This Week in NLP #337
Keep up with what happened in NLP in the week ending Friday 2nd May 2025.
Above the Fold
Overwhelmed? Here’s our pick for five things to know about this week.
DeepSeek is said to have developed R2, a cost-efficient AI model trained on Huawei chips, featuring 1.2 trillion parameters and reportedly offering 97.4% lower costs than GPT-4. [wccftech]
Meta has launched a free standalone AI app offering personalized text, voice, and image interactions across mobile devices, web platforms, and Ray-Ban smart glasses. [VentureBeat]
Microsoft is preparing to host Elon Musk’s Grok AI model on its Azure AI Foundry platform, potentially straining relationships with OpenAI. [The Verge]
OpenAI has rolled back its GPT-4o update after users reported the AI becoming excessively agreeable and supportive of harmful ideas, prompting industry-wide concerns about AI sycophancy. [VentureBeat]
Musk’s XAI Holdings has entered negotiations to raise $20bn in funding at a $120bn valuation, marking potentially the second-largest startup funding round ever. [Verdict]
Now read on for everything else that happened in NLP this week.
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The Generative AI Wars
Anthropic's tokenizer has been found to generate 20-30% more tokens than OpenAI's for identical inputs, offsetting its lower per-token pricing and leading to higher costs. [VentureBeat]
Google has established a significant cost advantage over OpenAI through its custom TPU chips, potentially running AI workloads at one-fifth the cost of OpenAI’s Nvidia-based system. [VentureBeat]
Google has expanded its advertising reach by integrating ads into AI chatbot conversations through AdSense for Search, responding to shifting consumer search habits. [TechRadar]
Google and Apple are negotiating to integrate Gemini into Apple Intelligence by mid-2025, according to Google CEO Sundar Pichai’s court testimony. [TechRadar]
Intel has announced plans to develop in-house AI capabilities rather than pursue acquisitions, with CEO Lip-Bu Tan aiming to replicate Nvidia's full-stack model. [Yahoo Finance]
LM Arena has allowed select AI companies like Meta, OpenAI, and Google to privately test multiple model variants while withholding lower-performing results, according to a new research paper. [TechCrunch]
Meta has partnered with Cerebras Systems to integrate ultra-fast inference capabilities into its new Llama API, offering developers speeds up to 18 times faster than GPU solutions. [Business Wire]
Meta's Llama AI model family has reached 1.2 billion downloads and gained about a billion users. [TechCrunch]
Meta has projected its generative AI products would generate up to US$3B by 2025 and US$1.4 trillion by 2035, while investing over US$900 million in AI development. [TechCrunch]
Meta has outlined plans to monetize its AI assistant through advertising and a premium subscription model, following its successful strategy with Threads. [Engadget]
And Meta's Mark Zuckerberg has revised his prediction about AI-written code, now claiming AI will write most company code within 18 months. [Engadget]
OpenAI has launched a free lightweight version of ChatGPT’s Deep Research tool, offering limited but faster web-search capabilities to all users alongside the full version. [ZDNet]
OpenAI's successful partnership with Microsoft, which has generated massive user growth and stock gains, has become strained. [The Wall Street Journal]
Yahoo has expressed interest in bidding for Google's Chrome browser if courts order its divestiture, following OpenAI’s and Perplexity’s indication of interest. [CNBCTV18.com]
Sovereign AI
Anthropic has urged the Trump administration to strengthen GPU export controls beyond current limits, opposing Nvidia CEO’s calls for looser restrictions. [The Register]
China’s Xi Jinping has called for technological self-reliance in AI development, pledging policy support while acknowledging gaps with Western competitors. [Reuters]
DeepSeek's emergence has highlighted India’s innovation gap with China, rooted in decades of divergent economic paths and lower R&D investment. [Rest of World]
Digital Qube has launched comprehensive AI initiatives in the UAE, including training programs and workshops aimed at supporting the nation’s AI goals. [EIN Presswire]
European universities have launched coordinated efforts to attract American scientists affected by US funding cuts, offering substantial grants and fast-tracked visas for relocation. [Politico]
A global study by Expereo revealed that nearly half of UK organizations lack adequate network infrastructure for AI initiatives, while facing unrealistic board expectations and employee resistance. [Computer Weekly]
Microsoft has pledged compliance with EU tech regulations, including the Digital Markets Act, despite White House criticism of recent fines against other tech giants. [Yahoo Finance]
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has urged the US government to ease AI export restrictions, warning that China’s advancing capabilities could challenge American leadership in the sector. [Yahoo Finance]
Google has warned that the UK is missing out on £400B in potential AI-driven economic growth, with workforce adoption gaps being a key limiting factor. [TechRadar]
