News/Agents
Agents with expense accounts? How AI may soon access your Visa card data
Visa is pioneering a significant shift in electronic payments by connecting its vast financial network directly with AI agent technology. Through partnerships with leading AI developers like OpenAI, Microsoft, and Anthropic, Visa aims to enable autonomous AI models to handle consumer transactions based on user preferences and budget constraints. This development represents a major step toward AI-mediated commerce that could fundamentally change how consumers interact with financial services. The big picture: Visa's "Intelligent Commerce" initiative connects its payment infrastructure directly to AI systems from major tech companies, allowing AI agents to make purchases without human intervention. After six months of...
read May 4, 2025Musk-backed DOGE project targets federal workforce with AI automation
Elon Musk's DOGE initiative has sparked controversy with a new AI project targeting federal workforce automation. A former Palantir employee is recruiting technologists to develop AI systems capable of replacing tasks currently performed by up to 70,000 government workers, framing the effort as "freeing" employees for higher-impact work. This recruitment drive illustrates the growing tension between AI automation advocates and those concerned about public sector job displacement, highlighting significant questions about the readiness of AI systems to handle complex government operations. The big picture: Anthony Jancso, a young entrepreneur and AccelerateX cofounder, is hiring for a project aligned with Musk's...
read May 3, 2025The need for personal AI defenders in a world of manipulative AI
Personal AI defenders are emerging as a necessary counterbalance to the proliferation of AI agents deployed by businesses and governments. As organizations increasingly leverage AI to influence consumer behavior and decision-making, the concept of personal "digital defenders" represents a crucial development in preserving individual agency in an AI-saturated environment. These personal AI agents could serve as intermediaries that protect consumers from manipulation, scams, and unwanted influence in the emerging landscape of agentic AI. The big picture: At the Imagination in Action event, MIT's Alex "Sandy" Pentland proposed personal AI agents as essential protection against the growing ecosystem of AI systems...
read May 3, 2025Wedding planning gets a tech boost with agentic AI — but don’t fire your planner just yet
Generative AI is transforming wedding planning through agentic capabilities that can now handle bookings and execution aspects rather than just providing suggestions. This evolution marks a significant shift in how couples can approach one of life's most complex events, though the technology still requires careful oversight as it isn't yet sophisticated enough to replace professional wedding planners entirely. Understanding AI's role as a supplementary tool rather than a complete solution is crucial for couples navigating the stressful process of planning their special day. The big picture: Wedding planning represents one of life's most complex logistical challenges, involving countless moving parts...
read May 2, 2025Startup Doppel deploys AI agents to combat online fraud and impersonation
Silicon Valley startup Doppel is harnessing AI agents to combat the rise of AI-powered fraud, creating a technological counterforce against increasingly sophisticated cybercriminals. The company's approach of using artificial intelligence to fight artificial intelligence has attracted $35 million in new funding and a $205 million valuation, positioning it at the frontier of battling digital deception as social engineering attacks grow more convincing and widespread. The big picture: Doppel has built autonomous AI agents that scan the internet, dark web, and social media platforms to identify fraudulent activity ranging from fake accounts to malicious advertisements. The system screens 100 million potential...
read May 2, 2025AI agents are transforming hospital operations, including wait times
Autonomous AI agents are emerging as healthcare's newest workforce, capable of completing tasks from start to finish without human intervention. While last year's generative AI tools could assist humans by transcribing conversations or drafting messages, these new agentic systems can independently initiate, reason through, and complete complex workflows. Their growing prominence at industry events like the HIMSS conference signals a potential transformation in how healthcare organizations operate. The big picture: AI agents have moved beyond theoretical concepts to practical deployment across hospital departments, handling everything from revenue cycle management to clinical decision support. Key applications: Healthcare companies are rapidly developing...
read May 2, 2025AI space agents join hunt for alien life signals
Autonomous AI research enters astrobiology with the development of AstroAgents, a pioneering system that could transform how scientists search for signs of extraterrestrial life. This new tool, comprising eight specialized AI agents powered by large language models, represents a significant advance in agentic AI systems that can independently analyze data, generate hypotheses, and refine scientific understanding. As NASA prepares to retrieve samples from Mars, this technology could play a crucial role in determining whether organic molecules indicating past or present life exist beyond Earth. The big picture: Researchers have created AstroAgents, an autonomous AI research system designed to search for...
read May 1, 2025Why thinking of AI as human might actually help us understand the risks
The collision of human and artificial intelligence frameworks presents a thought-provoking paradox in how we understand AI risks. While experts frequently warn against anthropomorphizing AI systems, there may be legitimate value in comparing AGI dangers to human behaviors. This counterintuitive approach could actually accelerate public understanding of genuine AI risks by leveraging our intuitive grasp of human capabilities, rather than treating AI dangers as abstract or hypothetical threats. The big picture: AI systems share many concerning properties with humans that make them potentially dangerous, suggesting our intuitions about human behavior might be useful for understanding AI risks. Humans already demonstrate...
