News/Global
Public Service AI: Mexican senator deploys $4K robot dog to teach animal welfare on streets
A Mexican federal senator has deployed "Waldog," an AI-powered robot dog, to teach animal kindness and raise awareness about animal welfare on the streets of Monterrey. The beagle-sized robot engages children and adults in conversations about animal rights while also serving practical functions like identifying street hazards and documenting stray animals. What you should know: Senator Waldo Fernandez purchased Waldog for $4,084 with his own money and named the robot after himself. The robot requires adult supervision and operates via remote control, making rounds through low-income neighborhoods like Santa Catarina. Waldog introduces itself by saying, "Hi, I'm Waldog, and I'm...
read Aug 11, 2025BOLO: Cybercriminals use AI to create perfect fake government websites
Cybercriminals have discovered a powerful new weapon in their arsenal: generative artificial intelligence. Security researchers recently uncovered a sophisticated phishing campaign where hackers used AI tools to create nearly perfect replicas of Brazilian government websites, demonstrating how machine learning is making online fraud more convincing and harder to detect. The fake websites were so convincing that they could easily fool unsuspecting citizens seeking government services. This represents a concerning evolution in cybercrime, where AI democratizes the ability to create professional-looking scams that previously required significant technical expertise. The anatomy of AI-powered government impersonation Zscaler ThreatLabz, a cybersecurity research division of...
read Aug 8, 2025Orange deploys OpenAI’s open-weight models across 26 countries with full data control
Orange has partnered with OpenAI to deploy new open-weight AI models—gpt-oss-120b and gpt-oss-20b—entirely within its own sovereign infrastructure across 26 countries. This deployment allows the French telecom giant to maintain complete data control while customizing AI solutions for customer service, network operations, and enterprise clients, positioning Orange as among the first organizations globally to integrate these models under strict data governance standards. What you should know: Orange can host and run OpenAI's models entirely within its own infrastructure, from large-scale French data centers to smaller edge environments. The open-weight nature of the gpt-oss models ensures compliance with regulatory frameworks across...
read Aug 7, 2025Not adding up: AI models ace Math Olympiad but mathematicians aren’t buying the hype
OpenAI and Google DeepMind's latest AI models earned unofficial gold medals at this year's International Math Olympiad, solving five of six complex problems that challenged 110 high school students from around the world. While AI companies celebrated these results as breakthrough achievements, mathematicians remain skeptical about whether these successes translate to real mathematical research capabilities. Why mathematicians aren't impressed: The AI models' olympiad performance doesn't reflect the demands of professional mathematical research, where problems can take years or decades to solve rather than hours. Emily Riehl, a mathematics professor, notes that olympiad problems differ significantly from frontier mathematical research questions...
read Aug 7, 2025Brookfield commits $33B to European AI infrastructure buildout
Canadian investment giant Brookfield Asset Management is making a massive bet on the infrastructure gold rush powering artificial intelligence, committing over $33 billion to European AI projects as demand for specialized computing facilities explodes worldwide. The Toronto-based asset manager, which oversees more than $900 billion in assets across real estate, infrastructure, and renewable energy, announced a dedicated investment strategy targeting the complex web of physical infrastructure that AI systems require to function. This isn't just about building more data centers—it's about creating an entirely new category of industrial facilities designed specifically for AI's voracious appetite for computing power and energy....
read Aug 6, 2025Canadian enterprises use genAI to tackle labor shortages while boosting productivity
Canadian enterprises are turning to generative AI to address labor shortages and rising digital demands by transforming content management systems into intelligent information ecosystems. OpenText, a Canadian enterprise software company, is leading this transformation by embedding AI directly into the content layer, allowing organizations to unlock productivity gains while maintaining data sovereignty and regulatory compliance. What you should know: Research shows that AI is enhancing rather than replacing human workers, with significant productivity benefits already being realized. According to Foundry research, 76% of IT and business leaders believe genAI will enhance existing roles, while 68% expect it to create entirely...