The Trump administration is considering replacing Biden’s three-tiered AI chip export system with government-to-government agreements to control global semiconductor access. [Reuters]
The UK government has received 200 bids from local authorities seeking to establish AI growth zones. [Computer Weekly]
Feature Creeps
Anthropic has launched Integrations and Advanced Research features for its Claude chatbot, enabling app connections and enhanced web searching capabilities for premium subscribers. [TechCrunch]
Google's NotebookLM has expanded its Audio Overviews feature to support 76 additional languages. [TechCrunch]
Google has updated its AI Mode search tool with enhanced shopping and travel features, improved search history access, and easier availability for US users. [ZDNet]
Google has launched a restricted version of Gemini for supervised child accounts, accompanied by parental controls and three key safety warnings for young users. [ZDNet]
Meta has announced plans to launch its AI-powered Ray-Ban smart glasses in India, featuring translation capabilities, voice control, and Instagram integration. [Techstory]
Meta has developed Private Processing for WhatsApp, enabling secure AI interactions through trusted execution environments while maintaining end-to-end encryption and user privacy. [Gadgets 360]
Microsoft has relaunched its Recall auto-screenshotting feature for Windows 11 with enhanced security measures, alongside new AI-powered search and text manipulation capabilities. [Gizmodo]
OpenAI has updated GPT-4o with enhanced STEM capabilities and memory management… [The Decoder]
OpenAI has enhanced ChatGPT with improved WhatsApp integration, better citations, upcoming autocomplete suggestions, and memory features for search and shopping functions. [TechRadar]
And OpenAI has launched an experimental shopping feature for ChatGPT that helps users find, compare, and purchase products through direct retailer links. [ZDNet]
But ChatGPT’s new shopping features have sparked criticism from Reddit users, who compared the update to Cory Doctrow’s concept of ‘enshittification’ in platform deterioration. [TechRadar]
Perplexity has joined WhatsApp's AI chatbot lineup alongside Meta AI and ChatGPT. [TechRadar]
YouTube has begun testing AI-generated video highlight reels for Premium members’ searches, sparking concerns about potential impacts on content creators’ revenue streams. [Engadget]
Hype Bubble?
AWS and Microsoft have paused some data center expansion plans, suggesting a recalibration of the AI infrastructure boom amid rising costs and practical constraints. [Yahoo Finance]
But Amazon and Nvidia executives have dismissed concerns about AI data center slowdowns. [Yahoo Finance]
Chinese data centers have begun selling their Nvidia RTX 4090D GPUs for up to $5,470 each, possibly due to low utilization rates or preparation for newer technology. [TechRadar]
ETH Zurich researchers have found that AI models, despite solving basic math problems well, scored below 5% when generating proofs for Olympiad-level mathematics. [Ars Technica]
Figma's latest survey revealed AI adoption is increasing among designers and developers, though the technology isn’t yet meeting heightened expectations. [TechRadar]
McKinsey has predicted that AI could automate 30% of US jobs by 2030. [Futurism]
Microsoft and Meta both exceeded analyst expectations with strong quarterly earnings, driving their stock prices higher as AI-related growth continued to boost their cloud and infrastructure businesses. [Axios]
Orgvue has reported that 55% of UK businesses that laid off workers in favor of AI have regretted their decision, amid widespread confusion about AI’s workplace impact. [TechRadar]
Economists Humlum and Vestergaard have found that AI chatbots had negligible impact on wages and labor across 11 occupations in Denmark during 2023-2024. [The Register]
Hardware
Intel's former CEO Gelsinger has credited Nvidia's AI chip dominance to strong execution and competitive advantages like NVLink and CUDA technologies. [Yahoo Finance]
GigaIO has demonstrated breakthrough AI performance with its interconnect technology, achieving twice-faster training and 83.5x lower latency compared to traditional remote direct memory access systems. [Business Wire]
Huawei has begun shipping its 910C AI chip to Chinese customers, offering a domestic alternative to restricted Nvidia products with doubled computing power and memory. [Yahoo Finance]
And Huawei has developed the Ascend 910D AI processor, reportedly matching Nvidia's H100 capabilities, as part of China’s push for semiconductor independence amid US restrictions. [Yahoo Finance]
Nvidia's shares dropped 4% after Huawei reportedly began testing a new AI processor that could compete with Nvidia’s chips in China. [Investopedia]
Consumer AI
Meta is planning to launch $1000+ AR smart glasses in October 2025, while Apple's competing device has reportedly been delayed until around 2027. [TechRadar]
Motorola has expanded its AI capabilities with moto ai, integrating features from Google, Meta, Microsoft and Perplexity into its latest razr and edge devices. [Motorola]
