Author: Art Ryan

Thanks to the generosity and vision of one dedicated community member, patients in the Comox Valley are now experiencing faster, clearer diagnostic imaging and safer, more effective emergency care—all without leaving the region. Through the extraordinary support of local donor Frank Carter, Comox Valley Hospital has acquired two groundbreaking technologies: an AI-assisted MRI imaging system and an Enhanced Glidescope airway visualization machine. These advancements are transforming patient care and enabling healthcare providers to deliver the highest standard of service right here at home. “This is a transformational gift,” said Rhonda Stevens, Co-Executive Director of the Comox Valley Healthcare Foundation. “This…

California’s state senate recently gave final approval to a new AI safety bill, SB 53, sending it to Governor Gavin Newsom to either sign or veto. If this all sounds familiar, that’s because Newsom vetoed another AI safety bill, also written by state senator Scott Wiener, last year. But SB 53 is narrower than Wiener’s previous SB 1047, with a focus on big AI companies making more than $500 million in annual revenue. I got the chance to discuss SB 53 with my colleagues Max Zeff and Kirsten Korosec on the latest episode of TechCrunch’s flagship podcast Equity. Max believes that Wiener’s new bill…

As part of its long-term vision, AI Pathfinder plans to invest £15bn in West Scotland, beginning with an initial investment from 2026 that will see the start of operations at its North Ayrshire site in the i3 area of Irvine. Up to 6,400 GPU’s will be deployed during that initial phase. This 1GW site is expected to scale into one of the largest AI infrastructure hubs in Europe, with the future potential to expand to 1.5GW. Its investment in North Ayrshire is expected to create substantial employment opportunities, both through the delivery of the site’s construction and in the diverse…

On 24–25 September 2025, the RAI in Amsterdam will host TechEx Europe, an event that brings together 8,000+ participants and 250+ speakers in five co-located events: AI & Big Data Expo, Cyber Security & Cloud Expo, IoT Tech Expo, Digital Transformation Week, and Data Centre Expo. The event offers opportunities to engage with peer executives and practitioners involved in AI operations and agentic AI systems. You’ll be able to benchmark individual approaches and explore the infrastructures and processes needed to deploy AI at scale. AI operations on the agenda AI is moving rapidly from pilot projects to enterprise-wide deployment. Agentic AI…

US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that AI was “taking over the world,” and joked that he hoped tech executives understood it better than he did. The comment came as Trump and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer hosted a gathering of business and technology leaders in London during the president’s second state visit to Britain. Among those present was Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, whose company has become central to the global AI boom. Breaking from a prepared speech about US-UK ties, fresh partnerships, and billions of dollars in pledged investments, Trump admitted he had little knowledge of AI. “This…

OpenAI has reportedly fixed a ChatGPT security weakness that left user email data vulnerable. That’s according to a report Thursday (Sept. 18) by Bloomberg News, citing researchers at cyber firm Radware. The issue was discovered in DeepReseach, a ChatGPT agent introduced in February to help users analyze large swaths of information, the report said. The flaw could have allowed hackers to steal sensitive data from corporate or personal Gmail accounts. Radware found the vulnerability, and researchers said there was no sign that attackers had exploited it. OpenAI informed Radware it had patched the vulnerability on Sept. 3. An OpenAI spokesperson told Bloomberg the safety of the company’s…

A new bill from U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz proposes giving artificial intelligence (AI) firms greater flexibility to test and develop new technologies by temporarily easing certain regulatory requirements. His proposed “Strengthening Artificial intelligence Normalization and Diffusion By Oversight and eXperimentation Act,” or SANDBOX Act (S.2750), introduced last week, would let companies test AI tools under temporary federal waivers that could stretch up to 10 years and appeals could go straight to the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy. Supporters say the plan could keep the United States ahead in the global AI race. Critics warn it risks weakening the very safeguards designed to protect consumers. Why Firms Are Watching…

Google said Thursday (Sept. 18) that it is building artificial intelligence into its Chrome browser. “Today represents the biggest upgrade to Chrome in its history, as we share how we’re using the latest in Google AI to enhance your browsing experience,” Mike Torres, vice president of product, Chrome, said in a Thursday blog post. New AI-powered features that are now available through Gemini in Chrome and other tools allow users to ask Gemini to clarify complex information on one or more webpages; work across multiple tabs to help users compare and summarize information from different websites; get information from other Google apps while the user remains on…

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is set to launch a multimillion-dollar program this fall that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to overhaul how hospitals analyze medical imaging. Called PRIMED-AI, the initiative is designed to knit together radiology, pathology, cardiology and other imaging fields into a single framework, with the goal of improving precision medicine. For researchers, providers and insurers, the program marks a critical test of whether AI can deliver not only better care but also new reimbursement models that align costs with outcomes. Linking Precision Medicine to Value-Based Care NIH’s emphasis on multimodal integration signals a shift toward outcomes-driven healthcare. By combining imaging…

Nvidia is evaluating a $500 million investment in Wayve, a developer of embodied artificial intelligence for autonomous vehicles. Wayve said in a Thursday (Sept. 18) press release that it has signed a letter of intent with Nvidia to evaluate the investment ahead of Wayve’s next funding round. The companies have collaborated since 2018, with Wayve’s robot platforms using Nvidia technology, and Nvidia participated in Wayve’s $1.05 billion Series C funding round in May 2024. Together, they aim to provide automakers with production-ready autonomous driving technology that combines Wavye’s foundation model and Nvidia’s automotive-grade accelerated computing platforms, according to the release. The next Wayve platform, Wayve Gen…