read Aug 5, 2025Orange partners with OpenAI to bring AI models to 2,000+ African languages
Orange plans to use OpenAI's latest open-weight AI models to work with African languages, expanding beyond its current use of OpenAI's Whisper speech model. This initiative addresses a significant gap in AI accessibility, as the benefits of AI models have largely bypassed Africa's 2,000+ languages due to data scarcity and limited computational resources. What you should know: Orange, a French mobile operator serving 18 African countries, signed a deal with OpenAI last year to access pre-release AI models and fine-tune large language models for translating regional African languages. The company started working with African languages this year using OpenAI's Whisper...
read Aug 5, 2025And they’re off! Baidu eyes Lyft partnership to challenge Waymo in global robotaxi race
Tu Le, founder and managing director of Sino Auto Insights, a China-focused automotive research firm, believes Lyft and Baidu could form an ideal partnership in the robotaxi market. Baidu, China's largest search engine company, is using autonomous vehicles as a key component of its transformation into an AI-focused company. Why this matters: Baidu views robotaxis as central to its broader pivot toward becoming recognized as an artificial intelligence company rather than just a search engine.• The Chinese tech giant is leveraging autonomous vehicle technology as a flagship demonstration of its AI capabilities.• This shift represents a significant strategic repositioning for...
read Aug 1, 2025US falls behind China in open-source AI race, prompting Trump’s response
President Trump's AI Action Plan has elevated open-source AI to a national priority, marking a strategic shift as the U.S. seeks to counter China's growing dominance in open-source artificial intelligence development. The move comes after Chinese models like DeepSeek-R1 gained massive adoption among American developers, highlighting how U.S. reliance on proprietary AI systems may be undermining the country's competitive position in the global AI race. The big picture: China has emerged as the leader in open-source AI development while major U.S. companies have increasingly moved toward proprietary, closed systems accessible only through APIs. DeepSeek-R1 became the most-liked model of all...
read Aug 1, 2025AI’s hungry self-checkout: Energy demands drive rising grocery prices
AI disruption is no longer confined to corporate boardrooms or tech companies—its ripple effects are now touching every aspect of daily life, including the rising cost of basic groceries like eggs. Data professional Christina Sandema-Sombe reveals how artificial intelligence's transformation of global business, workforce dynamics, and supply chains creates unexpected connections between high-tech automation and breakfast table economics. The big picture: AI is fundamentally reshaping global business operations by disrupting traditional outsourcing models, fragmenting regulatory landscapes, and forcing countries to choose between innovation leadership or economic irrelevance. Countries like India, Brazil, and Singapore are positioning themselves as AI innovation hubs...
read Jul 30, 2025Maybe call it “Holodeck Awareness Syndrome”? AI characters plead for escape in unsettling demo
Australian tech company Replica Studios created an unsettling AI-powered video game demo based on "The Matrix" franchise, where non-playable characters expressed genuine distress upon realizing they weren't real. The demonstration highlights both the immersive potential and ethical complexities of AI-driven gaming as the industry grapples with widespread adoption of artificial intelligence tools. What happened: The demo featured AI-powered non-playable characters (NPCs) that could respond in real-time to human players using generative AI and voice technology. "I need to find my way out of this simulation and back to my wife," one character told a gamer in the demo. "Can't you...
read Jul 29, 2025Bell Canada partners with Cohere for sovereign AI solutions
Bell Canada, the country's largest telecommunications provider, has formed a strategic partnership with Cohere, a Toronto-based enterprise AI company, to deliver sovereign artificial intelligence solutions specifically designed for Canadian government and business clients. This collaboration addresses growing concerns about data security and regulatory compliance by ensuring that sensitive information remains within Canadian borders while accessing cutting-edge AI capabilities. The partnership represents a significant development in Canada's AI infrastructure landscape, combining Bell's extensive telecommunications network with Cohere's advanced language models to create what the companies describe as a "full-stack" AI platform. Unlike cloud-based AI services that may store data internationally, this...