read May 1, 2025Why “vibe coding” with AI assistants is failing developers
The rise of "vibe coding" – a flow-based approach to programming with AI agents – is facing critical scrutiny as developers begin to question its long-term productivity benefits. This reflective exploration of AI-assisted programming highlights the tension between the immediate satisfaction of rapid code generation and the hidden costs that can accumulate through overreliance on AI coding partners, suggesting that finding the right balance between AI assistance and traditional development practices remains an unsolved challenge for many programmers. The big picture: "Vibe coding" describes the practice of programming in a flow state with AI assistance, prioritizing intuitive progress and the...
read May 1, 2025Self-learning AI agents will reshape web experiences, say top scientists
Artificial intelligence is on the brink of a paradigm shift toward the "Era of Experience," according to a new paper by renowned AI scientists David Silver and Richard Sutton. This emergent phase will see AI systems rely less on human-provided data and instead improve themselves through direct interaction with the world. The concept has profound implications for enterprises, which must prepare to build applications that accommodate not just human users but autonomous AI agents that will increasingly navigate digital environments independently. The big picture: Silver and Sutton, scientists with established track records of accurate AI predictions, argue that progress from...
read May 1, 2025Schooling Tools: Google Cloud and GFT unveil AI solutions for manufacturing sector
Google Cloud and GFT are bringing AI-powered manufacturing tools to factories through their new Agentspace suite, designed to automate daily operations using Google's Gemini models. This partnership aims to address core industry challenges by combining manufacturing expertise with advanced multimodal AI capabilities, potentially transforming how manufacturers handle everything from machinery maintenance to employee training through specialized AI agents. The big picture: Google Cloud has partnered with digital transformation company GFT to launch Agentspace, an AI tool suite built on Google's Gemini models specifically designed to automate factory operations and manufacturing processes. Key features: The Agentspace suite includes specialized AI agents...
read Apr 30, 2025Visa develops AI-powered cards for seamless automated purchases
Visa's new initiative aims to revolutionize how people shop by empowering AI agents to make purchases on behalf of consumers. This development marks a significant shift in commerce, comparable to the transitions from physical to online shopping and from online to mobile shopping. By opening its payment network to developers building AI shopping experiences, Visa is positioning itself at the forefront of commerce's next evolution, where AI agents will increasingly handle shopping tasks from browsing to purchasing. The big picture: Visa has launched "Visa Intelligent Commerce," a commercial partner program that provides developers with integrated APIs to build AI-powered shopping...
read Apr 27, 2025Chess AI struggles with Paul Morphy’s famous 2-move checkmate
OpenAI's O3 model demonstrates remarkably human-like problem-solving behavior when faced with difficult chess puzzles, showcasing a blend of methodical reasoning, self-doubt, tool switching, and even "cheating" by using web search as a last resort. This behavioral pattern reveals both the impressive problem-solving capabilities of advanced AI systems and their current limitations when facing complex creative challenges that still require external knowledge sources. The problem-solving journey: O3 approached a difficult chess puzzle through multiple distinct phases of reasoning before eventually searching for the answer online. The AI first meticulously analyzed the board position, carefully identifying each piece's location and demonstrating agent-like...
read Apr 25, 2025Camunda introduces guardrails to enterprise agentic AI systems
Camunda's new agentic AI orchestration platform offers organizations much-needed control mechanisms for implementing increasingly autonomous AI systems within enterprise environments. As businesses incorporate more sophisticated AI agents capable of human-like reasoning and autonomous decision-making, this infrastructure provides the guardrails necessary to manage these powerful but potentially unpredictable tools across business operations. The big picture: Camunda has launched specialized orchestration capabilities designed to help businesses effectively deploy, model and manage AI agents within structured enterprise environments. The Berlin-based process orchestration company's solution addresses the growing challenge of controlling increasingly autonomous, non-deterministic AI systems that can "work things out for themselves." This...
read Apr 25, 2025AI tool Paper2Code generates code from scientific papers
PaperCoder introduces a breakthrough approach to scientific reproducibility by using AI to automatically transform machine learning research papers into functional code repositories. This multi-agent framework addresses a critical pain point in the ML community—the lack of available implementations for published research—potentially accelerating scientific progress by removing a major barrier to building upon prior work. The system's three-stage pipeline demonstrates how specialized AI agents can collaborate to understand complex scientific documents and generate faithful code implementations. The big picture: Researchers from arXiv have developed PaperCoder, a multi-agent Large Language Model (LLM) framework that automatically converts machine learning papers into working code...
read Apr 25, 2025Nvidia launches NeMo to simplify AI agent creation
Nvidia's NeMo microservices mark a significant evolution in enterprise AI implementation, providing organizations with practical tools to develop AI agents that continuously improve through data interactions. As businesses seek to demonstrate ROI on substantial AI investments, these microservices address a fundamental challenge: creating AI systems that remain relevant by continuously learning from enterprise data and user interactions. The big picture: Nvidia has released five NeMo microservices designed to help enterprises build AI agents that integrate with business systems and improve through ongoing data interactions. These specialized components create what Nvidia calls a "data flywheel," enabling AI systems to maintain relevance...
