time of writing, Trump had exempted many electronics from the harshest levies on China and instead said they would be moved to a different tariff "bucket" in the future. Yet other tariffs have caused US CEOs to pause spending and hiring, and they could make it more expensive to build AI data centers.

The stocks of all publicly listed companies included here have dropped since the inauguration, as has the benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite.

Darrell West, a senior fellow in the Center for Technology Innovation at the nonpartisan Brookings Institution, said some of the tech leaders have "probably been disappointed."

"The tech leaders had a buddy-buddy relationship with Trump early in the administration, but since then, it has been a rocky road," he said. Moving forward, he anticipates that tech leaders will still try to remain close to Trump, even if it doesn't guarantee returns.

"The fact that he meets with CEOs does not mean that he follows the advice they give him," he said.

Here's where some of the biggest tech leaders β€” and their companies β€” stand with the president now.

Representatives for Meta, Nvidia, and Amazon declined to comment to Business Insider. Representatives for the White House and other companies did not respond to a request for comment from BI.

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, X, Boring Company, Neuralink
Elon Musk.
Elon Musk has remained close to Trump but announced that he'll be stepping back from DOGE.

Andrew Harnik/Getty Image

Elon Musk spent at least $277 million backing Trump and Republicans during the election, has influenced policy and personnel decisions, and is the face of the White House DOGE Office β€” for now.

The world's richest man has remained close to the president in the months since, but his involvement in Washington seems to be waning. Americans are souring on his political involvement, according to public opinion polls, and he has been viewed by some as a political liability. During a Tesla earnings call in April, Musk announced that he would be stepping back from DOGE and devoting more time to Tesla.

Tesla has suffered since Trump took office due to aΒ widespread protest movementΒ andΒ plummeting sales. Musk has publicly criticized Trump's tariffs but said on the earnings call that Tesla is generally "the least affected car company" when it comes to levies. SpaceX could also benefit from new government contracts.

Other than Tesla, Musk's companies are privately held.

Mark Zuckerberg: Meta
Mark Zuckerberg
The FTC is suing Mark Zuckerberg's Meta in a landmark anti-trust case.

Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Mark Zuckerberg and Trump have a tumultuous history, but the Facebook founder has recently tried to patch things up. The Meta CEO called Trump a "badass" before the election and ended fact-checking on Meta platforms. The company donated $1 million to the inaugural committee.

Court proceedings recently began in the Federal Trade Commission's blockbuster trial against Meta. The government is trying to force Meta to sell Instagram and WhatsApp, arguing that the company operates as an illegal monopoly. Zuckerberg was the first witness and testified for hours.

Before the trial, Zuckerberg tried to have the suit dismissed. The FTC asked for $30 billion to settle, but Zuckerberg offered only about $1 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Meta could also take a hit from tariffs, since Chinese advertisers buy ads on its platforms. The company could lose $7 billion in ad revenue, the Journal reported.

Sundar Pichai: Alphabet
Sundar Pichai
Sundar Pichai's Google is locked in a legal battle with the Justice Department.

Getty Images

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago after the election, and Google donated $1 million to the inauguration fund.

The company hasn't been spared from lawsuits β€” in April, the Department of Justice kicked off a remedy hearing for Google, where it will decide the company's fate after a previous ruling that it's a monopoly. One proposed solution is separating Chrome, Google's flagship search engine. Google has said it intends to appeal the case, and an executive said in a blog post that the DOJ's proposed solutions are "unnecessary and harmful."

Alphabet, Google's parent company, reported first-quarter earnings on April 24 and exceeded initial revenue expectations despite market volatility.

Jensen Huang: Nvidia
Jensen Huang wearing leather jacket, AI written on background behind him
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang didn't attend Trump's inauguration but met with the president shortly after.

Patrick T. Fallon / AFP

Unlike many of his counterparts, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang did not attend Trump's inauguration. He spent the day celebrating Lunar New Year with employees in Asia. He met with Trump shortly after, however, and Nvidia donated $1 million to the inaugural committee.

The chipmaker sources many of its semiconductors abroad, primarily in Taiwan, making the trade environment tricky. Yet in a March interview with CNBC, Huang sounded relatively calm about tariffs, saying that he's "enthusiastic" about building in the US and that "in the near term, the impact of tariffs won't be meaningful."

Morgan Stanley said in April that Nvidia was still its "top pick" in the market.

Tim Cook: Apple
Tim Cook in navy shirt
Apple CEO Tim Cook personally donated $1 million to Trump's inaugural fund.

Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Apple CEO Tim Cook personally donated $1 million to the inaugural committee and attended the event. He also had dinner with Trump at Mar-a-Lago after the election.

Apple is vulnerable to tariffs as the company manufactures many of its products in China. Analysts predicted that the original tariffs could massively drive up iPhone prices; It remains unclear exactly how prices will change in the fluctuating trade environment. The company is ramping up production in India.

Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts sent Cook a letter asking for more information about his reported efforts to get specific tariff exemptions. She wrote that they "raise fresh concerns" about corporations' abilities to "gain special favors."

Jeff Bezos: Amazon
Jeff Bezos.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos decided not to have the Washington Post endorse a presidential candidate.

AP Photo/John Loche

In addition to his role as the founder and executive chairman of Amazon, Bezos also owns The Washington Post. During the most recent election, he sparked controversy by deciding that the WaPo wouldn't endorse a candidate.

After Trump won, Bezos had dinner with Trump and Musk at Mar-a-Lago. Amazon donated $1 million to the president's inaugural committee, and Bezos and his fiancΓ©e attended the inauguration.

Amazon is facing an ongoing antitrust lawsuit from the FTC and tariffs look set to affect it. Some Amazon sellers have had to raise prices, though a representative for the company previously told BI only a "tiny fraction of items in our store" have been impacted.

Shou Zi Chew: TikTok
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew testifying at Capitol Hill.
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew attended Trump's inauguration.

Chip Somodevilla via Getty Images

TikTok is running up against the clock β€” Trump has repeatedly paused enforcement of a US ban to try and broker a deal with potential bidders for the company in America.

CEO Shou Zi Chew, the company's CEO, met with Trump in December and attended the inauguration. TikTok spent $50,000 on an inauguration party for Gen Z and influencers that helped spread the president's campaign message. The app's future remains uncertain.

TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a privately owned Chinese company.

Sam Altman: OpenAI
Sam Altman, the co-founder and CEO of OpenAI.
Sam Altman announced that OpenAI is part of Stargate, a $500 billion AI infrastructure investment.

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman personally gave $1 million to Trump's inaugural fund and attended the event. He also visited the White House early in Trump's term to announce Stargate, a $500 billion private-sector AI infrastructure investment that spurred a public spat with Musk.

The company gave the White House recommendations for an "AI Action Plan" due to be submitted to Trump in July and advocated for a light regulatory environment.

OpenAI is a privately held company. At the end of March, it announced a new funding round that put its valuation at $300 billion.

Satya Nadella: Microsoft
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella didn't attend Trump's inauguration.

Jason Redmond / AFP/ Getty Images

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella didn't attend Trump's inauguration but did congratulate him online, like many other tech leaders. Microsoft donated $1 million to the inaugural fund.

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