Author: Art Ryan

Meta Chief Revenue Officer John Hegeman said Tuesday (Nov. 18) that he is leaving the firm after 17 years to start his own company. Announcing the move in a post on Facebook, Hegeman said he had “decided it’s time to close this chapter and pursue a long-standing dream — starting a new company.” He did not provide any details about the new company. Hegeman thanked Meta executives, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and said that Andrew Bocking will take over as product group lead for ads and business messaging, while Naomi Gleit will become the leader of business artificial intelligence (AI) and other new monetization opportunities. “Meta’s business is as strong…

Microsoft on Tuesday (Nov. 18) introduced Microsoft Agent 365, a new system aimed to help companies track and control the growing number of AI agents used in everyday work. The company said organizations are starting to rely on agents to handle tasks across support, operations and productivity tools, and that they need a single place to manage them. Microsoft cited IDC research estimating that more than one billion agents could be active inside businesses by 2028. Agent 365 gives companies a unified view of all the agents running in their environments. It includes a central list where IT teams can see…

Lawmakers have introduced two bipartisan bills aimed at expanding artificial intelligence support for small businesses, marking one of Congress’s most targeted efforts this year to help Main Street firms understand and responsibly adopt AI. The proposals focus on training, education and advisory support at a time when many small firms are exploring AI but lack the resources to implement it effectively. The first measure, the AI for Workforce Innovation, Skills and Entrepreneurship Act, known as AI-WISE, was introduced by U.S. Reps. Hillary Scholten (D-Mich) and Troy Downing (R-Mont.). Sponsors outlined the effort in a press release, saying the goal is to provide small business owners with…

Microsoft says it is joining Nvidia in a multibillion-dollar partnership with artificial intelligence (AI) startup Anthropic. Under this collaboration, Anthropic will scale its Claude AI model on the Nvidia-powered Microsoft Azure, the companies announced Tuesday (Nov. 18). Anthropic has agreed to purchase $30 billion of Azure compute capacity and to contract additional compute capacity up to one gigawatt, while Microsoft and Nvidia have pledged to invest up to $5 billion and $10 billion, respectively, in Anthropic. According to the announcement, Microsoft and Anthropic are also expanding their existing partnership to widen access to Claude for businesses, giving Microsoft Foundry customers use of Anthropic’s frontier Claude models, while continuing to…

Dubai, UAE — 19 November 2025 — DATEwithTech Dubai 2025, the Middle East’s flagship technology and innovation summit, proudly announces EY and Magure as its Official Gold Partners for the upcoming edition, taking place 26–27 November 2025 at Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai. As the MENA region accelerates its advancement toward a digitally empowered economy, the involvement of EY and Magure brings unmatched strategic depth and leadership to this year’s event. Their Gold Partner status underscores their pivotal roles in shaping enterprise AI adoption, digital trust, cloud transformation and advanced technology deployment across the region. 🌟 Introducing the Gold Partners Elevating DATEwithTech…

Physical AI is emerging as the next stage of robotics as advances in sensing, perception and large AI models give machines capabilities that traditional automation never supported. Earlier robots followed fixed commands and worked only in predictable environments, struggling with the unpredictability found in everyday operations such as shifting layouts, varying item shapes, mixed lighting, and human movement. That is beginning to change as research groups show how simulation, digital twins and multimodal learning pipelines enable robots to learn adaptive behaviors and carry those behaviors into real facilities with minimal retraining. Meet the New Workforce Work from Fraunhofer IESE describes how…

Google introduced its newest AI model, Gemini 3, on Tuesday (Nov. 18) and deployed it directly into Google Search, the Gemini app and its enterprise cloud stack. The company announced the release in its blog, calling it its most capable multimodal model to date. Google Embeds Gemini 3 Into Its Core Products The company says Gemini 3 brings expanded reasoning, longer context handling and improved multimodal performance across text, image, audio and video. Google placed it into Search’s AI Mode for premium users, added it to the Gemini app and made it available to developers through AI Studio and Vertex AI.…

Amazon is introducing new features for its AI shopping assistant amid triple-digit user growth. The updates to the company’s Rufus, announced Tuesday (Nov. 18), include enhancements to its knowledge of shopping category and product research and evaluation, and product search and recommendations. In addition, Amazon says it has developed more than 50 technical upgrades, enhancements, and new features to make Rufus faster and more useful. Amazon introduced a beta version of Rufus last winter, before a wider, nationwide rollout in July of 2024. The generative artificial intelligence (AI)-powered conversational shopping assistant has seen significant growth since then, the announcement said. “More than 250 million customers have used…

Google CEO Sundar Pichai told BBC News that the artificial intelligence (AI) boom contains both rational and irrational elements. Pichai said the tech industry can “overshoot” during investment cycles like the one currently happening with AI, the BBC reported Tuesday (Nov. 18). He compared this investment cycle with the one that happened in the early days of the internet. There was “clearly a lot of excess investment” at that time, but the internet was certainly “profound,” Pichai said. “I expect AI to be the same,” Pichai said. “So I think it’s both rational and there are elements of irrationality through a moment like this.” Pichai…

TurboTax maker Intuit has launched a partnership with artificial intelligence (AI) startup OpenAI. The collaboration, announced Tuesday (Nov. 18), will let users of OpenAI’s ChatGPT take “trusted, secure, and accurate financial actions” through Intuit’s various apps, which can be accessed within the chatbot. According to an Intuit news release, this marks the first time consumers and businesses will be able to employ Intuit’s AI-driven expert platform and get personalized financial insights and recommendations, all through apps available in ChatGPT. “Every week, hundreds of millions of consumers and businesses search on ChatGPT for answers to their biggest problems,” the release said, citing questions such as “how can…

