Carbon Dust, Chonk Drops

By the Orchestra editors · 4 min read

TL;DR

Mistral open-sources its trillion-parameter 'Le Chonk' model, competitive on coding but trailing China's best
Google's AI search monetisation gap surfaces in Alphabet's Q3 as stock drops 10%
Australia's startup tax package clears the House, Senate fight over fossil fuel R&D looms
ASIC probing the failed Firmus AI data centre IPO

AI · Models & Products

Mistral open-sources trillion-parameter 'Le Chonk'

Mistral released the weights for Large 4, a trillion-parameter model trained entirely in Europe. It beats prior open-weight models at coding and cybersecurity tasks, though independent benchmarks still put it behind DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and GLM-5.3 from Chinese labs.

Google's AI search monetisation problem hits earnings

Alphabet's Q3 showed search revenue growing just 12%, slower than expected, as the company admitted AI-mode search brings in less money than traditional results. Cash flow swung to negative $9B and the stock fell roughly 10%, wiping about $500B in market value.

OpenAI doubles Pro plan usage limits

OpenAI is bumping limits from Pro 100 to Pro 500, reversing a planned cut to the Pro 200 tier after user pushback. The company says upcoming models like Terra and Sol will push usable capacity even higher as it fights Anthropic for enterprise share.

Gemini can now edit Docs, Sheets and PDFs inline

Google Gemini users can generate, preview and edit Google Docs, Sheets, slide decks, PDFs and code files without leaving the Gemini chat. Full-screen editing and highlighting are available on web now, with mobile support for PDFs.

Australian Tech

Startup tax package clears the House

The Albanese government's R&D tax incentive overhaul and the new Innovative Business CGT Concession passed the lower house. The Senate fight now centres on whether fossil fuel companies should be eligible for the R&D breaks.

ASIC probing failed Firmus data centre IPO

ASIC chair Sarah Court confirmed the regulator is talking to the banks that led Firmus's collapsed $5B listing, though no formal investigation has been opened yet. The AI data centre operator's IPO fell apart earlier this month.