Specialty Silicon, A Chip Listing, And Cash Flow Over Growth

Record foundry guidance, a chip-unit listing, and a software name that gets paid in cash.

September 20, 2026

This week's movers are not momentum names. One is a specialty foundry guiding to the biggest quarter in its history, one is a Chinese AI platform whose chip unit is already in the listing queue, and one is a software business that stopped selling growth and started selling free cash flow.

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Enterprise Software

Oracle Rolls Out ChatGPT Enterprise and Codex Across Its Workforce

Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) has introduced ChatGPT Enterprise and Codex across its workforce after struggling to find a broad internal use for generative AI. Adoption reportedly reached 80% within three months as developers began using the tools to produce code faster.

The rollout quickly changed how Oracle’s software teams completed development work. Tasks that once required considerable manual effort could be handled faster, allowing engineers to produce more code in less time.

Faster Coding Reveals a Bigger Problem

The speed created pressure elsewhere in Oracle’s development process. Testing, validation, security reviews, deployment, and product releases could not automatically match the faster pace of code production.

Oracle’s experience shows why adding an AI coding assistant is only one part of updating software development. Every stage after the initial code must also become faster without weakening reliability or security.

Security Checks Bring Another Challenge

Oracle is also using an Anthropic model to examine software for possible security weaknesses. The system has identified more potential vulnerabilities, but it also produces false alerts that require additional human verification.

AI is helping Oracle write and inspect software faster, while exposing parts of the development pipeline that still depend on slower processes. The company’s experience offers a practical look at what happens when AI moves from a workplace experiment into daily enterprise operations.

Consumer

Apple Pay Heads to India With Axis Bank Support

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) is preparing to launch Apple Pay in India, with Axis Bank expected to support the service first. The company is also reportedly speaking with HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank as it builds wider card support for the planned rollout.

India remains one of the few major markets where Apple Pay is unavailable, even as the country becomes increasingly important to Apple’s hardware business. The arrival would let supported iPhone and Apple Watch owners make contactless purchases without carrying a physical card.

The iPhone Becomes the Wallet

After adding a supported card, you could pay by holding an Apple device near a compatible terminal and confirming the transaction with Face ID or Touch ID. Apple Pay replaces the original card number with a device-specific token, so merchants don't receive the actual account information.

Apple would enter a market dominated by UPI, which handles most digital transactions through bank-linked applications and QR codes. Apple’s Indian smartphone share has doubled to around 8% since 2022, giving the service a larger audience that already uses the iPhone for banking

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Aviation

Joby’s Autonomous Flight System Completes 3,199-Mile U.S. Crossing

Joby Aviation (NYSE: JOBY) says its autonomous flight technology completed a 3,199-mile, multistop trip across the United States. The converted Cessna Caravan flew without any control inputs from its onboard safety pilot.

The system handled taxiing, takeoffs, flight, and landings rather than leaving those airport movements to a human. The eastbound route ended in North Carolina’s Outer Banks after stops spanning several different operating environments.

Remote Teams Supervise the Flight

Teams monitored the aircraft from California and South Carolina, with supervision reaching distances of up to 2,323 miles. A safety pilot remained aboard, so the demonstration did not involve an empty cockpit.

The aircraft also rerouted around severe weather and thunderstorms in real time. Joby says it operated at unfamiliar airports, including Phoenix Deer Valley, one of the country’s busiest general aviation airports.

Existing Aircraft Gets New Capabilities

The demonstration used a conventional aircraft fitted with autonomous controls, separate from Joby’s electric passenger air taxi. Its technology builds on the autonomy business acquired from Xwing and has logged more than 400 flights and 800 automated flight hours.

Joby is developing the system for freight, medical transport, disaster response, and defense logistics. The aircraft will now begin its westbound return, adding more airports and operating conditions to the cross-country test.

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Recent Tech Movers

Tower Semiconductor (NASDAQ: TSEM)

Specialty foundry riding AI optics

Tower is the analog and RF pure-play foundry you forget about when the conversation turns to AI silicon. Every AI data center still needs power management, optical interfaces and RF front-ends, and Tower makes the wafers for the companies that build those parts. The order book has been firming all summer, and the shares have followed it higher, though they still sit about 30% below the 52-week high.

What is coming: management reported record second-quarter revenue of $460 million, up 24% year over year, and guided the third quarter to a record $520 million plus or minus 5%, which would be 31% growth. The swing factor is silicon photonics, which reached a $680 million annualized run rate in the second quarter against $180 million a year earlier, and which management expects to cross $1 billion annualized in the fourth quarter. Third-quarter results land in early November, so you have a runway to do the work before the print. The risk you are carrying is concentration: a single large customer pushing a program out one quarter moves that guidance.

Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU)

The chip unit is in the listing queue

Baidu has been the least loved AI setup in tech for two years, and you can see it in the range: the shares sit close to the low end of their 52-week band, roughly 45% below the 52-week high, at a market cap near $30 billion. The AI Cloud business is growing at a pace that finally matters, and Apollo Go is running paid robotaxi rides in a widening list of cities, with the Middle East and Southeast Asia pilots moving from announcement to fare revenue.

The catalyst you want dated is the chip unit. Baidu announced the proposed spin-off and separate Hong Kong listing of Kunlunxin in January, and the unit filed its listing application confidentially with the Hong Kong exchange the same week. That is a disclosed process rather than a rumor, which means the sum-of-the-parts math on this stock gets marked to a real price when the deal comes to market instead of to your spreadsheet. The offsetting risk is everything that comes with a China-listed AI platform: export controls on high-end accelerators, and a search advertising business still paying for the transition.

Paylocity (NASDAQ: PCTY)

Growth slowed, cash did not

Paylocity sells payroll and human-capital software to mid-market employers, and it spent the last two years widening into the finance office with Airbase and into recruiting with its Grayscale Labs acquisition in April. What makes it interesting to you now is what happened to the multiple. The market caps this business near $7.8 billion and prices it at roughly 16 times forward earnings, which is a mature-software multiple on a company that still compounds.

Fiscal 2026 closed on August 4 with total revenue up 11%, adjusted EBITDA up 12.3% to $654.9 million at a 37.0% margin, and free cash flow of $427.8 million, or 24.2% of revenue. Close to $700 million of stock has been repurchased since May 2024. Now the honest part: management guided fiscal 2027 to roughly 7% total revenue growth and about 8% recurring growth, half the pace it just delivered, and the client base grew only 7%, which tells you more of the growth is coming from selling more products to existing customers. Short interest above 7% of the float says plenty of people think that deceleration keeps going. First-quarter results are due in early November, and new logo adds are the line to read first.

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Speculative Play

UiPath (NYSE: PATH)

An automation installed base trying to become an agent platform

UiPath is the purest agentic-automation name you can own at mid-cap size, with a market cap near $7.2 billion. Small enough that one strong quarter changes the multiple, large enough that you are not underwriting survival. What changed is the product mix: the platform now sells agents that act inside the robotic process automation workflows customers already run, so the installed base becomes a distribution channel instead of a legacy anchor. That is the part the market has not paid for yet.

What put it on my radar

The calendar, and it is close enough that you can plan around it. The company hosts its investor day in Las Vegas on Tuesday, September 22, and its FUSION user conference runs September 22 to 25 at the same venue. That is a rare setup where a beaten-down software name has to stand on a stage and show whether agent attach rates are turning into booked revenue, and it happens inside 48 hours of this issue landing. Shares slipped on Friday and still sit roughly a third below the 52-week high, so almost none of the expectation is built in ahead of the event. That is the honest reason this sits in the speculative slot rather than a core position.

What could blow it up

Vagueness. If management talks about agents without attaching a dollar figure to bookings, you get the same reaction software promises have been getting all month. The second risk is timing: fiscal third-quarter results do not land until early December, so a soft investor day leaves you holding the name for ten weeks with no new information. The third is competitive, because every large platform vendor now ships agent tooling as a feature, and UiPath has to prove orchestration is a product rather than a checkbox. Speculative sizing only, and size it before Tuesday rather than chasing the reaction.

Everything Else

  • 📊 As a volatile first quarter shook things up, these 7 stocks stand out as where our analysts see the next leadership shift starting.

  • 📱 Apple is preparing to launch Apple Pay in India next month through Axis Bank, giving it a foothold in one of the world’s largest digital-payments markets.

  • 🎬 Netflix shares fell after Wells Fargo downgraded the stock, citing weaker engagement trends and tougher choices around content spending and live sports.

  • 🛒 Shopify gained attention after partnering with OpenAI on e-commerce advertising, easing concerns that AI assistants could bypass its merchant platform.

  • 💡 Corning is raising up to $2 billion in fresh equity to help fund large-scale projects as demand for AI data-center connectivity keeps climbing.

  • 💾 Infineon agreed to sell its memory-chip business to Winbond for $1.12 billion, allowing the German chipmaker to focus more heavily on higher-growth semiconductor markets.

That's our coverage for today; thanks for reading! Reply to this email with feedback or any tech stocks you want me to check out.

Best Regards,
—Noah Zelvis
Tech Stock Insider