Author: Art Ryan

Luxury conglomerate LVMH is deploying artificial intelligence (AI) tools throughout its operations, targeting both operational efficiency and customer retention. The company is using predictive AI, generative AI and AI agents across supply chain, pricing, product design and marketing, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Monday (June 9). “Tech is, for me, mandatory to become super-efficient and at the same time keep the spirit and the essence of luxury and offer the best possible luxury experience,” LVMH Group IT and Technology Director Franck Le Maol said in the report. LVMH brands are using AI tools to summarize previous interactions with customers and help sales advisers generate personalized messages; better…

China has initiated the world’s first large-scale application of non-binary AI chips, integrating its proprietary hybrid computing technology into critical sectors including aviation and industrial systems. Spearheaded by Professor Li Hongge’s team at Beihang University in Beijing, this breakthrough overcomes fundamental barriers in traditional computing by merging binary and stochastic logic, enabling unprecedented fault tolerance and power efficiency in intelligent control applications like touch displays and flight systems while sidestepping US chip restrictions. Today’s chip technologies face two big challenges: the power wall and the architecture wall, Li told the Beijing-based official newspaper Guangming Daily last month. The power wall stems from a fundamental contradiction – while binary systems…

Meta Platforms (META.O), opens new tab is in talks to make an investment that could exceed $10 billion in artificial intelligence startup Scale AI, Bloomberg News reported on Sunday. The terms of the deal were not yet finalized and could still change, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter. Scale AI declined to comment and Meta did not immediately respond to Reuters request for comment outside regular business hours. Founded in 2016, Scale AI is a data labeling startup backed by tech giants Nvidia (NVDA.O), opens new tab, Amazon (AMZN.O), opens new tab and Meta. Last valued at nearly $14 billion, Scale AI also provides…

Marriott is automating task of assigning rooms Marriott Chief Technology Officer Naveen Manga participated in the Skift Data and AI Summit this past week, talking about the incremental progress that the company is making with AI. One comment stood out to me, in particular. Marriott will shortly be deploying an AI tool that will automate the task of hotel room assignments for front desk staff. As described by Manga, “essentially, taking hours and hours of manual work — all that heads down work the associates do — and in a fraction of a second, 1.2 million rooms can be assigned.” Hotels assigning…

Microsoft is planning to rank artificial intelligence (AI) models based on safety. This effort is part of the tech giant’s effort to foster trust among its cloud customers as it sells them AI products from companies like OpenAI and xAI, the Financial Times (FT) reported Sunday (June 8). Sarah Bird, Microsoft’s head of Responsible AI, told the FT the company would soon add a “safety” category to its “model leaderboard,” a feature it created recently for developers to rank iterations from providers including China’s DeepSeek and France’s Mistral. The leaderboard, which is accessible to clients using the Azure Foundry developer platform, is expected to influence which…

