OpenAI’s Jalapeño chip debuts as US-Iran Hormuz ceasefire frays

The weekend opened with a dangerous escalation in the Middle East. The U.S. military struck targets inside Iran for a second consecutive night on Saturday after Iranian forces attacked the Panama-flagged tanker MT Kiku in the Strait of Hormuz ^[1]. The drone strike at 4:30 a.m. Eastern time damaged a vessel carrying more than two million barrels of crude oil, though no crew were hurt and no cargo leaked ^[1]. U.S. Central Command said the strikes were ordered by President Donald Trump and targeted Iranian surveillance infrastructure, communications systems, air-defense sites, drone storage, and minelaying equipment ^[1]. The tit-for-tat attacks are testing a fragile ceasefire memorandum signed on June 17, which had called for an immediate end to military operations and for Iran to allow commercial vessels to transit Hormuz freely for 60 days ^[1].

The Strait of Hormuz remains a global economic chokepoint: roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil supply passes through the waterway, along with large volumes of natural gas and fertilizer ^[1]. After the U.S. and Israel struck Iran in February, Tehran had shut the strait to commercial traffic, sending fuel prices higher ^[1]. Washington and Gulf Arab states maintain that Hormuz is an international waterway, while Iranian officials insist the strait is governed by Iran ^[1].

In tech, OpenAI made its biggest hardware move yet. On June 24, the company unveiled Jalapeño, its first custom-built inference processor, co-developed with Broadcom ^[2][3]. The chip is designed specifically for running large language models in production, and OpenAI says early testing shows “substantially better” performance-per-watt than current state-of-the-art alternatives ^[2][3]. Jalapeño was taped out in just nine months, a timeline OpenAI attributes to software-hardware co-development and the use of its own models to accelerate parts of the design process ^[2]. The accelerator is the first in a multi-generation platform intended for gigawatt-scale deployment with data-center partners beginning later this year ^[2].

The regulatory environment for autonomous vehicles is also shifting. On June 25, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s NHTSA began rulemaking to remove the mandate for manual brake pedals in vehicles designed exclusively for automated driving systems, while preserving strict stopping-distance requirements ^[4]. The agency framed the change as part of a broader effort to “reimagine” safety standards for vehicles that will never be human-driven ^[4].

Meanwhile, Slate Auto opened preorders for its minimalist electric pickup, priced at $24,950 — making it the least expensive truck and EV on the U.S. market, according to the company ^[5]. Production is scheduled to begin in autumn 2026, with deliveries expected late this year ^[5].