Author: Art Ryan

Dubai, UAE – May 14, 2025 — The highly anticipated #HODLDubai 2025 summit is officially underway, kicking off with a powerful opening panel that cuts straight to the heart of one of the most critical issues in Web3 today: crypto regulation. The session, titled “Crypto Rulebook: Global Best Practices & Regulatory Measures,” brought together a powerhouse lineup of global experts to unpack the evolving landscape of digital asset governance. Moderated with precision by Saqr Ereiqat of the Dubai Digital Asset Association, the panel sparked thought-provoking dialogue around the delicate balance between innovation and oversight. Featured speakers included: Bridging Innovation with…

Dubai, UAE – May 14, 2025 — The vibrant heart of the crypto world beats loud today at #HODLDubai, where leaders, innovators, and enthusiasts of the blockchain ecosystem have gathered for a high-impact day of networking and knowledge-sharing. Among the most anticipated sessions, Cristian Ulloa, Co-Founder and CEO of Liquid Loans, delivered a keynote that electrified the crowd and set a powerful tone for the event. Titled “How To Get Crypto Rich, and Avoid Crypto Regret,” Ulloa’s presentation was a masterclass in decentralized finance (DeFi) strategy. With a focus on sustainable wealth-building and common pitfalls to avoid, Ulloa blended technical…

Dubai, UAE – May 2025 — At the heart of the Dubai FinTech Summit 2025, Fernando Plaza, Chief Digital Officer of Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank (ADIB), shared a compelling vision for how Islamic banking can thrive in the digital age through cutting-edge partnerships, AI integration, and customer-centric transformation. ADIB Ventures: A Symbiotic FinTech Partnership Program At the core of ADIB’s digital transformation is ADIB Ventures, a forward-thinking fintech partnership initiative. Plaza explained the bank’s approach: “We recognize that there are fintechs and emerging technologies in the market we can partner with to better serve our customers.” ADIB Ventures identifies promising…

Dubai, UAE – May 2025 — In the dynamic corridors of the Dubai FinTech Summit (DFS) 2025, where the world’s most innovative financial technologies converge, Myne has emerged as a standout WealthTech force. Founded by Karim Chouman, the company is redefining personal finance management through a single, intelligent platform that aggregates, analyzes, and secures users’ wealth like never before. A New Era of Wealth Visibility and Control “Myne is a holistic wealth aggregator,” explains Chouman. “It allows you to add all your assets of all types in one single dashboard to have a live view of your net worth.” This…

Dubai, UAE – May 2025 — At the heart of the Dubai FinTech Summit (DFS) 2025, KLAIM AI is making waves with its pioneering approach to solving one of the healthcare sector’s most persistent issues: delayed cash flow. Speaking from the event, Sara Tahiri, Marketing Manager at KLAIM AI, offered an inside look at how the company is reshaping healthcare finance through technology. Revolutionizing Revenue Cycles in Healthcare KLAIM AI is on a mission to unburden healthcare providers from the crippling effects of insurance payment delays. “Most of the time, healthcare providers are blocked and stuck because they run out…

Dubai, UAE – May 2025 — Amidst the bustling energy of the Dubai FinTech Summit (DFS) 2025, Lucia Chirico, Business Development Manager at Business Setup Consultants, shared insights into the company’s mission to simplify and streamline the entrepreneurial journey in the UAE and beyond. Bridging Dreams with Legal Expertise At its core, Business Setup Consultants serves as a launchpad for aspiring entrepreneurs, offering end-to-end support in establishing businesses across various jurisdictions. “We are a business setup company,” Chirico explains. “We help entrepreneurs to build their own companies, and we support them with all legal paperwork, government approvals, and the processes…

Dubai, UAE – May 14, 2025 — The wait is over. Today marks the official opening of HODL Summit 2025, the world’s longest-running Web3 and crypto event, taking center stage at the stunning Madinat Jumeirah in Dubai. Organized by Trescon, this landmark 30th global edition welcomes over 5,000 international leaders across blockchain, decentralized finance (DeFi), artificial intelligence (AI), and digital asset infrastructure — all gathered to map the next phase of the decentralized digital economy. Formerly known as the World Blockchain Summit, HODL Summit has evolved into a flagship platform where institutional adoption converges with breakthrough technologies. With Dubai rapidly…

Google is testing a redesign of its Search homepage in which “AI Mode,” the experimental AI-powered search feature the company rolled out earlier in May, replaces its longstanding “I’m Feeling Lucky” button under the Search bar. A company spokesperson confirmed to The Verge, which was the first to report the change, that the feature began rolling out to some users in Google’s experimental Labs environment. However, it may not launch publicly. The test comes just a week ahead of Google I/O, where the company is expected to announce some major updates to its AI-powered search offerings. Google rarely makes changes to its Search…

WizardLM, a Beijing-based Microsoft AI research group, appears to have joined Tencent, the Chinese company that owns WeChat and blockbuster games like PUBG Mobile. In a post on X on Tuesday, Can Xu, a senior AI researcher who led a number of projects within WizardLM, said that he and the team left Microsoft to join Hunyuan, one of Tencent’s AI development orgs. Over the past few months, Hunyuan has released AI models, including video and 3D object generators. WizardLM has already released a Hunyuan-branded model, in fact: Hunyuan-TurboS 0416. In an X post, Qingfeng Sun, who claims to be a “co-founder” of WizardLM, says…

TikTok is launching its first image-to-video AI feature, the company announced on Tuesday. The new feature is called “TikTok AI Alive” and allows users to turn static photos into videos within TikTok Stories. The feature is only accessible via TikTok’s Story Camera and uses AI to create short-form videos with “movement, atmospheric and creative effects,” TikTok says. For instance, if your static photo features a sky, clouds, and the ocean, TikTok could turn the photo into a video where the sky gradually shifts hues, the clouds start to drift, and you hear the sound of waves crashing. Or, you could animate a…

