Daily Tech & GNSS News Digest - January 20, 2026

The AI industry’s biggest legal battle intensifies as Elon Musk demands up to $134 billion from OpenAI and Microsoft in a lawsuit heading to jury trial. Meanwhile, Micron moves to expand DRAM production with a major Taiwan fab acquisition, and Anthropic’s Claude Code emerges as the hottest coding tool in tech.

Tech News

Musk Seeks Up to $134 Billion From OpenAI and Microsoft

Elon Musk filed court documents seeking between $79 billion and $134 billion in damages from OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming the AI company defrauded him by abandoning its nonprofit mission. An Oakland judge ruled this month that a jury trial will proceed, expected to begin in April.

According to the filing, Musk contributed approximately $38 million—roughly 60% of OpenAI’s early seed funding—while also recruiting staff, connecting founders with contacts, and lending credibility to the project. The lawsuit alleges OpenAI gained between $65.5 billion and $109.4 billion from Musk’s contributions, while Microsoft gained between $13.3 billion and $25.1 billion.

OpenAI dismissed the claim as an “unserious demand” and part of Musk’s “harassment campaign.” The company and Microsoft asked the judge to exclude Musk’s expert analysis, calling it “made up” and “unverifiable.” Musk, who left OpenAI in 2018 and now runs competitor xAI, alleges the organization violated its founding mission through its high-profile restructuring into a for-profit entity.

Micron Acquires Taiwan Fab for $1.8 Billion

Micron Technology signed a letter of intent to acquire Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp’s P5 fabrication site in Taiwan for $1.8 billion, marking a significant expansion of the memory giant’s DRAM production capacity. The acquisition includes a 300,000-square-foot cleanroom at the Tongluo facility in Miaoli County.

Micron plans to close the transaction by Q2 2026, pending regulatory approvals, with phased DRAM production ramp-up beginning in 2027. Vice President Manish Bhatia told Bloomberg the memory chip shortage has become so “unprecedented” that smartphone and PC makers are “lining up” to secure supplies beyond 2026.

Powerchip shares surged nearly 10% following the announcement. CEO Sanjay Mehrotra has indicated tight memory markets could persist beyond 2026, with Micron’s stock having surged 240% last year on AI-driven demand.

Claude Code Becomes Tech’s Hottest AI Coding Tool

Anthropic’s Claude Code is having a breakout moment, with engineers and hobbyists alike declaring it the best tool for AI-assisted coding. Bloomberg reports that Claude Code “is redefining the engineering department,” with professionals saying it outperforms competitors including Cursor, GitHub Copilot, and even Gemini 3 Pro.

The latest release, Claude Code v2.1.0, delivers improvements across agent lifecycle control, skill development, and session portability—bundled in a dense package of 1,096 commits. The update adds setup hooks, UI tweaks, security fixes, and enables MCP tool auto-search by default to reduce context usage.

Anthropic also announced Claude Cowork, a more accessible version built into the Claude Desktop app that lets users designate folders where Claude can read or modify files through a standard chat interface. The company has implemented strict new safeguards preventing third-party applications from spoofing Claude Code to access underlying models at favorable pricing.

Additional Headlines

Europe’s AI sovereignty debate heats up: Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt warned at Davos that Europe must invest in open-source AI labs or “end up using Chinese models,” while Ericsson’s CEO called Europe’s tech sovereignty push “dangerous.”
European tech outperforms: Technology remains the best-performing Stoxx Europe 600 sector in January, up 10%, while US tech stocks remain flat.
Defense tech funding surges: German investor DTCP is on track to close Europe’s largest-ever defense tech VC fund at €500 million ($580 million).

GNSS News

Anello Launches Aerial INS at CES 2026

Anello Photonics unveiled the Anello Aerial inertial navigation system (INS) at CES 2026, a compact, high-performance system built around the company’s Silicon Photonics Optical Gyroscope (SiPhOG) technology integrated with multi-band GNSS receivers.

The system targets the growing market for autonomous aerial vehicles, drones, and advanced air mobility platforms requiring precise navigation in GPS-denied or GPS-degraded environments. Silicon photonic gyroscopes offer significant advantages over traditional MEMS IMUs, including improved bias stability and reduced drift over time—critical factors for extended autonomous flight operations.

Also at CES, Innoviz Technologies demonstrated its InnovizThree lidar with integrated RGB sensing in a single compact module, designed for behind-the-windshield installations, drones, micro-robotics, and humanoids. Meanwhile, etherWhere partnered with AsiaRF to showcase new low-power GNSS modules based on the EW6181 platform.

LEO-PNT Momentum Builds With Multiple Programs

The low-Earth orbit positioning, navigation, and timing (LEO-PNT) sector continues gaining momentum as multiple programs advance toward operational capability. GPS World reports that everyday location-dependent devices now have requirements that “have surpassed what GPS can support.”

Xona Space Systems is pursuing integration of Trimble correction services with its PULSAR high-performance navigation service. Initial satellite launches are expected in late 2026, with service starting in 2027 through a constellation that will provide secure, high-precision positioning. At 16 satellites, PULSAR will achieve persistent 1-satellite-in-view coverage, enabling precise time transfer and coarse positioning even indoors.

The technology addresses a growing vulnerability: most LEO spacecraft rely on GPS signals that are increasingly subject to jamming and electronic interference. Communications-PNT integration is emerging as a new architectural layer for resilient navigation, with experts noting that as GNSS is deployed more deeply in autonomy-driven and safety-critical domains, single-layer PNT architectures show increasingly apparent limitations.

Key Takeaways

AI legal battles escalate: Musk’s $134 billion lawsuit against OpenAI heads to jury trial, marking the highest-stakes legal battle yet over AI company governance and nonprofit-to-profit conversions.
Memory shortage intensifies: Micron’s $1.8 billion Taiwan fab acquisition underscores the “unprecedented” DRAM supply crunch driven by AI demand, with shortages expected to persist through 2027.
Navigation evolves beyond GNSS: From Anello’s silicon photonic INS to LEO-PNT constellations, the positioning industry is rapidly developing alternatives and complements to traditional GPS for increasingly demanding autonomous applications.