Author: Art Ryan

Microsoft’s CEO has reportedly made significant changes to strengthen the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) business. As the Financial Times (FT) reported Tuesday, December 30, these changes include a complete overhaul of Microsoft’s senior leadership. Satya Nadella aims to keep the company ahead in the AI race following the restructuring of its partnership with OpenAI. The chief executive is responding to increased competition in the AI field. He wants to speed up the development of Microsoft’s AI models, coding tools, and applications, according to more than half a dozen current and former Microsoft executives. “Satya is in ‘founder mode,’” said Dee…

Meta is acquiring the Singapore-based startup Manus to strengthen its artificial intelligence (AI) agent offerings. “Manus already meets the daily needs of millions of users and businesses worldwide,” Meta stated in its announcement on Monday (Dec. 29). “It launched its first general AI agent earlier this year and has served more than 147 trillion tokens and created over 80 million virtual computers. We plan to expand this service to many more businesses.” While the companies did not disclose a price for the deal, a report by the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) says sources indicated Meta is paying more than $2…

Roblox is leaning heavily on artificial intelligence (AI) to solve one of the most complex operational challenges in digital platforms: moderating massive volumes of user-generated content in real time. The company says AI systems now form the backbone of how it keeps harmful text, voice and behavior from reaching its nearly 150 million daily users, many of whom are children. Unlike traditional social networks, Roblox operates as an interactive ecosystem where users create games, environments and social experiences. That structure generates billions of chat messages, voice interactions and in-game behaviors each day, making post-hoc enforcement impractical. Roblox says its moderation strategy has shifted toward real-time prevention, with AI models designed to intercept violations before content is distributed. Roblox reports…

Silicon Valley’s AI startups have raised a record $150 billion this year. As the Financial Times reported on Sunday, December 28, this is part of an effort by these companies to safeguard themselves in case the surge in artificial intelligence (AI) investment slows down next year. The report, which cites data from Pitchbook, shows that this year’s funding surpassed the previous record of $92 billion set in 2021. Companies like OpenAI and Anthropic have drawn significant interest from investors. Venture capitalists and industry experts informed the FT that this funding will support growth and provide a buffer in case of…

According to reports, the consumer technology conference CES this year will have a lot of items that use artificial intelligence (AI) as their main selling point. According to Bloomberg on Monday, December 29, exhibitors at the event from January 6 to 9, 2026, would probably try to show investors, business clients, and regular people how useful AI is. The report says that smart glasses are one type of AI-powered product that will probably be on exhibit at the expo. The article added that Meta would show off some new or better software features, Snap might let more people try on…

As part of a bigger tech alliance, Nvidia has bought $5 billion worth of Intel shares. Intel revealed the purchase of 214.7 million shares in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday, December 29. This was the end of a deal that was first announced in September. Reuters reports that the purchase is a big help for Intel after years of mistakes and expensive expansions of its production capacity that drained its resources. The statement comes just a few days after the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) said that authorities had given the green light to the proposed…

Startups are using new money to hardwire artificial intelligence (AI) into their business processes, from automating warehouse docks and evaluating cognitive performance to changing the way insurance companies underwrite policies. Logistics Intelligence Makes Dock Operations Work Kargo.ai, a business that automates warehouses, raised $42 million in a Series B financing to grow its AI-powered dock operations platform for enterprise customers throughout the world. The money shows that there is an increasing need for automation in logistics environments, where margins are getting tighter because of manpower constraints, high error rates, and a lack of real-time visibility. Kargo’s technology uses AI software…

Since the AI race sped up, we’ve seen some major expenditures in the field. SoftBank, a big Japanese multinational company with its main office in Tokyo, is one of the most well-known brands in these kinds of investments. Reports from earlier this month said that Soft Bank and NVIDIA are teaming up to put at least $15 billion into Skild AI, a business that creates foundation models for robots and already has a lot of money. DigitalBridge acquisition helps SoftBank’s AI strategy.SoftBank Group is once again in the news. This time, the Japanese multinational conglomerate has made a big step…

Artificial Intelligence has a lot of potential, and some AI companies are working hard to make the most of it. But when we talk about that in terms of an emotionally aware AI, the effects can be different and, to say the least, scary. If you’ve ever thought that there should be limits on how much AI can do, China may have just given you a good answer. The Chinese government has begun to set limits on emotionally intelligent AI. China wants to develop new rules that will stop AI chatbots from affecting people’s feelings.The draft rules say that AI…

Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google, has agreed to acquire Intersect Power in a deal valued at $4.75 billion, underscoring how access to electricity — not algorithms — is rapidly becoming the defining constraint of the artificial intelligence era. The acquisition reflects a fundamental shift in how major technology companies are approaching AI expansion: moving beyond software and chips toward direct control of energy generation and data-center power supply. As AI models grow larger and more computationally intensive, Google’s leadership has made clear that traditional grid access alone is no longer sufficient to support long-term ambitions in generative AI,…