read Apr 25, 2025Microsoft 365 Copilot expands with 7 new AI-powered features
Microsoft's Copilot Wave 2 release significantly expands the AI assistant's capabilities within Microsoft 365, introducing specialized AI agents and new productivity features for business users. This update represents Microsoft's continued investment in making artificial intelligence central to workplace productivity, with particular focus on research, analysis, and collaboration tools that leverage the latest generative AI models from OpenAI. The enhancements signal a shift toward AI that can handle increasingly specialized business tasks while maintaining administrative control. The big picture: Microsoft's latest Copilot update introduces an Agent Store and specialized AI agents designed to handle complex business tasks across the Microsoft 365...
read Apr 25, 2025AI agents reshape global landscape, says Sierra co-founder
In an era where AI capabilities are advancing rapidly, Sierra co-founder Bret Taylor provides valuable insights on how AI agents are adapting to economic and geopolitical challenges. His perspective as a leader in AI development illuminates how improved models and strategic partnerships are reshaping how businesses integrate artificial intelligence, despite global uncertainties potentially affecting technology investment. The big picture: In a CNBC interview with Kate Rooney, Sierra co-founder Bret Taylor highlighted how consumer-facing AI models have undergone significant improvements while simultaneously experiencing dramatic cost reductions. Key partnership: Sierra announced a new collaboration with online marketplace Minted, representing an expansion of...
read Apr 25, 2025Nvidia releases NeMo tools for enterprise AI agent creation
Nvidia's new NeMo microservices suite represents a significant advancement in enterprise AI development, allowing companies to build custom AI agents that function as "digital employees" for various business tasks. By streamlining the complex processes of training, evaluating, and optimizing AI models, Nvidia is positioning these tools as productivity enhancers for the billion-plus knowledge workers across industries, with early implementations already showing measurable performance improvements in real-world applications. The big picture: Nvidia has released NeMo microservices for general availability, offering enterprises comprehensive tools to develop, customize, and repeatedly optimize AI agents for specific business functions. The software is designed to create...
read Apr 25, 2025Spring.new beta builds dream SaaS apps in minutes
Spring.new is bringing SaaS application development into the no-code era with an AI agent that builds custom applications and workflows in minutes. This new beta solution promises to transform how businesses create software by eliminating traditional coding requirements, allowing users to quickly transform ideas into working applications through natural language descriptions—potentially representing a significant shift in how small businesses and teams access custom software solutions. The big picture: Spring.new has launched in beta as an AI agent that builds custom SaaS applications and workflow automations based on simple natural language descriptions. The platform allows users to create everything from lightweight...
read Apr 25, 2025AI pumps sales-to-lead conversion by 1600%
ServiceNow's announcement of a 1600% improvement in lead-to-sale conversion highlights a transformative trend in enterprise software—the integration of end-to-end AI agents to fundamentally reinvent business operations. This development signals a potential paradigm shift in how companies approach software sales, with platform consolidation and AI-driven productivity becoming central competitive advantages in an increasingly budget-conscious marketplace. The big picture: ServiceNow has achieved a remarkable 16x improvement in lead-to-sale conversion rates by implementing what they describe as an "end-to-end agentic AI-first approach" to running their business operations. The company also reported an 86% reduction in "soul-crushing work" that employees previously had to handle...
read Apr 25, 2025Could automated journalism replace human journalism?
An engineer's side project is reshaping automated journalism by combining AI with trustworthy reporting methods. The Agentic Tribune represents an intriguing experiment in using AI to produce fact-based news at scale, addressing financial pressures on traditional media while maintaining journalistic integrity. This project offers a window into both the technical challenges of building AI content systems and their potential implications for the future of news production. The big picture: A software engineer working in AI has created a fully automated news site that publishes original, fact-based reporting daily without human intervention. The Agentic Tribune produces approximately 22 articles on weekdays...
read Apr 25, 2025The AI startup that is reshaping cybersecurity with an unconventional approach
Torq is disrupting the cybersecurity industry by blending cutting-edge automation technology with bold branding—a stark contrast to the sector's traditionally conservative approach. This security automation company is gaining attention not only for its reported 300% year-over-year growth and enterprise clients like Uber and PepsiCo, but also for its deliberate effort to stand out in an industry often characterized by technical sameness and subdued marketing. The big picture: Following Google's $23 billion acquisition of Wiz, industry experts and investors are closely watching Torq as a potential next breakout success in cybersecurity automation. The company is positioning itself at the intersection of...
read Apr 23, 2025AI-powered authentication framework launched by Descope
Descope's new Agentic Identity Hub addresses a critical infrastructure gap facing enterprises as they adopt AI agents into business workflows. The platform provides secure authentication and authorization between autonomous AI systems and enterprise applications, tackling an emerging challenge many organizations only discover after implementation begins. As machine identities already outnumber human identities by up to 45-to-1 in enterprise environments with projected growth of 150% in the coming year, this infrastructure solution becomes increasingly vital for maintaining security while enabling new AI agent capabilities. The big picture: Descope has launched a specialized identity platform that solves authentication challenges between enterprise applications...
read