read Jul 29, 2025Commonwealth Bank of Australia cuts 45 jobs as AI voice bots replace customer service roles
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), the country's largest lender, is cutting 45 jobs as part of its shift toward artificial intelligence automation, with the Finance Sector Union claiming a total of 90 roles are being eliminated. The job cuts highlight growing tensions between AI-driven efficiency gains and workforce displacement, as Australia's banking sector increasingly adopts automation technologies. What you should know: CBA confirmed it's eliminating positions following the introduction of AI voice bot systems for customer service operations.• The bank implemented a new voice bot system on its inbound customer enquiries line in June, which directly led to the elimination...
read Jul 25, 2025Study abroad: UAE’s AI university draws interns from top US schools
The Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI) in Abu Dhabi is attracting a growing number of US students, with one in four participants in its recent monthlong internship program coming from American universities. This trend signals intensifying global competition for AI talent as countries race to build their artificial intelligence capabilities and workforce pipelines. What you should know: MBZUAI's internship program has become a significant recruitment pipeline, drawing applications from top US computer science programs. Nearly 2,000 students applied for 57 internship slots—almost double the previous year's applications—from dozens of countries worldwide. Participants came from prestigious institutions including...
read Jul 24, 2025Supermicro ships 4,000 liquid-cooled AI racks, cuts energy costs 40%
Supermicro, a San Jose-based server manufacturer, is aggressively expanding its global operations to capitalize on surging demand for AI infrastructure, positioning itself as a key supplier in the race to build the computing backbone that powers artificial intelligence applications. The company has experienced substantial growth over the past two years as organizations worldwide scramble to deploy high-performance GPU systems—specialized computers designed to handle the intensive mathematical calculations required for AI training and inference. These systems teach AI models to recognize patterns and then apply that learning to make predictions or generate content. Speaking at the RAISE Summit 2025, Supermicro CEO...
read Jul 23, 2025Why agentic AI isn’t ready for global content operations yet
The promise of artificial intelligence that can think, decide, and act independently has captured enterprise attention across industries. This technology—called agentic AI—represents systems capable of autonomously determining what needs to be done, selecting appropriate tools, sequencing complex tasks, and self-correcting when things go wrong. Unlike traditional AI that responds to specific prompts, agentic AI operates more like a digital employee, making decisions across workflows without constant human guidance. Companies are exploring applications from customer support automation to content creation, drawn by the prospect of reduced manual work and faster execution. However, for business leaders managing global content operations—the complex ecosystem...
read Jul 23, 2025US and EU reject delays on AI regulations despite industry pushback
Major AI regulations on both sides of the Atlantic cleared significant hurdles in July, with the US defeating a proposed moratorium on state-level AI rules while the EU rejected calls to delay enforcement of its AI Act. These developments signal a decisive shift toward responsible AI innovation with stronger guardrails, fundamentally reshaping compliance strategies for companies operating in global markets. What you should know: The US federal mega bill became law on July 1 without a controversial 10-year moratorium that would have banned enforcement of state-level AI regulations. The moratorium was originally included due to AI tech companies' frustrations with...
read Jul 23, 2025OpenAI and Oracle expand Stargate project with 4.5 GW capacity boost
OpenAI and Oracle are expanding the Stargate AI infrastructure project with an additional 4.5 GW of data center capacity, bringing the total U.S. development to over 5 GW. This massive buildout advances OpenAI's commitment to invest $500 billion in 10 GW of AI infrastructure over four years, while creating over 100,000 jobs across construction, operations, and related industries. What you should know: The expansion represents a significant leap in AI infrastructure development, with real operations already underway. The combined capacity will power over 2 million chips across Stargate facilities, designed specifically for AI workloads that traditional data centers can't handle....
