April rundown: OpenAI hesitations and Apple's new CEO

(Image credit: Future)

April has come to an end and what a busy month it’s been, with major announcements, updates, and cancellations across all corners of the tech sector.

Earlier this month, OpenAI made headlines throughout the UK with the news that it was pausing its landmark Stargate UK project citing region-specific difficulties. But how do these claims stack up, given signs OpenAI is pulling back from other key compute projects?

Also this month, John Ternus was announced as the incoming CEO at Apple. What does the Apple’s hardware king mean for the tech giant going forward? And DeepSeek released its much-awaited v4 Pro frontier model – with a muted response.

In this episode, Rory is once again joined by Ross Kelly, ITPro’s news and analysis editor, to discuss some of April's biggest news.

Highlights

"Stargate UK was this flagship expansion to compute capacity across the UK. Big money involved, big names involved. But now it's hit the rocks, largely due to a combination of sort of factors that, I suppose, are outside of OpenAI's control."

"So John Ternus is an apple veteran. He was the SVP for hardware engineering at Apple, he's been there since 2001, he's part of the bricks and mortar of Apple. It makes perfect sense that you would have Ternus move into this role. "

"We are edging closer to companies like deep seek being able to completely rely on Chinese energy production, Chinese chip production and Chinese AI training, essentially making them completely resilient to any shifts, bans, tariffs, embargoes that the US may experience or want to impose."

Footnotes

TOPICS

Rory Bathgate was Features and Multimedia Editor at ITPro until 2026, overseeing all in-depth content and case studies. He also co-hosted the ITPro Podcast with Jane McCallion, swapping a keyboard for a microphone to discuss the latest learnings with thought leaders from across the tech sector.

In his free time, Rory enjoys photography, video editing, and good science fiction. After graduating from the University of Kent with a BA in English and American Literature, Rory undertook an MA in Eighteenth-Century Studies at King’s College London. He joined ITPro in 2022 as a graduate, following four years in student journalism. You can contact Rory on LinkedIn.

Highlights

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