It might be Sagittarius season right now, but in the world of tech, this month has been all about Gemini. Last Tuesday, Alphabet launched its new chatbot, Gemini 3, which impressed users and is reportedly superior to its peers like ChatGPT and Perplexity. Then on Thursday, Alphabet launched the latest version of its image generation program, dubbed (for some inexplicable reason) Nano Banana Pro. The cherry on top came today, with a report that Meta Platforms is in talks to use Google’s chips, which pushed Alphabet 1.62% higher. Zoom out: When ChatGPT dropped back in 2022, many analysts argued Google had blown its search lead, given OpenAI’s prowess. But part of what has helped Google get its mojo back is its full-stack advantage, meaning it not only makes a range of software platforms to market and distribute Gemini, but also designs its own chips. Some of those chips, called tensor processing units, or TPUs, may allow companies like Meta to power their AI at a lower cost than Nvidia’s GPUs. If that proves to be the case it would be a major blow to Nvidia, and underscore that Google is making strides on both the software and hardware fronts. The AI race isn’t over yet At the same time that the new and improved Gemini wooed investors, it sent shares of competitors tumbling. SoftBank, a major investor in privately-owned OpenAI, fell 11.42% today, and is now down 36.71% over the last month. Meanwhile, Nvidia sank 2.59%, wiping out roughly $243 billion in market value today, according to Bloomberg. Nvidia released a statement on Google’s recent victory lap this afternoon, which started pretty congenially: “We’re delighted by Google’s success—they’ve made great advances in AI and we continue to supply to Google,” the company posted on X. But Nvidia also made it clear who’s the boss: “NVIDIA is a generation ahead of the industry—it’s the only platform that runs every AI model and does it everywhere computing is done.” Nvidia may be the name most associated with the AI trade, but in fact, Alphabet has been the best performing Mag 7 stock this year: It has surged 69.94% in 2025, compared to Nvidia’s 32.41% gain. Last Friday, Alphabet surpassed Microsoft to become the third most valuable US firm by market cap, and it’s now only a few billion behind second-ranked Apple. At this rate, Nvidia may not be the big kahuna of the AI trade for much longer.—LB |