Memo: Zuck wants AI profits

Good evening ZipLawyer! Here’s the news you need to know today.

🤖 Zuck pivots to for-profit AI
🇩🇰 Denmark says US is a risk
🪽 Hogan Lovells wins Red Bull design case
⛏️ Kirkland, CC head mining settlement
🧑‍💻 Linklaters, Kirkland lead tech deal

What you need to know today

• 🤝 The UK just went “all in” on Aukus, doubling down on its submarine alliance with the US and Australia after Washington finally signed off. Britain’s putting billions on the table to build a new fleet of nuclear-powered subs — a massive strategic swing aimed at countering China. It’s the clearest sign yet that the UK wants a front-row seat in Indo-Pacific security and is willing to spend big to get it.
• 💶 Christine Lagarde says the ECB is ready to upgrade Europe’s growth outlook, thanks to surprising resilience against US tariffs, a solid job market and a steady euro. With Q3 growth hitting 0.3%, officials now think there’s no need for more rate cuts, and some even hint the next move could be a hike.
• 🇬🇧 Keir Starmer shot down the idea of a new customs union with the EU, warning it could blow up UK trade deals with the US and India, especially in sectors like cars and pharma. Parliament backed the proposal in a symbolic vote, but most Labour MPs quietly abstained.
• 🇩🇰 Denmark’s intelligence service labelled the US a potential security risk. The concern? Washington’s growing use of economic and tech power — even on its allies. The report cites old Trump–Greenland drama and broader doubts about whether America would really show up in a crisis.

Zuck pivots to for-profit AI

What’s going on here?
Mark Zuckerberg (aka Zuck) is taking the reins of Meta’s AI unit and steering the company away from its long-held open-source philosophy, building a closed, paid AI model dubbed Avocado, a sharp pivot that mirrors rivals like OpenAI and Google.

What does this mean?
After years of preaching transparency, Meta is tightening the gates. Its new model will reportedly be “closed,” meaning access will be sold and control kept in-house. The shift comes after Llama 4 failed to impress Silicon Valley, leading Zuckerberg to bench parts of his open-source team, bring in Alexandr Wang (of Scale AI fame), and invest billions into a new elite AI lab called TBD.

This move marks a philosophical flip: Meta once compared open-source AI to Android’s free-for-all innovation; now it’s chasing Apple-style exclusivity. The goal? Monetisation, control, and a competitive edge in the race toward “superintelligence.” But the stakes are sky-high, Wall Street is already fretting over Meta’s $600 billion AI spend, and regulators in Europe are watching closely. If Avocado flops, Zuckerberg’s expensive bet on secrecy could leave Meta’s AI ambitions half-baked.

How does this impact Law Firms?

🤖 Technology, IP and Commercial:
Meta’s shift from open-source to a closed, paid AI model means a wholesale redesign of how its technology is licensed, monetised, and protected. Lawyers will be pulled into drafting new licensing frameworks, negotiating access tiers for enterprise clients, and ring-fencing proprietary model weights and training data. With Meta now chasing Apple-style exclusivity, lawyers will also help build robust IP protection strategies to prevent leakage of model architecture or training datasets.

• Example of work: A lawyer may draft a bespoke enterprise AI deployment licence, setting out strict usage limits, data-handling terms, liability caps for model hallucinations, and audit rights ensuring customers don’t reverse-engineer the model.

🔍 Regulatory and Data Protection Law:
Moving to a closed model with paid access invites heavy regulatory scrutiny, particularly from the EU which has already expressed concern about the concentration of power among a small group of private AI developers. The new Avocado model will likely trigger assessments under the EU AI Act, DMA, and GDPR, especially around transparency, high-risk categorisation and model governance. Lawyers will guide Meta through regulatory impact assessments and design internal compliance frameworks to justify the philosophical flip toward secrecy.

• Example of work: A lawyer may conduct an EU AI Act High-Risk System Assessment, mapping Avocado’s capabilities, identifying risk classifications, drafting technical documentation, and preparing disclosures required for deployment in the EU market.

⚔️ Competition and Antitrust Law:
Meta locking down its AI ecosystem—and doing so after hiring elite AI talent and abruptly sidelining its open-source strategy—will raise eyebrows among global regulators already probing Big Tech dominance. Lawyers will assess whether Meta’s pivot could be interpreted as foreclosing competition or creating unfair advantages through vertical integration of chips, compute, and AI models. They’ll also advise on engagement with regulators in the UK, EU and US as they scrutinise Meta’s massive AI spending and exclusive access strategy.

• Example of work: A competition lawyer may prepare a competition risk memorandum analysing whether Meta’s closed-model licensing terms could be deemed exclusionary, and advising on adjustments to avoid enforcement action by the CMA or European Commission.

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