During the Android Show on Tuesday, leading up to Google I/O, Google announced that it’s bringing Gemini to Wear OS smartwatches and Google TV. The announcement is part of Google’s plans to replace Google Assistant with Gemini across all of its devices and platforms. Tuesday’s announcement doesn’t come as a surprise, as users have been expecting Google to bring its AI assistant to Wear OS smartwatches and Google TV. The tech giant says this expansion will make its AI assistant accessible beyond phones to allow people to use it when they’re doing things like going on a run or relaxing on the couch.…

Audible, Amazon’s audiobook service, announced on Tuesday that it’s partnering with select publishers to convert print and e-books into AI-narrated audiobooks. This initiative aims to quickly expand its catalog as it competes with Apple, Spotify, and others in the rapidly growing audiobook market. Audible is leveraging Amazon’s AI capabilities to assist publishers in producing audiobooks. Publishers can choose from over 100 AI-generated voices available in English, French, Spanish, and Italian, with multiple accents and dialect options. The company plans to expand these options over time. Additionally, Audible plans to roll out a beta version of AI translation later this year, offering both…

In a bid to make its AI DJ feel more interactive, Spotify is updating the feature to allow users to request music or change the mood of a playlist using voice commands. The company is rolling out this feature, initially only supported in English, in over 60 markets for its Premium subscribers. Previously, users could only listen to the AI DJ play songs with added commentary in between certain tracks. Now, the feature is becoming interactive. Users can tell the AI DJ to change the mood or genre, or have it play tracks from specific artists. To use the AI…

Dubai, UAE – May 13, 2025 — The countdown is nearly over. Tomorrow, May 14, the world’s longest-running Web3 and crypto event, HODL Summit 2025, officially opens its doors at the spectacular Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai. Running from May 14–15, this landmark 30th global edition, organized by Trescon, will bring together over 5,000 global leaders in blockchain, DeFi, AI, and digital asset infrastructure to shape the future of decentralized technology. 🔍 Tomorrow’s Agenda: The Future of Web3 Begins Participants will dive into visionary sessions and strategic debates around: 🌍 30th Global Edition: A Web3 Milestone in Dubai Now rebranded from the…

As a privileged knowledge partner of the G20 under South Africa’s 2025 presidency, UNESCO is supporting the G20’s bold agenda to harness artificial intelligence (AI) and digital transformation for the public sector. At the heart of this partnership, UNESCO delivered a workshop in Gqeberha, South Africa, on 11 April 2025, gathering G20 members, guest countries and international organizations to accelerate AI capacity building in the public sector. AI for Public Good: From Vision to Action With digital transformation being now a cornerstone of modern governance, UNESCO’s workshop tackled the urgent need to equip civil servants with the skills and ethical grounding…

Perplexity AI is reportedly in advanced talks to raise $500 million at a valuation of $14 billion, a figure that would be up from the $9 billion at which it was valued in November. The potential leap in value comes at a time when Apple is considering adding the startup’s artificial intelligence (AI) search features to Apple’s browser, Safari, and when the Perplexity AI is planning to launch its own web browser called Comet, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Monday (May 12), citing unnamed sources. Perplexity AI did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment. The company’s AI-powered search tool provides answers in the form of sentences with links to the…

On Monday, Google announced the launch of its AI Futures Fund, a new initiative that seeks to invest in startups that are building with the latest AI tools from Google DeepMind, the company’s AI R&D lab. The fund will back startups from seed to late stage and will offer varying degrees of support, including allowing founders to have early access to Google AI models from DeepMind, the ability to work with Google experts from DeepMind and Google Labs, and Google Cloud credits. Some startups will also have the opportunity to receive direct investment from Google. “The AI Futures Fund doesn’t…

Google’s openly available Gemma collection of AI models has reached a milestone: over 150 million downloads. Omar Sanseviero, a developer relations engineer at Google DeepMind, announced the figure on X over the weekend, also revealing that developers have created more than 70,000 variants of Gemma on the AI dev platform Hugging Face. Google launched Gemma in February 2024, aiming to compete with other “open” model families like Meta’s Llama. The latest Gemma releases are multimodal, meaning that they can work with images as well as text, and support over 100 languages. Google has also created versions of Gemma fine-tuned for particular applications, like drug discovery.…

From Smart Systems to Sustainable Luxury, Saudi Arabia’s Hospitality Roadmap Aligns with Vision 2030’s Ambitions Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – Day two of the Future Hospitality Summit (FHS) Saudi Arabia 2025 brought together global hospitality leaders, investors, and policymakers for a deep dive into the Kingdom’s evolving role as a premier global tourism hub. Against the backdrop of Vision 2030, the day emphasized innovation, sustainability, talent development, and strategic investment—marking a decisive shift in how Saudi Arabia is reshaping its hospitality and tourism narrative. Harnessing Technology: Smart Hospitality on the Rise A central theme of the day was the integration of…

Dubai, UAE – May 12, 2025On Day 1 of the Dubai FinTech Summit 2025, a headline fireside chat captured the attention of global finance leaders. Matthew Koder, President of Global Corporate & Investment Banking at Bank of America, sat down with Nawied Jabarkhyl of APCO to explore the evolving dynamics of the U.S. economy and what lies ahead for international markets. A Deep Dive Into Market Forces The session delivered a comprehensive examination of the current U.S. economic trajectory, spotlighting the delicate balance between monetary policy and macroeconomic momentum. Koder began by outlining the Federal Reserve’s strategic pivot, signaling that…