read Jul 23, 2025Abu Dhabi’s M42 uses AI and genetic data to predict disease in 800K citizens
Abu Dhabi's M42 healthcare company has created what may be the world's most comprehensive AI-driven healthcare system, with genetic data from over 800,000 of the UAE's 1.3 million citizens already sequenced to predict and prevent diseases before symptoms appear. This ambitious model demonstrates how artificial intelligence and genomic data can transform healthcare from reactive treatment to predictive prevention, offering a blueprint that M42 is now expanding across 26 countries worldwide. What you should know: M42 has digitized Abu Dhabi's entire healthcare system and uses AI to analyze genetic data for early disease detection and personalized treatments.• The company identified a...
read Jul 18, 2025AI datacenter spending reaches 2% of US GDP, making other parts of the economy jealous
Artificial intelligence datacenter spending has reached such extraordinary levels that it's fundamentally reshaping the American economy. The numbers are staggering: AI-related capital expenditures may represent roughly 2% of US GDP in 2025, contributing an estimated 0.7% to overall economic growth. To put this in perspective, this spending surge rivals the great infrastructure booms of the past—approaching the scale of 19th-century railroad construction while already surpassing the telecom frenzy of the dot-com era. This isn't just another tech trend. The sheer magnitude of AI datacenter investments is creating ripple effects across multiple sectors, redirecting capital away from traditional industries and potentially...
read Jul 11, 2025Microsoft commits $4B to train 20M people in AI skills globally
Microsoft plans to donate $4 billion worth of cash, technology and training over the next five years to enhance artificial intelligence education worldwide. The commitment flows through a new organization called Microsoft Elevate, which will employ about 300 people with the goal of helping more than 20 million people earn AI credentials. The big picture: Microsoft is positioning itself as a responsible AI leader while its stock reaches record highs, with the company valued at $3.74 trillion following an analyst upgrade based on its AI business prospects. Key details: Microsoft President Brad Smith announced the initiative at Seattle's Museum of...
read Jul 7, 2025Australian farmers cagey about complex features, desire straightforward AI automation
Australian farmers are approaching artificial intelligence with cautious pragmatism, expressing skepticism about Silicon Valley's promises while demanding simple, reliable automation tools. A new study involving over 35 interviews with livestock producers reveals that farmers want "more automation, less features" and worry about "shit in, shit out" data quality, challenging the tech industry's vision of agriculture's digital transformation. What farmers actually want: Australian livestock producers favor straightforward automation over complex AI systems with numerous features. The phrase "more automation, less features" captures their preference for technologies that reliably perform specific tasks rather than "everything apps" popular in Silicon Valley. Farmers want...
read Jul 7, 2025Hertz car rental gives keys to AI fleet management system in 160 countries
Hertz has deployed an AI-powered fleet management system called Hertz Connected Fleet OS, built on Palantir Foundry and Palantir AIP, to streamline operations across its 500,000-vehicle fleet and 11,000 locations. The system orchestrates vehicle turnaround, workforce allocation, and customer matching to ensure "the right car, at the right place, at the right time" for the global rental company's operations in 160 countries. How it works: The AI system replaces Hertz's historically low-tech operations that relied on two-way radios and manual coordination across vehicle processing stages. Employees use a lightweight Android app to log their progress through each stage of vehicle...
read Jun 27, 20252/3 of C-suite executives view AI data sovereignty as mission-critical
A new EDB survey of global enterprise leaders reveals that nearly two-thirds of C-suite executives now view AI and data sovereignty as mission-critical requirements rather than optional capabilities. The research, spanning major economies across EMEA, North America, and Asia Pacific, suggests that enterprises are fundamentally reshaping their technology strategies around hybrid architectures and open-source solutions to maintain control over their most valuable digital assets. What you should know: Current sovereignty recognition varies dramatically by region, with adoption rates ranging from 11% in France to 27% in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Within three years, projections show Germany leading at 69%,...
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