Three AI business stories from 8 and 9 October 2026: an Australian AI data-centre company has called off a record-sized listing, Alphabet’s drug-discovery company is reportedly raising money, and a Chinese developer’s flagship model is now on two model marketplaces. None of this is investment advice.
Spotted via Bloomberg (@business) on X and Vercel Developers (@vercel_dev) on X. The Isomorphic Labs item is from Bloomberg.
Firmus withdraws its ASX listing
Confirmed (company statement). Firmus, an AI data-centre company backed by Nvidia, has withdrawn its application to list on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) [1][2][3]. In statements to the media, the company said its board had considered “recent market volatility and prevailing market conditions” and decided the terms on which the offer could go ahead “would not appropriately reflect the strength of the Company’s business and long-term growth outlook” [3].
“The board therefore concluded that proceeding with the offer was not in the best interests of the company and its shareholders,” Firmus said. “Firmus will now pursue capital from the private markets and consider alternative public and private market options” [1][3].
ABC News says the float would have been the biggest on the Australian market since Telstra in 1997, and that investors were put off by the A$11 share price and concerns about an AI bubble (reported) [2].
What next (reported). Bloomberg reports that Firmus is exploring raising $3 billion privately; TSN could read only the headline, which says Firmus “Is Said to Explore Raising $3 Billion After Shelving IPO” [4]. Reuters, citing Bloomberg, describes it as “up to $3 billion from existing investors” and says Firmus declined to comment on its funding plans [5]. A person involved told Reuters a Nasdaq listing would follow; Firmus declined to comment [5].
Isomorphic Labs: early talks at “at least $40 billion”
Reported (Bloomberg, people familiar with the matter). Isomorphic Labs, the Alphabet company that spun out of Google DeepMind to use AI for drug discovery, “is in early talks to raise new funds at a valuation of at least $40 billion”, Bloomberg reported on the morning of 8 October [6]. The round “could value Isomorphic Labs… at as much as $50 billion, one of the people said” [6].
Bloomberg stresses: “The financing hasn’t closed and details could change.” Isomorphic Labs did not respond to its request for comment [6]. Bloomberg says the company raised $2.1 billion in a series B round five months ago [6]. The report is about 30 hours old.
StepFun’s Step 5 Preview is live on OpenRouter and Vercel
Confirmed (listings); capabilities are company claims. StepFun’s Step 5 Preview is now listed on OpenRouter, a service that sells access to many AI models through one interface. It was added on 8 October at 13:34 BST [7]. OpenRouter describes it as StepFun’s “flagship model for agentic work, built on a sparse Mixture-of-Experts architecture (27B active / 600B total parameters)” [7]. In such a model only part of the network is used for each piece of text, which cuts running costs.
OpenRouter lists a 1,000,000-token context window (how much text the model can consider at once) and prices of $1 per million input tokens and $2.70 per million output tokens [7]. Vercel’s AI Gateway lists the same prices and “1M-token context window • Text and image input • 600B MoE, 27B active” [8][9]. As the name says, it is a preview.
What this does not prove
- That Firmus will list elsewhere or raise $3 billion. Both are reported, and Firmus declined to comment on its funding plans [4][5].
- That Isomorphic Labs is worth $40 billion. The talks are early, unnamed people describe them, and nothing has closed [6].
- How well Step 5 Preview performs. TSN has not tested it, and the descriptions are the listing services’ and StepFun’s [7][8].
The Bottom Line
Firmus has pulled its ASX float and says it will look to private money. Isomorphic Labs is reportedly in early talks at a valuation of at least $40 billion. And StepFun’s Step 5 Preview, a 600-billion-parameter model, can now be used through OpenRouter and Vercel at published prices.
Related on TSN: OpenAI’s Revenue Run Rate Is Reportedly Nearer $50bn, Not $70bn: What “Annualised” Means
Sources
- Jenny Lee, “Nvidia-backed Aussie AI firm Firmus withdraws historic IPO, citing market volatility”, CNBC, 9 October 2026, 02:02 BST (company statement emailed to CNBC). https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/09/nvidia-ai-firmus-ipo-.html
- “Data centre operator Firmus pulls blockbuster ASX float after lacklustre demand”, ABC News (Australia), 8 October 2026, 23:12 BST (updated 9 October, 00:50 BST). https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-09/firmus-float-gets-pulled-following-lacklustre-investor-demand/107246230
- Aminah Farid, “Firmus withdraws ASX listing application, set to pursue private capital”, InvestorDaily, 9 October 2026 (media statement to InvestorDaily). https://www.investordaily.com.au/firmus-withdraws-asx-listing-application-to-pursue-private-capital/
- Bloomberg, “Firmus Is Said to Explore Raising $3 Billion After Shelving IPO”, 9 October 2026 (paywalled; TSN read the headline only; unnamed sources). https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-10-09/firmus-is-said-to-explore-raising-3-billion-after-shelving-ipo
- Reuters, “Nvidia-backed Firmus scraps $5 billion Australia IPO amid growing AI scrutiny”, 9 October 2026 (read via a syndicated copy; source of the “existing investors” detail and the Nasdaq line). https://d2233.cms.socastsrm.com/2026/10/08/australian-nvidia-backed-ai-data-centre-operator-firmus-shelves-ipo/
- Bloomberg News, “Isomorphic Labs in Funding Talks for Over $40 Billion Value”, via Bloomberg Law, 8 October 2026, 07:58 BST (people familiar with the matter). https://news.bloomberglaw.com/private-equity/isomorphic-labs-in-funding-talks-for-at-least-40-billion-value
- OpenRouter, “StepFun: Step 5 Preview” model page and models API, checked 9 October 2026 (listing; created 8 October 2026, 13:34 BST). https://openrouter.ai/stepfun/step-5-preview
- Vercel AI Gateway, “Step 5 Preview” model page, checked 9 October 2026 (listing and prices). https://vercel.com/ai-gateway/models/step-5-preview
- Vercel Developers (@vercel_dev), X post, 8 October 2026, 17:12 BST (read via the X API; matches the Vercel listing and calls Step 5 Preview StepFun’s “flagship model for agentic coding, research, and finance”, a company description). https://x.com/vercel_dev/status/2108228982185566361
- Bloomberg (@business), X post, 9 October 2026, 09:39 BST (read via the X API). It goes beyond Firmus’s statement by saying the company “failed to lure global investors who’ve grown increasingly skittish over frothy AI valuations”, which is Bloomberg’s characterisation. https://x.com/business/status/2108477484614185032
