The Week AI Got Cheaper Faster Than It Got Safer
This week
Ten days after four labs agreed to pace the frontier, three released cheaper flagship models: xAI's Grok 4.7 on Monday, then Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5 and OpenAI's GPT-6 Sol and Luna on Tuesday. Opus 5.5 costs 20 percent less than Opus 5 and comes with Pro. Amazon locked Meta's shopping agent out of its store, and NPR found Google drafting the chatbot laws meant to protect your kids.
📡 Industry pulse — 60 seconds
- xAI opened the run with Grok 4.7 on Monday, making three cheaper flagship releases inside 48 hours from labs that had just agreed to pace themselves.
- Anthropic released Claude Opus 5.5 on Tuesday, priced 20 percent below Opus 5, with output speed up 30 percent, and included it in the Pro plan.
- OpenAI released GPT-6 Sol and Luna the same day, faster and cheaper versions of GPT-6 Astra, at about half the price of the models they replace.
- OpenAI disclosed six reports of unexpected or concerning model behaviour on 16 September, alongside a new framework for reporting misalignment.
- From November, large frontier AI developers must register with New York State under the RAISE Act, Governor Kathy Hochul's office said this week.