The explosive growth of artificial intelligence in 2025 delivered one of the largest single-year wealth transfers in modern financial history, dramatically increasing the fortunes of the world’s most powerful technology billionaires and reshaping the hierarchy of global wealth. According to multiple market and media reports, the combined net worth of leading U.S. tech billionaires surged by more than $500 billion in 2025, driven largely by soaring valuations of AI-focused companies, chipmakers, cloud infrastructure firms, and generative AI platforms. At the start of the year, the collective wealth of America’s top technology figures stood at roughly $1.9 trillion. By late December,…

NVIDIA will join the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Genesis Mission as a private industry partner to keep U.S. AI both the leader and the standard in technology around the world. The Genesis Mission, which is part of an Executive Order recently signed by President Trump, aims to redefine American leadership in AI across three key areas: energy, scientific research and national security. NVIDIA will offer its services to the Department to integrate a discovery platform that unites the U.S. government, industry and academia. DOE officials expect the Genesis Mission to double the productivity and impact of American science and engineering, and…

The works of Plato state that when humans have an experience, some level of change occurs in their brain, which is powered by memory — specifically long-term memory. This change is what Andre Fenton, professor of neural science at New York University, and Abhishek Kumar, assistant professor of cell and regenerative biology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, are studying at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. “My life’s work is to understand how minds operate, and especially to understand memory — not merely as a trace of the past in the brain but as an estimate of…

NEW DELHI / NOIDA — Indian IT services major Coforge Ltd. has announced one of the most consequential deals in its history, agreeing to acquire U.S.-based Encora in a $2.35 billion transaction that reshapes its growth trajectory and positions the company squarely at the center of the AI-driven digital engineering race. The acquisition, disclosed on December 26, 2025, is not merely an expansion play — it represents a strategic pivot from traditional IT services toward high-margin, AI-first product engineering, at a time when global enterprises are accelerating investments in artificial intelligence, cloud modernization, and software-defined systems. A Deal Designed for…

Key Highlights AI has slipped into our workspace and living room for a long time now, but Samsung is making sure that the technology sits right inside the kitchen. CES 2026 is just around the corner and Samsung has announced to showcase some of the best kitchen appliances under its refreshed Bespoke AI lineup. The upcoming lineup focuses on smarter automation, cleaner design, and more personalized everyday use. Bespoke AI refrigerators are one of the highlights In the announcement post, Samsung has confirmed that it will unveil the updated Bespoke AI refrigerators, over-the-range (OTR) microwave, and slide-in range at the annual…

ABU DHABI — Abu Dhabi has taken a decisive step toward AI-driven environmental governance with the launch of a pioneering project that uses artificial intelligence and satellite imagery to detect and monitor illegal waste dumping across the Emirate — a move that positions the capital as a regional leader in technology-enabled sustainability enforcement. Led by the Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD), the initiative represents a shift from reactive, manpower-intensive inspections to predictive, data-driven environmental oversight, leveraging AI to protect land, ecosystems, and public health at scale. From Manual Inspections to Intelligent Detection Illegal dumping has long posed challenges for…

An Nvidia spokesperson confirmed Friday (Dec. 26) that the company acquired talent and tech from Groq, a maker of custom-built inference chips. Groq said in a Wednesday (Dec. 24) blog post that it entered into a non-exclusive licensing agreement with chip maker Nvidia for Groq’s inference technology. Reached by PYMNTS, an Nvidia spokesperson said in an emailed statement: “We haven’t acquired Groq. We’ve taken a non-exclusive license to Groq’s IP and have hired engineering talent from Groq’s team to join us in our mission to provide world-leading accelerate computing technology.” Groq said in its blog post that with this agreement, the companies aim to expand…

Key Highlights: Europe is one of the markets across the globe where tech giants find themselves under heavy scrutiny from the European Commission. Meta, this time, has found itself in a spot of bother after introducing a WhatsApp policy that blocks third-party AI providers. Italy’s antitrust regulator asks Meta to suspend its WhatsApp policy that blocks third-party AI providers Earlier this month, the European Commission launched a separate investigation into this matter. At the time, the regulator announced that the probe will cover the entire EEA, except one country, Italy. That’s because Italy’s competition watchdog, theItalian Competition Authority (AGCM), launched the probe…

Key Highlights: If you use NotebookLM, this might be the news you wanted to hear for a long time now. NotebookLM is unarguably one of the best AI tools to exist at this point, but Google isn’t done with pushing even more upgrades. The company is reportedly working on another notable upgrade related to long-form audio learning behind the scenes. NotebookLM’s Lecture mode focuses on long-form explanations The news comes via Testing Catalog, which reported that Google is working on a new “Lecture” format for Audio Overviews that can provide AI-generated audio of up to 30 minutes long. To catch you…

Key Highlights: Google has been making massive strides to turn Gemini into a useful AI assistant that not only helps us with summarizing emails, generating images, and much more. Thanks to the growing list of features now associated with Gemini, Waymo appears to be exploring a new frontier for its robotaxis. Formerly the Google self-driving car project, Waymo is now looking to integrate Gemini AI chatbot as an in-car assistant. In a blog post, tech blogger and app researcher Jane Manchun Wong mentioned that while examining Waymo’s mobile app code, she uncovered the complete system prompt for its unreleased Gemini integration…