Author: Art Ryan

Abu Dhabi, UAE — Global AI Show 2025 is proud to announce LOCALS, Kuwait’s leading cultural-commerce platform, as an official Exhibitor at this year’s premier AI event, taking place 8–9 December 2025 at Space42 Arena, Abu Dhabi. With a mission to celebrate Gulf identity while integrating cutting-edge technology, LOCALS is transforming how communities connect, shop, and gift — all powered by the region’s first emotionally intelligent, culturally aware AI agent. Introducing Lolwa: The Gulf’s First Emotionally Intelligent AI Agent At the core of the LOCALS experience is Lolwa, an advanced AI agent designed specifically for the Gulf region. Lolwa understands:…

At a moment when the artificial intelligence (AI) landscape is dominated by headlines and the consumer race for viral features, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei delivered a counter-intuitive message at this week’s DealBook Summit: The future of AI’s economic value lies not in chasing fleeting consumer mindshare, but in a relentless, technically rigorous focus on enterprise needs and disciplined, long-term infrastructure planning. This is central to Anthropic’s strategy, he said. As competitors sprint for mass-market adoption, Amodei positioned his firm as having a “privileged position” to methodically “keep growing and just keep developing our models,” deliberately rooting its value in the stability and consistency…

Payments infrastructure FinTech Stripe signed a definitive agreement to acquire Metronome, a usage-based billing platform for software companies. Stripe CEO Patrick Collison announced the agreement in a Tuesday (Dec. 2) post on X, saying the company will integrate Metronome’s capabilities with the rest of the Stripe Billing platform. “Metered pricing is the native business model for the [artificial intelligence (AI)] era,” Collison said in the post. “As far as we can tell, the associated shift in how businesses generate revenue will be as big as the advent of SaaS. (It may even turn out to be considerably bigger.)” Metronome CEO Scott Woody said in a Tuesday post on X that he was proud to announce…

The New York Times sued Perplexity Friday (Dec. 5), alleging that the artificial intelligence (AI) startup repeatedly violated its copyrights. The New York Times reported Friday (Dec. 5) that the suit accuses Perplexity of violating its copyrights by retrieving The Times’ content with its AI-powered search engine and displaying large parts of that content in a way that competes with The Times. The suit also accuses Perplexity of damaging the publisher’s brand by in some cases making up information and falsely attributing that information to The Times, according to the report. The New York Times contacted Perplexity several times over the past 18 months, demanding…

The promise of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare has long centered on the vision of an autonomous diagnostic engine, a machine that sees disease where human eyes fail. Yet, the current reality in the banking, payments, and digital health ecosystem is far more strategic and immediate: AI is stepping in not to replace the doctor, but to save their time. This shift is the financial and operational linchpin of the newest wave of healthcare technology adoption. With rising patient loads, staffing shortages and a volume of imaging and documentation that has simply outpaced human capacity, health systems are actively embracing…

Verification systems built for yesterday’s fraud no longer work in today’s threat landscape. While firms could once assume that criminals needed skill, capital and patience to mount sophisticated attacks on onboarding or identity systems, that old playbook has fallen out of sync with a world defined by generative imagery, deepfakes and hyper-scalable fraud automation. Cheap artificial intelligence (AI) models now generate convincing synthetic identities. Automated agents can mimic human patterns. Entire fake businesses pop up with registries that pass muster under outdated verification models. But it’s not all gloom and doom. To unpack the opportunities and explore how enterprises are responding, PYMNTS sat down with Zac Cohen, chief product officer at Trulioo,…

Anthropic has announced what it calls a “significant” expansion of its partnership with Snowflake. The artificial intelligence (AI) company has signed a $200 million agreement with Snowflake that will make its Claude model available via Snowflake’s cloud storage platform to more than 12,600 customers worldwide, Anthropic said in a Thursday (Dec. 4) news release. In addition, this collaboration establishes a “joint go-to-market initiative” aimed at deploying AI agents across the world’s biggest enterprises, the companies said. “Enterprises have spent years building secure, trusted data environments, and now they want AI that can work within those environments without compromise,” Anthropic’s CEO/co-founder Dario Amodei said. “This partnership brings…

Abu Dhabi, UAE — Global AI Show 2025 is proud to announce Snowflake, the world’s leading AI Data Cloud company, as an official Gold Sponsor for this year’s flagship event, taking place 8–9 December 2025 at Space42 Arena, Abu Dhabi. With over 12,000 enterprises worldwide relying on Snowflake to unify, mobilize, and maximize the value of their data, the company stands at the forefront of global AI transformation. The Platform Built for the AI Era Snowflake is redefining how organizations build, use, and share data and AI. Through its AI Data Cloud, Snowflake empowers enterprises to: From financial services to…

Abu Dhabi, UAE — Global AI Show 2025 is thrilled to announce Zealogics, a global AI engineering and digital transformation partner, as an official Exhibitor at this year’s flagship AI event, taking place 8–9 December 2025 at Space42 Arena, Abu Dhabi. With a mission to make AI empowering—not overwhelming, Zealogics enables enterprises to transform data, workflows, and operational processes into intelligent systems that deliver measurable business impact. Engineering the Next Generation of Enterprise Intelligence Zealogics brings deep expertise in designing, implementing, and scaling AI systems across complex enterprise environments. Their portfolio spans a powerful suite of solutions, including: 🔹 ZeaIQ…

Abu Dhabi, UAE — The countdown has reached its final stretch. In just 3 days, the world’s most influential leaders in artificial intelligence will gather in Abu Dhabi for Global AI Show 2025, a landmark event poised to redefine the future of AI across industries, governments, and global society. Taking place on December 8, 2025 at the cutting-edge Space42 Arena, the Show — organized by VAP Group in partnership with Times of AI — will unite global innovators for two days of breakthrough insights, technology showcases, and high-level policy dialogue. A Defining Moment for the Global AI Movement Global AI…