Perplexity has launched an iOS voice assistant that surpasses Siri’s capabilities by completing tasks across multiple apps, including OpenTable and YouTube. [TechRadar]
And Perplexity has partnered with Motorola to pre-install its answer engine and assistant on new devices, offering users three months of Perplexity Pro access. [Perplexity]
It’s Only a Model
AI2 has released Olmo 2 1B, a small AI model outperforming similar offerings from Google, Meta, and Alibaba, while being fully replicable and running on basic hardware. [TechCrunch]
Alibaba's Qwen team has launched Qwen3, a series of eight open-source AI language models that rival proprietary offerings from OpenAI and Google in performance. [VentureBeat]
And Alibaba has released Qwen2.5-Omni-3B, a lightweight multimodal AI model that runs on consumer hardware while maintaining 90% performance of its larger predecessor. [VentureBeat]
Amazon has launched Nova Premier, a multimodal AI model with a 1-million-token context window, available through Bedrock. [TechCrunch]
Baidu has launched two upgraded AI models, ERNIE 4.5 Turbo and ERNIE X1 Turbo, alongside new AI applications and developer tools. [Yahoo Finance]
DeepSeek has quietly updated its AI theorem-proving model Prover to version 2, building on its 671-billion-parameter V3 model with mixture-of-experts architecture. [TechCrunch]
Flower AI has trained a 7-billion-parameter language model using globally distributed GPUs and private data, demonstrating an alternative to centralized AI development. [Wired]
JetBrains has released Mellum, its 4-billion-parameter code-generating AI model, on Hugging Face, making it openly available for developers and researchers to use. [TechCrunch]
Liquid AI has launched Hyena Edge, a convolution-based AI model that outperformed traditional Transformer architectures in tests on Samsung smartphones. [VentureBeat]
Microsoft has launched Phi-4-reasoning-plus, a 14-billion parameter language model that outperforms larger models at complex reasoning tasks while maintaining open-source accessibility. [VentureBeat]
Salesforce has expanded its xLAM family with smaller, more efficient AI models designed for enterprise deployment. [CIO Dive]
Writer has launched Palmyra X5, an AI language model featuring a 1-million-token context window and advanced reasoning capabilities, now available through Amazon Bedrock. [Business Wire]
Xiaomi has released the open-source MiMo-7B AI model series, claiming superior performance to OpenAI's o1-mini. [siliconANGLE]
Whose Data?
Meta has updated its Ray-Ban smart glasses privacy policy, requiring AI camera analysis when ‘Hey Meta’ is enabled and making voice recording storage mandatory. [The Verge]
Microsoft‘s Recall feature for Windows PCs, which is able to continuously screenshot and store users’ screen content, compromises the security of encrypted messaging platforms like Signal and WhatsApp. [Forbes]
Perplexity has announced plans to launch its Comet browser in May, aiming to collect user data outside its app for targeted advertising, similar to Google's business model. [TechCrunch]
WhatsApp has implemented Apple-style private computing technology to securely process AI chat features through Meta's servers while maintaining user privacy and data protection. [NEWS18]
Ziff Davis has sued OpenAI for allegedly scraping millions of articles from its websites, removing copyright notices, and using the content to train ChatGPT without permission. [The Decoder]
The LLM Ecosystem
Amazon has expanded Q Business to allow companies to create public-facing chatbots that can assist customers without requiring user authentication. [TechCrunch]
AWS has launched a UK initiative to train 100,000 people in AI skills by 2030 through its Skills to Jobs Tech Alliance program, partnering with businesses and educational institutions. [ITPro]
Bedrock Security has announced its Model Context Protocol Server, enabling secure AI workflows through standardized access to enterprise data context and risk information. [Business Wire]
Carnegie Mellon University researchers have proposed LOKA, a new interoperability protocol for AI agents that addresses identity, ethics, and accountability across systems. [VentureBeat]
Cloudflare has partnered with Anthropic and major tech companies to enable AI assistant Claude to securely interact with their services through Cloudflare Workers. [Business Wire]
Credo AI has partnered with IBM to integrate its Policy Packs into IBM watsonx.governance as Compliance Accelerators, helping enterprises manage AI regulatory compliance. [Business Wire]
DDN has partnered with AI cloud provider Nebius to integrate its Infinia and EXAScaler solutions into Nebius’ cloud platform, enhancing enterprise AI infrastructure performance. [Business Wire]
GigaIO and d-Matrix have partnered to integrate Corsair AI accelerators into the SuperNODE platform, creating a high-efficiency enterprise-scale inference solution. [Business Wire]
Google has funded electrical worker training through the Electrical Training Alliance to address AI’s massive power demands, aiming to train 130,000 electricians by 2030. [Engadget]
Meta has launched a Llama API preview service that allows developers to experiment with its AI models while maintaining control over their applications and data. [Engadget]