There are too many unglamorous taxes on business growth to count, but B2B onboarding has long been one of the most headache-inducing. It’s a familiar story: a new client signs a contract, often after months of negotiation, only to be funneled into a gantlet of training webinars, static PDF guides and support queues. But for firms, the cost can be staggering. Every additional day between signature and successful adoption, after all, not just stretches the payback period but raises the risk of churn and drags down net revenue retention. Fortunately, that math is starting to shift. Artificial intelligence (AI), in…

Five witness told a House Financial Services subcommittee that AI is already changing the face of banking, improving back office operations and customer-facing interactions, but caution must govern use of the advanced technology in credit scoring and amid third-party vendor risks. At the Thursday afternoon (Sept. 18) hearing before the subcommittee on Digital Assets, Financial Technology, and Artificial Intelligence titled “Unlocking the Next Generation of AI in the U.S. Financial System for Consumers, Businesses, and Competitiveness,” panelists took note of the growth in generative artificial intelligence (AI) and agentic AI within banking. Gains in efficiency and inclusion must be balanced against risks…

OpenAI reportedly plans to work with at least two manufacturers that supply Apple when it begins production of its own devices. The artificial intelligence startup has signed a contract with Luxshare to assemble at least one device and has approached Goertek to supply components, The Information reported Friday (Sept. 19). Luxshare share assembles Apple iPhones and AirPods in China, while Goertek assembles AirPods, HomePods and Apple Watches, according to the report. The AI-powered devices OpenAI has considered making include a smart speaker, glasses, a digital voice recorder and a wearable pin, the report said. The company aims to release its first device late next year or in early 2027,…

Every unclicked search box is a treasure map, and Amazon just handed sellers a compass. By turning what shoppers can’t find into a to-do list for entrepreneurs, the eCommerce giant is recasting failure into an opportunity. Amazon is using its annual independent seller conference in Seattle to deepen its role as a partner to small businesses and brands. The company rolled out several artificial intelligence-driven tools designed to help sellers launch products faster, lower upfront risk and capture shopper demand more efficiently, according to a Thursday (Sept. 18) company blog post. The centerpiece is an upgraded Opportunity Explorer, which now parses billions of searches,…

Chinese technology giant Huawei announced its plans for the next generations of its Ascend chip line at the Huawei Connect 2025 event in Shanghai this week. In his keynote to the conference, deputy chair of the Huawei board, Eric Xu, said that 2025 had been a “memorable year,” and noted the debut of DeepSeek-R1 in January as a turning point for the company. He also acknowledged that China is likely to lag behind in semiconductor manufacturing process nodes, “for a relatively long time.” The company’s response to tariffs and trade embargoes is to advance infrastructure design and technology, plus it’s…

The moment a cardholder challenges a charge, it shifts from a quiet operational task to a critical customer touchpoint. Disputes are no longer just a back-office issue, said Shane Malloy, vice president of Value Added Services at Visa DPS. “It’s really one of the highest impact moments that a cardholder goes through,” he told PYMNTS. Research shows that a large percentage of cardholders say they would change their behavior based on a bad dispute experience. That elevates post-purchase interactions to a boardroom concern. “We’ve really seen that this is elevated from an experience that is not just really in the back office or operations, but really expands and is…

Meta has unveiled its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered smart glasses with a built-in screen.  The Meta Ray-Ban Display, introduced by CEO Mark Zuckerberg at an event Wednesday (Sept. 17) and set to sell for $799, features a screen that can display text messages, video calls, photos and the results of queries to Meta’s AI service. “And it isn’t on all the time — it’s designed for short interactions that you’re always in control of,” Meta’s announcement said. “This isn’t about strapping a phone to your face. It’s about helping you quickly accomplish some of your everyday tasks without breaking your flow.” Meta says each…

Incident management solutions firm Vibranium Labs has raised $4.6 million in seed funding. The new financing, announced Thursday (Sept. 18) will help the company scale Vibe AI, which the company calls the first artificial intelligence (AI) site reliability engineer (SRE) that uses agentic technology to monitor, triage and resolve IT incidents and outages. “Every outage carries hidden costs, lost revenue, shaken confidence and eroded trust,” Sang Lee, Vibranium Labs’ co-founder and CEO, said in a news release provided to PYMNTS. “For years, incident response has followed the same script: A senior engineer getting jolted awake at 2 a.m. on a Saturday, scrambling to…

Meta has reportedly held talks with media companies about using their articles for AI training. The tech giant has had discussions with companies including Axel Springer, Fox Corp and News Corp, about licensing their articles for use in its artificial intelligence (AI) tools, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Thursday (Sept. 18), citing sources familiar with the matter. The WSJ notes that this marks a shift for Meta, which has in recent years focused less on news content and has had an on-again, off-again relationship with publishers. After forging multimillion-dollar deals to include stories from outlets like the WSJ and New York Times in its News tab,…

Two years ago, Nscale was a brand new startup in the U.K. that had yet to raise any outside funding or officially announce its existence. Last year the London-based company came out of stealth, and in December announced that it had raised its Series A fundraising, totaling $155 million. Now, Nscale finds itself at the center of the action in the hottest market on the planet: artificial intelligence. And it has close to $700 million in fresh capital from Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company. In press releases on Tuesday, Nscale was named as an AI infrastructure partner for Nvidia, Microsoft and OpenAI, as the companies expand their…