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Amazon expands same-day shipping to over 4,000 rural towns in massive delivery push

The e-comm giant plans to triple its delivery network by 2026 and is zeroing in on everyday essentials.

Nia Warfield

Amazon is making a big move into small cities. In a press release Tuesday, the company said it plans to roll out same-day and next-day delivery to over 4,000 smaller cities, towns, and rural communities by the end of this year.

The expansion is part of a broader $4 billion effort to triple the size of its delivery network by 2026 and pull ahead in its race with legacy rivals like UPS and FedEx. The company added that the number of items delivered using same- or next-day in the US are already up over 30% compared to last year.

Amazon is especially focused on delivering everyday essentials (think: toilet paper, pet food, household goods), using AI to forecast demand and pre-stock top-selling items closer to customers.

The strategy is paying off: in Q1, Amazon said its everyday essentials category grew more than twice as fast as the rest of its business and accounted for a third of every unit sold in the US.

Amazon shares were up more than 2% Tuesday afternoon.

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Retail display of Takis snack food in various spicy flavors in Target store, Queens, New York

America’s love for spicy food and mouth-tingling sauces has surged, but are we approaching “peak heat”?

Takis doesn’t think so, as it searches for a “Chief Intensity Officer.”

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Tom Jones
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Netflix made $1.5 billion from advertising last year, about 3% of its total revenue

The figure rose more than 2.5x last year, per the company.

Netflix Ads x CES 2026
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Tom Jones

OpenAI’s ARR reached over $20 billion in 2025, CFO says

Sam Altman’s $500 billion artificial intelligence behemoth hit a major financial milestone last year, according to a new blog post over the weekend from OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar, as the company confirmed it had hit a more than $20 billion annual revenue run rate at the end of 2025.

Elsewhere in the blog post, Friar spent time addressing the company’s shifting goals, referencing plans to “close the distance between where intelligence is advancing and how individuals, companies, and countries actually adopt and use it.” As has become customary in the AI company press release genre, the CFO was also keen to tout the unending growth of the business, writing:

  • “Both our Weekly Active User (WAU) and Daily Active User (DAU) figures continue to produce all-time highs. This growth is driven by a flywheel across compute, frontier research, products, and monetization.”

  • “Compute grew 3X year over year or 9.5X from 2023 to 2025: 0.2 GW in 2023, 0.6 GW in 2024, and ~1.9 GW in 2025.”

And, perhaps most importantly for current backers and those keeping an eye on the private company before its rumored mega IPO:

  • “Revenue followed the same curve growing 3X year over year, or 10X from 2023 to 2025: $2B ARR in 2023, $6B in 2024, and $20B+ in 2025. This is never-before-seen growth at such scale.”

That latest figure has certainly set tongues in the tech world wagging, just as the company announced it would begin rolling out ads to free and ChatGPT Go users. It also puts the chatbot giant a fair way ahead of competitors like Anthropic, the company behind Claude.

OpenAI Anthropic ARR race
Sherwood News

A business that scales with the value of intelligence

A business that scales with the value of intelligence

Elsewhere in the blog post, Friar spent time addressing the company’s shifting goals, referencing plans to “close the distance between where intelligence is advancing and how individuals, companies, and countries actually adopt and use it.” As has become customary in the AI company press release genre, the CFO was also keen to tout the unending growth of the business, writing:

  • “Both our Weekly Active User (WAU) and Daily Active User (DAU) figures continue to produce all-time highs. This growth is driven by a flywheel across compute, frontier research, products, and monetization.”

  • “Compute grew 3X year over year or 9.5X from 2023 to 2025: 0.2 GW in 2023, 0.6 GW in 2024, and ~1.9 GW in 2025.”

And, perhaps most importantly for current backers and those keeping an eye on the private company before its rumored mega IPO:

  • “Revenue followed the same curve growing 3X year over year, or 10X from 2023 to 2025: $2B ARR in 2023, $6B in 2024, and $20B+ in 2025. This is never-before-seen growth at such scale.”

That latest figure has certainly set tongues in the tech world wagging, just as the company announced it would begin rolling out ads to free and ChatGPT Go users. It also puts the chatbot giant a fair way ahead of competitors like Anthropic, the company behind Claude.

OpenAI Anthropic ARR race
Sherwood News
The Sphere In Las Vegas

Washington, DC, looks set to get America’s second Sphere

Revenue for the Las Vegas version of the big orb has soared, but the Sphere is still a money pit.

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Opponents of the Netflix-Warner Bros. deal take fight to Europe

Europe is the latest frontier of the ongoing tug-of-war for the “Friends” back catalog.

Paramount Skydance To Reportedly Make Bid For Warner Bros. Discovery

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