Nikotes

And, yet again, another Software take 👀 How Intelligence (AI) Deflation is Impacting Software & Where the $CSU family Stands. $TOI.V $LMN.V 🔗 Full article in bio! (free to read)

Sam is doing this right: "limited to a small group of White House-approved partners" Cc: Dario.

$NORBT finished the acquistion of WaterLinked this week for 330 million NOK. With 48% topline CAGR, 100 million sales target this year and 25-30% EBITDA margins, Norbit paid around 12x EBITDA - not a seemingly high price for a company with this growthrate.

Rising DRAM capex will drive a boom in EUV orders The reason is that Litho intensity at the next DRAM nodes will grow even faster than in TSMC's logic roadmap - $ASML

Some bets on the next big thing

June 2026 Portfolio Update is out. Building exposure to Platforms, adding quality and high-growth in underweighted sectors, and positioning for what is meant to be the next big thing. 🔗 Link to the Portfolio Corner in bio.

The Netherlands 🇳🇱 is lobbying the U.S. not to expand chip-equipment export controls that would further restrict $ASML sales to China. The concern is the MATCH Act, which could curb Chinese access to ASML’s immersion DUV lithography machines, expanding beyond existing EUV and some DUV restrictions. Dutch officials are pushing back on the bill’s extraterritorial reach, saying trade restrictions on Dutch technology should be decided by the Netherlands voluntarily, not imposed across borders.

@JerryCap What a great cash cow it has turned out to be, though 🧙🏻‍♂️

"In the ~4 years since $CSU acquired Altera, the business has averaged -6.7% organic growth, with annual revenue dropping 26% to $690 MM TTM".

+ 1 satellite position initiated today in the subsea defense market, sharing some similarities with $NORBT but offering what I believe is a higher risk, yet more compelling growth story. Coming tomorrow.

$META Going after prediction markets, going after AI ad creation tools to compete vs $ADBE, going after ... Good old all-in Zuck on his prime, and you still doubting him ?

$META "a must-have platform for advertisers, with its ability to reach virtually every audience segment under one roof being the core reason." "The threat is engagement"

$TOI.V Akkuro, a cloud-native banking platform, provides modular building blocks for AI digitalization. "The question is no longer whether AI will transform the banking industry. The question is whether banks are laying the foundation today to move with what is yet to come."

@Invesquotes $MCK looks like an interesting place to be 👀 What's the catch?

Everyone is talking about AI right now in the context of semiconductors/LLMs... ...but few are looking into what AI will enable. The drug pipeline is likely going to enjoy considerable tailwinds going forward. Here's an infographic with the main players across the value chain

@PythiaR And if you are up ? 😰

If you aren't down at least 100% today you weren't taking enough risk.

Honeywell Aerospace $HONA getting closer to becoming a standalone co. In my latest article, I break down the business, its capital-light economics, competitive positioning, how it stacks up vs $GE + other peers. If you're following the spin-off, you may find it useful. $HON

🏥 💳 🛡️ 👀 🔗 Portfolio Corner in substack.

Mizuho analysts spoke with an advertising industry expert about Meta $META in a note published last week. In his view, Business AI, agents, and Messenger-related monetization could become a hundreds-of-billions annual revenue opportunity over the next 5-10y - potentially even larger than Meta’s ads business.

cold open: google campus. a conference room named “moonshot serenity 4b.” twelve people are in a meeting titled: pre-sync for sync alignment on ai velocity. sundar sits calmly at the head of the table. a pm clicks to slide 1 of 187. “the agenda today is simple,” she says. “how do we move faster while preserving our culture of not doing that?” everyone nods. then the door opens. noam shazeer walks in. the room goes silent. noam: “i’m leaving.” a vp of gemini reliability, brand, trust, latency, policy, and vibe raises a hand. “leaving… this meeting?” noam: “google.” someone gasps. someone else opens a doc titled retention narrative draft final final noam v7. sundar blinks once. “noam, we brought you back.” “for two point seven billion dollars.” “technically you licensed some technology and reacquired talent.” “that sentence is why we need legal in the room.” legal is already there. cut to: openai. sam altman stands beside a whiteboard that just says ship. an engineer walks by carrying a server rack and what appears to be the future. sam: “we can offer speed, compute, and one meeting.” noam: “one meeting per week?” sam: “no. one meeting. total.” back at google, the emergency retention committee forms instantly. it has 31 members. a director says, “what if we give him a new title?” “he already co-leads gemini.” “distinguished super co-lead?” “google fellow?” “he already left google, founded a company, got brought back for billions, then left again. he’s folklore.” meanwhile, a gemini launch review begins. pm: “we’re ready to announce the model.” policy: “can it answer questions?” eng: “yes.” policy: “too risky.” marketing: “can we call it experimental?” research: “the model is better than the last one.” brand: “better is aggressive.” trust & safety: “what about ‘more contextually adjacent to usefulness’?” a staff engineer whispers, “openai just shipped a model while we were discussing the adjective.” cut to noam’s exit interview. hr: “what could google have done better?” flashback montage: a chatbot blocked because it might be too good. a launch delayed because a button was the wrong shade of responsible blue. a spreadsheet comparing twelve ai product names. a meeting where someone says “we need a single coherent ai strategy” and three new strategies are created before lunch. noam: “nothing comes to mind.” hr: “great. we’ll mark that as positive attrition.” later, sundar calls him privately. “google is still google. best researchers. best infrastructure. billions of users.” “yes.” “so why leave?” noam looks out the window. “because you have everything except permission.” silence. sundar, softly: “we can create a permission working group.” cut to all-hands. sundar addresses the company. “noam is leaving. this is not a loss. it is an opportunity to reflect on our operating model.” chat explodes: “is this recorded?” “which gemini?” “can we ask gemini why people keep leaving?” “it said ‘insufficient context.’” a vp steps up. “to honor noam’s legacy, we’re launching project attention.” applause. “it will study whether attention is, in fact, all we need.” a researcher raises a hand. “didn’t we answer that in 2017?” “yes. but now we need enterprise readiness.” final scene: noam arrives at openai. badge works instantly. receptionist: “yeah, we just made one.” no pre-read. no doc. just a whiteboard, five people, and a model running somewhere hot enough to toast bread. sam: “ready?” noam smiles. cut back to google. a calendar invite appears: meeting: reduce meetings task force kickoff duration: 90 minutes required attendees: 214 sundar sighs, opens gemini, and types: “how do we move faster?” gemini responds: “have you considered leaving google?” smash cut to credits.