Author: Art Ryan

Abu Dhabi, UAE — Global Trading Show has announced an update to its event dates, with the highly anticipated event now set to take place on 10–11 December 2026 in Abu Dhabi co-located with Global Blockchain Show. Organized by VAP Group and powered by Times Of Trading, the first edition of the event brings together the full spectrum of the trading world, including the most influential market movers such as ultra-HNW investors, brokers, regulators, exchanges, institutional desks, high-volume traders, influencers and leading financial key opinion leaders, all under one roof at one of the region’s most prestigious venues.Until now, the…

Airbus has been nominated for the 2026 World AI Awards in the Aerospace category, recognising the global aerospace group’s work in applying artificial intelligence to some of aviation’s most complex technological and operational challenges. The nomination comes as AI moves deeper into the aerospace sector, with applications extending from data analysis and predictive maintenance to computer vision, pilot assistance, flight automation and research into increasingly autonomous aircraft operations. The World AI Awards recognises the organisations, individuals, products and technologies helping shape the development and real-world application of artificial intelligence. With more than 10,000 nominees spanning over 1,000 categories, the programme showcases AI innovation…

Anthropic is making another major infrastructure bet as demand for artificial intelligence continues to climb. The Claude developer has signed a seven-year cloud services agreement with Akamai Technologies worth $11.6 billion, giving Anthropic access to more computing capacity as it scales its models and enterprise services. The agreement could eventually become much larger. Akamai said the relationship includes room for an additional $9 billion in commitments, which could push the total value of the partnership close to $20 billion. The deal is notable not only because of its size. It also includes an equity component that could give Anthropic ownership…

McDonald’s AI strategy is reshaping how the company puts artificial intelligence deeper into its restaurant operations as it looks for new ways to attract customers and improve efficiency. The fast-food giant is pushing ahead with its McDonald’s > NEXT strategy. The plan combines AI-powered restaurant technology, new menu products and redesigned locations. McDonald’s is investing billions of dollars in the effort as it tries to modernize how its restaurants operate while giving customers more reasons to return. The interesting part isn’t simply the arrival of AI at the drive-thru. Much of the technology will work quietly behind the counter, where…

Hotels have experimented with AI chatbots for years. Dextr AI is betting the bigger opportunity sits deeper inside the property — answering reservation calls, coordinating staff, managing guest requests and handling the operational work that rarely stops. The San Francisco startup has raised $6.7 million in seed funding as it expands its AI agent platform for the hospitality industry. Elevation Capital led the round, with Foundation Capital participating. The financing marks Dextr AI’s first institutional funding round. Founded by Sajid Shariff and Scott Arnold, Dextr AI is building specialized AI agents that work across different parts of hotel operations. Rather…

The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is pushing for broader choice in online search, and artificial intelligence is now firmly part of that conversation. The regulator has strengthened proposals that would require Google to give people more freedom when selecting a search service on Android devices and Chrome. The updated plan could allow AI assistants to appear alongside traditional search engines, reflecting how quickly tools such as ChatGPT and Perplexity are changing the way people find information online. Rather than treating conversational AI as separate from search, the CMA is responding to a market where users increasingly turn to…

Microsoft is putting more money behind the Gulf’s fast-growing artificial intelligence ambitions. The technology giant plans to invest more than $10 billion across the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait through 2030. The spending will cover AI infrastructure, cloud capacity, connectivity, cybersecurity, digital resilience and workforce development. Around $2 billion of that total represents additional spending beyond previously announced commitments, including Microsoft’s major investment program in the UAE. The announcement shows how quickly the Gulf’s AI race is moving beyond software. Data centers, subsea cables, cloud regions and national digital infrastructure are becoming just as important as the…

Accor is pushing artificial intelligence deeper into the hotel experience with the launch of ALL Concierge, a conversational AI travel assistant designed to support guests across far more than the initial hotel search. The hospitality group says the new tool can help travelers discover destinations, compare hotels, manage bookings, understand loyalty benefits, receive assistance during a stay and continue getting support afterward. Following a pilot phase, Accor plans to deploy ALL Concierge across its digital ecosystem, including the ALL Accor website, mobile app, WhatsApp and iMessage. The company is positioning the technology as an end-to-end conversational travel companion rather than…

The race to build an AI agent capable of planning and booking an entire vacation is getting crowded. Expedia, though, is not convinced that one digital assistant will end up controlling the whole journey. Expedia Group CEO Ariane Gorin has outlined a more fragmented vision of AI-powered travel. Rather than expecting travelers to hand everything — destination research, hotel selection, flights, payments and changes — to one conversational AI, Expedia sees a future shaped by multiple tools, platforms and entry points. That does not mean Expedia is staying outside the agent boom. The company is moving deeper into the ecosystem…

Abu Dhabi is preparing to host another major gathering of the global artificial intelligence industry as AI Everything Abu Dhabi 2026 brings more than 350 AI companies, enterprises and startups together at the ADNEC Centre on October 6–7. The two-day event will focus heavily on applied AI, enterprise deployment, autonomous agents, infrastructure, robotics and startup innovation. Rather than treating artificial intelligence as a distant concept, the event is expected to showcase systems already moving into business, government and industry workflows. That shift matters. The AI market is no longer centered only on what models can generate. Companies now want to…