Abu Dhabi, UAE — The countdown has officially begun. In just 5 days, the world’s gaming, esports, and digital-entertainment leaders will converge in Abu Dhabi for Global Games Show 2025, one of the most anticipated interactive-entertainment events of the year. Scheduled for December 10–11, 2025, the show is set to electrify the region with groundbreaking announcements, exclusive reveals, and immersive gaming experiences. Hosted at the ultra-modern Space42 Arena, Global Games Show 2025 is organized by VAP Group in partnership with Times of Games, and supported by the Abu Dhabi Convention & Exhibition Bureau — cementing the emirate’s rise as a…

TD Bank Group implemented 75 artificial intelligence (AI) use cases that generated 170 million Canadian dollars (about $122 million) in value this year, according to TD Bank Group President and CEO Raymond Chun. “These use cases span from transforming loan underwriting to creating intelligent leads to deepening relationships to meet more of our clients’ needs,” Chun said Thursday (Dec. 4) during the bank’s fourth quarter earnings call. TD Bank Group expects these AI use cases to generate 200 million Canadian dollars (about $143 million) in incremental value in 2026 as the bank continues to “reimagine end-to-end processes,” Chun said. “We are prioritizing our…

Anthropic has announced what it calls a “significant” expansion of its partnership with Snowflake. The artificial intelligence (AI) company has signed a $200 million agreement with Snowflake that will make its Claude model available via Snowflake’s cloud storage platform to more than 12,600 customers worldwide, Anthropic said in a Thursday (Dec. 4) news release. In addition, this collaboration establishes a “joint go-to-market initiative” aimed at deploying AI agents across the world’s biggest enterprises, the companies said. “Enterprises have spent years building secure, trusted data environments, and now they want AI that can work within those environments without compromise,” Anthropic’s CEO/co-founder Dario Amodei said. “This partnership brings…

Private equity’s long-standing formula of leverage and operational fixes is meeting a new force multiplier. As deal cycles tighten and competition for assets intensifies, firms are turning to artificial intelligence not as a curiosity but as a core component of value creation. The industry is testing whether AI can compress diligence, sharpen forecasting and surface risks long before they show up in earnings. The shift signals that AI is becoming less of an experiment and more of an operational requirement. That shift is most visible in the earliest stages of investment work. BayPine, a Boston-based PE firm, has begun embedding AI…

Meta executives are reportedly considering cutting as much as 30% of the budget of the company’s metaverse group amid a shift of resources toward artificial intelligence. The proposed cuts are part of Meta’s annual budget planning for 2026, and they could lead to layoffs as soon as January, Bloomberg reported Thursday (Dec. 4), citing unnamed sources. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, has also asked executives to look for 10% budget cuts across the company, according to the report. Meta did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment. The company’s metaverse group includes the Meta Horizon Worlds virtual worlds product and the Quest virtual reality unit, according…

Identity platform Trulioo has joined Google’s Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) initiative, which creates a common language for how artificial intelligence agents can initiate and complete transactions on behalf of users. Trulioo will bring to the AP2 initiative its expertise in identity verification and trust infrastructure and will show how its Digital Agent Passport (DAP) can be used with AP2 to convey trust for agent-led transactions, the company said in a Thursday (Dec. 4) press release emailed to PYMNTS. “By joining AP2, we’re helping define the identity backbone for autonomous payments, where verified agents transact transparently, responsibly and at machine speed,” Trulioo CEO Vicky Bindra said in the release. “This…

European antitrust regulators have launched an investigation into Meta’s artificial intelligence (AI) enhancement to WhatsApp. The European Commission announced Thursday (Dec. 4) that it had launched a probe into whether the tech giant’s new policy on AI providers’ access to WhatApp violates European Union competition rules. Meta’s new policy, announced in October, bars AI providers from using a tool allowing businesses to communicate with customers via WhatsApp, the “WhatsApp Business Solution,” when AI is the chief service offered. “Businesses may still use AI tools for ancillary or support functions, such as automated customer support offered via WhatsApp,” the EC said in its announcement. “The Commission…

The great divide in American business has traditionally been defined by scale. The Fortune 500 enjoyed the advantages of large finance teams, sophisticated systems, and the operational resilience that comes from institutional infrastructure. Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) were left to fend mostly for themselves, however they could, with whatever semi-diluted enterprise-grade tools they could afford to integrate. But the intersection of AI, automation, and a fundamental shift in software design suggests that the balance of power is shifting. And René Lacerte, CEO and founder of BILL, said it could be tilting in the favor of the millions of Main Street SMBs…

Meta is establishing a new creative studio in its Reality Labs division and has hired longtime Apple design executive Alan Dye to lead it. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO at Meta, announced these moves in a Wednesday (Dec. 3) post on Threads. The new studio will “define the next generation of our products and services” and will include designers with “deep experience building iconic products that bridge hardware and software,” Zuckerberg said in another post. Together with Dye, the creative studio will include Billy Sorentino, another design lead from Apple; Joshua To, who has led interface design across Reality Labs; Meta’s industrial design team; and its metaverse design and art teams, Zuckerberg said in…

The OpenAI Foundation has announced the first recipients from the $50 million People-First artificial intelligence (AI) Fund it announced in September. The Foundation will disburse $40.5 million in unrestricted grants to these 208 nonprofits from across the United States by the end of the year, and will announce $9.5 million in grants within months, it said in a Wednesday (Dec. 3) press release. The OpenAI Foundation holds equity in OpenAI Group, which is currently valued at $130 billion, and is one of the best resourced philanthropic organizations in the world, according to its website. Its People-First AI Fund invests in nonprofits “working to…