London, United Kingdom—The UK government is to team up with tech-giants including Google, Microsoft and Amazon to train 7.5 million workers in AI skills, Prime Minister Keir Starmer is to announce Monday. https://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/ads?gdpr=0&client=ca-pub-7821547671837563&output=html&h=280&adk=1924473403&adf=336166957&w=714&abgtt=6&fwrn=4&fwrnh=100&lmt=1749428821&num_ads=1&rafmt=1&armr=3&sem=mc&pwprc=4072896600&ad_type=text_image&format=714×280&url=https%3A%2F%2Fmanilastandard.net%2Fnews%2Fworld-news%2F314600625%2Fuk-launches-ai-skills-drive-for-workers-schoolchildren.html&fwr=0&pra=3&rh=179&rw=714&rpe=1&resp_fmts=3&wgl=1&fa=27&uach=WyJXaW5kb3dzIiwiMTAuMC4wIiwieDg2IiwiIiwiMTM3LjAuNzE1MS42OSIsbnVsbCwwLG51bGwsIjY0IixbWyJHb29nbGUgQ2hyb21lIiwiMTM3LjAuNzE1MS42OSJdLFsiQ2hyb21pdW0iLCIxMzcuMC43MTUxLjY5Il0sWyJOb3QvQSlCcmFuZCIsIjI0LjAuMC4wIl1dLDBd&dt=1749428823616&bpp=1&bdt=799&idt=1&shv=r20250605&mjsv=m202506050101&ptt=9&saldr=aa&abxe=1&cookie=ID%3Ddf95094b92705648%3AT%3D1749428802%3ART%3D1749428802%3AS%3DALNI_MZAzFsAswjWZgQ2WpmO9oC09jyayA&gpic=UID%3D00001125dde952d8%3AT%3D1749428802%3ART%3D1749428802%3AS%3DALNI_MZxfXdfNFwQidw6n6-eWAA2ehzT_w&eo_id_str=ID%3Defb4df057b5f8dd5%3AT%3D1749428802%3ART%3D1749428802%3AS%3DAA-AfjabfjoZ5NAiuuowovnPwfM5&prev_fmts=0x0%2C785x280%2C785x280%2C376x314%2C1192x280%2C728x90%2C160x600%2C160x600&nras=5&correlator=2583088194891&frm=20&pv=1&u_tz=480&u_his=3&u_h=1080&u_w=1920&u_ah=1040&u_aw=1920&u_cd=24&u_sd=1&dmc=8&adx=596&ady=1420&biw=1905&bih=953&scr_x=0&scr_y=0&eid=95353386%2C31092882%2C95344788%2C95362796%2C95359265%2C95362804%2C95363074%2C95360294&oid=2&pvsid=8596452248815779&tmod=669474427&uas=0&nvt=3&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.co.uk%2F&fc=1408&brdim=0%2C0%2C0%2C0%2C1920%2C0%2C1920%2C1040%2C1920%2C953&vis=1&rsz=%7C%7Cs%7C&abl=NS&fu=128&bc=31&bz=1&td=1&tdf=2&psd=W251bGwsW251bGwsbnVsbCxudWxsLCJkZXByZWNhdGVkX2thbm9uIl0sbnVsbCwzXQ..&nt=1&ifi=11&uci=a!b&btvi=8&fsb=1&dtd=12336 Starmer is also set to unveil £187 million ($253 million) in funding to help develop tech abilities for one million secondary school students, as part of its “TechFirst” program to bring AI learning into classrooms and communities. “We are putting the power of AI into the hands of the next generation—so they can shape the future, not be shaped by it,” Starmer was to say, according to extracts…

Compyl, a New York-based provider of a unified governance, risk, and compliance platform, has raised $12 million in a Series A funding round led by Venture Guides. The company said in a statement that the investment will help accelerate go-to-market initiatives, team growth, and enhance its AI-powered platform. The round also included participation from existing investors Contour Venture Partners, Armory Square Ventures, NVP Capital, Alpine Meridian Ventures, Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, and Zelkova Ventures. Venture Guides Partner Anton Simunovic will join Compyl’s board, according to the statement. Addressing the Growing Demand for Automated Compliance As 57% of cybersecurity teams report being understaffed and…

Internet safety campaigners have urged the UK’s communications watchdog to limit the use of artificial intelligence in crucial risk assessments after a report that Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta was planning to automate checks. Ofcom said it was “considering the concerns” raised by the campaigners’ letter, after a report last month that up to 90% of all risk assessments at the owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp would soon be carried out by AI. Social media platforms are required under the UK’s Online Safety Act to gauge how harm could take place on their services and how they plan to mitigate those potential harms…

There was palpable excitement around Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) last year. The company was about to unveil its AI capabilities, with the tech world expecting the company to unveil an AI platform capable of competing with Google and OpenAI. The demos Apple showed off at the time were compelling, but the follow-through has been underwhelming, leaving both developers and consumers wanting more. Apple’s broader struggles with AI have become clearer over the past year. Its ambitions around personalized intelligence have faced delays, and its rollout of new tools has been inconsistent. The vision that Apple sold in 2024 —…

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A growing number of former OpenAI employees are reportedly launching startups of their own. Like OpenAI, each of the startups is focused on the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, Bloomberg reported Thursday (June 5). A startup founded by former OpenAI vice president of research for post-training, Liam Fedus, and former Google DeepMind research scientist Ekin Dogus Cubuk is called Periodic Labs and is focused on AI for material science, according to the report. Another startup is being formed by former OpenAI employees Rhythm Garg, Linden Li and Yash Patil and is focused on reinforcement learning, in which AI systems learn to make decisions through trial and error, the report said. Former OpenAI chief technology officer Mira…

As Apple heads into its annual developers conference this coming week, it is facing a slew of problems that has led to a stock price slide of 20% this year thus far, the worst performance since at least 2010. Expected to dominate headlines at Apple’s WWDC, or Worldwide Developers Conference, is how far it lags its rivals in artificial intelligence (AI), according to The Wall Street Journal (WSJ). While competitors like Microsoft and Google have used their own developer events to highlight rapid progress in AI, Apple’s event might underscore how far it still has to go in AI. Siri is long overdue for an AI revamp. Apple itself admitted recently…