Verizon is putting serious money behind a problem that keeps following the artificial intelligence boom: plenty of companies want AI, but not enough workers know how to use it confidently. The US telecommunications giant has announced a $70 million investment in Verizon AI Skills for America, a nationwide initiative offering free AI training to job seekers, early-career professionals, displaced workers, educators and small businesses. The program combines $50 million in new funding with Verizon’s existing $20 million Reskilling and Career Transition Fund. That earlier fund was created to support departing Verizon employees with training and career-transition assistance. It is a…

Liquid AI is pushing personalized artificial intelligence deeper into the device itself. At Snapdragon Summit 2026, the company announced that Liquid Context, its on-device context layer, has been optimized for Snapdragon processors and Qualcomm’s Hexagon NPU. The collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies is designed to give AI agents a persistent understanding of a user’s routines, preferences and needs without sending every piece of information to the cloud. The announcement points toward a different kind of personal AI. Instead of forcing users to explain their situation every time they interact with an assistant, AI agents could already have access to relevant context,…

Meta’s new Muse personal AI agent is supposed to handle real-world tasks for users, from making bookings to contacting businesses. But behind some of that automation, there may still be a human on the other end. Meta has been testing the use of human contractors to handle certain phone calls initiated through Muse, according to reporting from Reuters and Social Media Today. This arrangement is part of Meta’s effort to expand what its AI agent can accomplish. The technology is still developing. It also brings back an old question for AI assistants: how much of an “AI” experience is actually…

Abu Dhabi is preparing for a major gathering of the global artificial intelligence industry. AI Everything Abu Dhabi 2026 heads to the ADNEC Centre on October 6–7. Organizers describe the sold-out event as the world’s largest AI-first Expo and Summit. It will bring together AI companies, startups, investors, government entities, researchers and technology executives from more than 60 countries. Moreover, more than 400 AI infrastructure builders, model developers, unicorns and startups are expected to participate. Alongside them, over 200 investors managing a combined $91 billion in assets will attend. The event lands at an interesting moment for Abu Dhabi. The…

Jet2 is putting artificial intelligence much closer to the centre of its customer experience through a new multi-year partnership with Adobe. The UK travel company plans to use agentic AI, customer data and generative AI tools to make holiday discovery, booking and trip planning more personalised for millions of travellers. Rather than using AI as a standalone feature, Jet2 wants the technology woven into the wider customer journey, from destination inspiration to post-booking recommendations. Agentic AI Moves Into Jet2’s Customer Experience At the centre of the partnership is Adobe CX Enterprise and its agentic AI capabilities. Jet2 plans to use…

Artificial intelligence is moving deeper into the travel business. At WTE Miami 2026, it will not just be a conference topic. Attendees will actually use it during the event. The international travel trade show will introduce SnapCard AI, an AI-powered matchmaking platform developed by Fairfest Media. The technology is designed to help buyers, exhibitors and tourism organizations find potentially useful business connections more quickly. WTE Miami takes place on October 27 and 28, 2026, at the Miami Beach Convention Center. Organizers expect more than 500 exhibitors and around 7,000 travel trade professionals to attend. SnapCard AI Comes to WTE Miami…

SoftBank Group is returning to the debt market with one of its biggest financing moves yet. OpenAI sits at the center of it. The Japanese technology investment group has launched roughly $11 billion worth of dollar- and euro-denominated bonds. Part of the proceeds is expected to fund another major investment in OpenAI. The deal underlines just how much capital is now required to stay competitive in the global artificial intelligence race. According to a term sheet reported by Reuters, SoftBank is offering $10 billion in U.S. dollar-denominated senior unsecured notes together with €1 billion in euro-denominated notes. The scale of…

The United States has proposed a new communication mechanism with China for serious artificial intelligence incidents that could affect national security, putting AI risk directly into one of the world’s most consequential diplomatic relationships. This initiative would serve as a US China AI incident alert system to help manage and respond to potential crises. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent disclosed the proposal following talks with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in New York. The discussions came ahead of a planned meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington. The concept is fairly simple: when an…

OpenAI is bringing mathematicians closer to one of the more unusual questions created by rapidly advancing artificial intelligence. What happens when AI begins solving important mathematical problems faster than researchers can comfortably review and absorb the results? The company announced that it is working with an independent Advisory Group on Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence as OpenAI reports major progress from a new internal AI model. According to OpenAI, the system has resolved more than 100 long-standing open mathematical problems across several areas of mathematics. The development is drawing attention not only because of the scale of the claimed progress. It…

AutoScheduler.AI is pushing warehouse AI beyond dashboards and recommendations. Its new AI App Builder gives warehouse planners, supervisors, and site leaders a way to create their own operational applications. They can do this using plain-language instructions. The tool sits inside the company’s Warehouse AI Platform and works with live facility data. Instead of sending another software request to IT or waiting months for a vendor update, warehouse teams can build applications around problems they are already dealing with on the floor. It is a practical shift in how AI could enter logistics operations. The people closest to a warehouse problem…