Before the doom descended last week, OpenAI researchers were euphoric. The startup claimed its latest internal AI model had solved one of the famously complicated Millennium Prize math problems, an experiment it embarked on after seeing rumors online that archrival Anthropic had already done so. Researchers called each other excitedly and posted about their triumph on Slack. The breakthrough was seen internally as a victory in a ruthless commercial race to build AI tools smarter than humans, a multitrillion-dollar sprint that promised an unprecedented windfall of wealth and power when the two companies eventually go public—tentatively planned for as soon as the end of this year. But it was also a sign of an explosive problem for the industry that was about to detonate. AI development is moving ahead at blazing speed—much faster than expected—feeding a growing sense of dread within the companies that it was in danger of spinning out of control.

Full analysis : OpenAI and Anthropic, in heated competition—with each other and China—are racing toward IPOs, even as they admit they could lose control of their powerful bots.