Social discovery moves at the speed of trends. Large language models (LLMs) are reshaping how people search and buy online. Yet brick-and-mortar remains the heart of beauty. Ulta Beauty sits at the center of all three forces, building a connected commerce strategy designed for consumers who shift rapidly between digital inspiration and the in-store experience. In a conversation with PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster as part of “The SKU” series, Josh Friedman, senior vice president of eCommerce and digital at Ulta Beauty, said the typical shopper focuses on the end result, rather than the means, when it comes to commerce. Webster noted that…

U.S. Bank now offers its business clients an artificial intelligence-enabled cash forecasting tool powered by Kyriba’s liquidity performance platform. The new U.S. Bank Liquidity Manager leverages traditional methods and AI to deliver cash forecasting, scenario planning and operational efficiency for mid-sized and large firms, the bank said in a Tuesday (Nov. 18) press release. The tool can be accessed by clients through U.S. Bank’s treasury management platform, SinglePoint, according to the release. Its features include cash forecasting, cash positioning, cash pooling, multi-bank reporting and enhanced visibility, per the release. The tool’s automation and centralization reduce operational costs, while its streamlined workflows boost operational efficiency, the release…

Credit unions are discovering that the youngest generation in their membership base is not simply digital-first. They are digital-fluid, moving between screens and branches with ease, and they expect financial partners to keep up. That shift is producing a new set of pressures for an industry that has historically relied on long-term loyalty. The PYMNTS Intelligence report, “Digital-First Retention Playbook: Winning Gen Z Loyalty at Credit Unions,” produced in collaboration with Velera, shows that Gen Z brings different expectations to their banking relationships. They value personalization, immediacy and authenticity as strongly as they value convenience. They also view financial stability through…

Citi is deepening its use of artificial intelligence (AI) across the enterprise with the launch of an upgraded Stylus Workspaces, an internal productivity platform designed to automate multistep workflows and enable more autonomous execution across its operations. Chief Technology Officer David Griffiths told PYMNTS the initiative marks Citi’s move from using AI primarily as a support tool to developing agentic systems that can plan, execute and refine tasks with minimal supervision while upholding the governance and compliance standards required in global finance. The latest version of Stylus Workspaces combines what were once fragmented, manual workflows into a single prompt-driven interface. Tasks that previously required…

Levi Strauss & Co. is partnering with Microsoft to build an enterprise superagent designed to unify employee support, streamline retail operations and modernize the company’s data backbone. The companies said the Azure-native orchestrator will run inside Microsoft Teams and route requests across IT, HR, retail-support and operational sub-agents, forming the core of Levi’s shift toward what it described as a “fan-obsessed, direct-to-consumer first business.” Levi said the system will centralize employee questions, system lookups and operational tasks into one conversational interface, reducing reliance on legacy navigation and enabling faster support for store associates and corporate teams. Several sub-agents are already deployed, with more planned for the next development cycle. The project…

As innovation spins the world ever faster, CFOs are being tasked with finding inspiration in new places. And while the news last week (Nov. 13) that cybercriminals had undertaken the first agentic artificial intelligence (AI) cyber campaign set the tech sector abuzz, it could be the back office where its most immediate impact is felt. It may seem an odd place for insight, but the attack offers an unexpected window for CFOs: a chance to study how agentic orchestration can automate workflows, the role of human oversight, and how to validate outcomes. Still, when AI company Anthropic revealed that a “jailbroken” version of its Claude model was behind the first documented…

Automakers are accelerating their use of artificial intelligence (AI) as vehicle complexity, software integration and safety expectations rise across the sector. IBM noted that manufacturers are turning to machine learning, computer vision and predictive modeling because traditional vehicle programs and factory processes can no longer keep pace with modern demands. The Kaizen Institute adds that rising pressure to improve efficiency and safety is pushing companies to embed AI across design, production, logistics and in-car systems. That momentum is now driving strategic decisions. A PYMNTS Intelligence analysis found that roughly 75% of automakers plan to integrate generative AI into vehicles this year, a signal that the industry is…

Dubai, UAE — The countdown intensifies as the region prepares for one of its most influential technology gatherings of the year. With only 8 days to go, the Digital Acceleration & Technology Expo (DATE) Dubai 2025 is set to open its doors on 26–27 November 2025 at Madinat Jumeirah, bringing together global innovators, enterprise leaders, government officials, and investors for two transformative days. Hosted by Trescon, DATE Dubai 2025 is emerging as a central platform for high-level decision-making, knowledge exchange, and forward-looking discussion on the technologies defining the next decade of growth in MENA. 🚀 A Strategic Platform for Digital…

The volume and scale of startup funding this week indicates that even with broader macro concerns, investors continue to deploy capital into artificial intelligence (AI) products that solve immediate business challenges and support a growing wave of enterprise adoption. Developer and Coding AI Attract Record Capital Cursor raised $2.3 billion, a round that lifted its valuation to $29.3 billion. The company also added Coatue, Google and Nvidia to their investor list, alongside existing backers such as a16z and Thrive Capital. Cursor builds an AI-powered development environment that helps software engineers write, fix and manage code more efficiently. The tool behaves like…

Financial operations platform Ramp said Monday (Nov. 17) that it closed a $300 million primary financing round as well as an employee tender offer. The company is now valued at $32 billion, it said in a press release. Ramp’s valuation has been rising this year. The company was valued at $13 billion in March when investors purchased secondaries from employees and early investors; $16 billion in June when it raised $200 million in Series E financing; and $22.5 billion in July when it raised $500 million a Series E-2 round. Ramp’s latest valuation came about four months after the company began rolling out its first artificial intelligence agents, according…