The week of September 21, 2026

The big picture

Tesla ramps Optimus to hundreds a week, but its hands are the bottleneck

Tesla scaled Optimus production from a few dozen units a week in Q2 to several hundred a week by August, The Information reports. The robot's hand and forearm still need over 100 small parts assembled by hand, and some touch sensors aren't holding up reliably. Tesla is targeting more than 1,000 robots a week by year end, with a longer-term goal of about 20,000 a week. Outside suppliers, many in China, are also struggling to hold quality at higher volume.

Artificial Intelligence

• Pat Gelsinger-backed PicoJool raises $27.5M for AI data center lasers

  PicoJool's Series A, led by Socratic Partners, funds a laser-based alternative to copper wiring meant to solve a growing bandwidth and energy bottleneck in AI data centers.

• Meta lets smart glasses owners opt out of AI training on their visual data

  A new setting in the Meta AI app lets smart glasses owners stop Meta from using camera-fed 'visual data' to train its AI models, though opting out can disable some features.

• Bill Gates warns AI is 'powerful enough' to cause a billion deaths

  The Microsoft co-founder says AI could drive catastrophic harm if misused, and called for mandatory government oversight rather than relying on tech companies to self-regulate.

• Google's first AI chips in orbit launch October 1

  Project Suncatcher's prototype satellite, nicknamed MVP, carries Google TPUs into space on October 1 to test whether AI computing can work in orbit, where solar power is nearly constant.

• Google gives Gemini a talking face with Live Avatar

  Live Avatar adds animated, lip-synced characters to Gemini 3.8 Live, Google's real-time voice model, in 97 languages. For now it's a business product.

• Meta launches camera-free AI glasses, a $1,299 VR headset and hearing help

  Ray-Ban Meta Audio drops the camera entirely after privacy criticism, Ray-Ban Meta Gen 3 gets slimmer, and Meta VR Glasses weigh about 100 grams. Here's what each costs and when.

• Meta's Muse agent gets a Tamagotchi-like device, video avatars and Mac control

  At Connect 2026, Meta showed Muse Charm, a pocket device for its AI agent, and gave Muse its own email, real-time avatars and the ability to use Mac apps.

Technology

• Apple weighs four new Vision Pro designs, Apple Glass targeted for 2027

  Bloomberg reports Apple is testing four different designs for a revamped Vision Pro, including one with an external compute puck like Meta's, while its long-rumored Apple Glass smart glasses target a 2027 debut.

• Jury orders Apple to pay $5.7 billion over Taptic Engine patents

  A federal jury says Apple's Taptic Engine infringes two of Taction Technology's haptic feedback patents, ordering the company to pay more than $5.7 billion in one of the largest patent verdicts in U.S. history.

• Microsoft breaks Excel's 40-year one-value-per-cell rule

  Excel is rolling out Lists, Arrays in Cells and Nested Arrays, letting a single cell hold multiple values that still work individually for filtering and calculations.

• Apple's new London music venue opens with Elton John, Baby Keem

  Apple Music Hall, a 600-seat venue in London's Battersea Power Station, kicks off its first shows with Elton John on September 28, with every performance capturable in Spatial Audio.

• Leaked images reveal a new HomePod mini, iPad mini and Apple TV 4K

  Code and leaked images point to an October Apple hardware refresh: a new iPad mini with an A20 Pro chip, HomePod mini colors and a redesigned Apple TV 4K.

• A Samsung software update broke smart fridges in South Korea days before a holiday

  Test software sent out by mistake left some Bespoke AI refrigerators without power or cooling ahead of Chuseok. Samsung halted the update and is offering free repairs.

• Microsoft quietly drops the Copilot+ PC brand

  New Surface laptops meet every Copilot+ requirement but no longer carry the name, a sign Microsoft is moving on from its troubled 2024 AI PC label.

Robotics

• Tesla ramps Optimus to hundreds a week, but its hands are the bottleneck

  Tesla has scaled Optimus production roughly tenfold since Q2, but the robot's hands still need hand assembly and its touch sensors aren't holding up, The Information reports.