Retailers like Amazon and Walmart don’t just battle for consumer spend in brick-and-mortar or online. They battle everywhere, all the time. As shoppers shift habits faster than you can say “same-day delivery” and tech upends every aisle, the winners aren’t just reacting but are increasingly predicting what customers want before they even know it themselves. Both giants are doing just that. Amazon is doubling down on cashierless stores, innovative deliveries and voice-enabled shopping through Alexa. Walmart, not to be outdone, is rolling out artificial intelligence (AI)-powered inventory systems, revamping stores into fulfillment hubs and partnering with startups to keep its tech game tight. But the real…

While AMD has made significant investments to speed up development of its Instinct data center GPUs to go head-to-head with Nvidia’s most powerful AI chips, the company has also leaned heavily into acquisitions so that it can offer “end-to-end AI solutions.” At its Advancing AI 2025 event next Thursday, the Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip designer is expected to share its “bold vision” for AI and announce its next generation of Instinct GPUs, including the MI400 slated for release next year, among other things—efforts of which have been boosted by several acquisitions the company has made over the past three years.…

AMD is continuing its acquisition spree. Semiconductor giant AMD acqui-hired the team behind Untether AI, a startup that develops AI inference chips, as originally reported by CRN. Untether claims that their chips are faster and more energy-efficient than their rivals. The terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. Toronto-based Untether was founded in 2018 and has raised more than $150 million in venture capital from firms including Intel Capital, Radical Ventures, and Tracker Capital Management, among others. Untether released an AI chip in October meant to power physical AI applications in machines, including cars and agricultural devices. Earlier this week, AMD announced it had…

An artificial intelligence pioneer has launched a non-profit dedicated to developing an “honest” AI that will spot rogue systems attempting to deceive humans. Yoshua Bengio, a renowned computer scientist described as one of the “godfathers” of AI, will be president of LawZero, an organisation committed to the safe design of the cutting-edge technology that has sparked a $1tn (£740bn) arms race. Starting with funding of approximately $30m and more than a dozen researchers, Bengio is developing a system called Scientist AI that will act as a guardrail against AI agents – which carry out tasks without human intervention – showing deceptive or self-preserving behaviour, such…

Researchers at the Else Kröner Fresenius Center (EKFZ) for Digital Health at TUD Dresden University of Technology, in collaboration with partners from Germany, the U.K. and U.S., have developed and validated an autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agent capable of supporting clinical decision-making in oncology. In the future, AI agents could assist health care professionals in navigating complex medical data and supporting informed, personalized treatment decisions for cancer patients. The research is published in the journal Nature Cancer. Clinical decision-making in oncology is challenging and requires the analysis of various data types—from medical imaging and genetic information to patient records and treatment guidelines. To effectively support medical practice,…

IBM has launched Watsonx AI Labs, a New York City-based initiative designed to support AI developers and boost AI adoption in the enterprise. The company also this week acquired New York startup Seek AI, which uses natural language to help analyze business data. Launched in 2023, Watsonx has carved out a strong niche in the enterprise generative AI landscape. AI Labs will act as a startup accelerator, providing access to expertise and Watsonx tools to AI developers building business applications. The lab will focus on AI products that address enterprise challenges in areas such as customer service, supply chain optimization, cybersecurity and…

EleutherAI, an AI research organization, has released what it claims is one of the largest collections of licensed and open-domain text for training AI models. The dataset, called the Common Pile v0.1, took around two years to complete in collaboration with AI startups Poolside, Hugging Face, and others, along with several academic institutions. Weighing in at 8 terabytes in size, the Common Pile v0.1 was used to train two new AI models from EleutherAI, Comma v0.1-1T and Comma v0.1-2T, that EleutherAI claims perform on par with models developed using unlicensed, copyrighted data. AI companies, including OpenAI, are embroiled in lawsuits over their…

Amid brands struggling to bring AI concepts and prototypes into full-scale production, NLX and Toyota shared their experiences with actionable advice on using AI to solve significant business problems and navigating the process from executive buy-in, to technology integration to change management. NLX co-founder and CEO Andrei Papancea and Kordel France, principal AI engineer at Toyota North America, go in depth about how they navigated executive buy-in, technology integration, and change management to deliver real business impact, during this TechCrunch Sessions: AI discussion. Source: https://techcrunch.com/