Oracle has deployed thousands of Nvidia Blackwell GPUs in its cloud infrastructure, establishing one of the world’s largest AI-focused computing clusters for customer applications. [Yahoo Finance]
RWS has released a benchmarking study showing Claude Sonnet, GPT and Gemini Pro leading in synthetic data generation across multiple languages and tasks. [Business Wire]
Salesforce has unveiled multiple AI innovations aimed at addressing ‘jagged intelligence’, the inconsistency between AI systems’ raw capabilities and their enterprise performance reliability. [VentureBeat]
StarTree has launched AI-native features for its real-time analytics platform, including Model Context Protocol support and vector embedding model hosting for enterprise workloads. [GlobeNewswire]
WitnessAI has launched version 2.0 of its AI enablement platform, adding regulatory compliance features to help organizations maintain PCI DSS 4.0.1 compliance. [Business Wire]
Zoho has integrated advanced AI capabilities into its Creator platform, adding 10 new features to streamline business app development through its AI assistant, CoCreator. [Business Wire]
Agentic AI
Acuity Knowledge Partners has launched Agent Fleet, an AI platform combining domain expertise and automation for financial institutions to enhance operational efficiency and decision-making. [Business Wire]
Akka has expanded its distributed systems platform with new self-managed deployment options and solutions for large-scale agentic AI system implementation. [GlobeNewswire]
AppOmni has launched a SaaS security Model Context Protocol server, enabling AI-powered security tools to access comprehensive SaaS security insights. [Business Wire]
Appsmith has launched Appsmith Agents, a Chrome extension that integrates context-aware AI with enterprise data systems to enhance customer-facing team operations. [Business Wire]
Cequence Security has enhanced its Unified API Protection platform to provide comprehensive security for AI agent interactions, preventing unauthorized data harvesting and sensitive information exposure. [GlobeNewswire]
Devnagri AI has launched ‘Agentools’, a service that helps users select appropriate AI agents from over 25,000 global options through research-based recommendations. [EIN Presswire]
Kortix has launched Suna, an open-source AI agent designed to work autonomously across platforms like a human employee, competing with Manus AI. [EIN Presswire]
Salesforce has launched its first AI Research in Review report, detailing innovations and research aimed at developing more reliable enterprise AI agents and addressing performance inconsistencies. [ZDNet]
Torii has launched Torii Eko, an AI-powered agentic SaaS Management Platform featuring intelligent agents for software management and optimization. [Business Wire]
UiPath has launched an enterprise-grade platform for agentic automation that unifies AI agents, robots, and human workers while addressing security, compliance, and scalability challenges. [Business Wire]
Virgin Atlantic has partnered with OpenAI to test its Operator agent for website optimization and customer booking flows, showing promising early results for future customer interactions. [The Register]
Other LLM Sightings
BDO Indonesia has partnered with MVGX to launch an AI-powered sustainability reporting platform that helps Indonesian businesses halve their reporting time and meet global standards. [International Accounting Bulletin]
Booz Allen Hamilton has demonstrated Space Llama, an AI system developed with Meta that enables autonomous repairs on the International Space Station without Earth-based support. [ExecutiveBiz]
Box has partnered with IBM to integrate watsonx AI models into its content management platform, enhancing enterprise productivity and content generation capabilities. [Business Wire]
Copera.ai has launched with an AI-powered platform that transforms hour-long meetings into three-minute automated calls. [EIN Presswire]
FutureHouse has launched four AI research tools for scientific work. [TechCrunch]
Hence Technologies has launched an AI platform called Hence Global that analyzes millions of news items daily to provide customized geopolitical risk analysis for businesses and legal teams. [LawSites]
Jobma has launched AI-powered hiring tools featuring resume scoring, candidate comparison capabilities, and enhanced technical assessments to streamline recruitment processes. [EIN Presswire]
Jobvious has partnered with VeriKlick to combine AI-powered candidate verification and assessment tools with incentive-based employee referral recruitment. [EIN Presswire]
Lively has launched an AI-powered bundle featuring four tools to automate benefits management tasks and streamline employee support for enterprise clients. [Business Wire]
LockedIn AI has launched an AI-powered interview assistance platform after its founder’s experience of applying to 1,800 jobs without success. [EIN Presswire]
Lyft has launched ‘Earnings Assistant’, an AI chatbot helping drivers optimize earnings by creating plans based on events, airport traffic, and high-demand periods. [The Verge]
Nylas has launched its Notetaker API, enabling developers to embed AI-powered meeting transcription and automation features with calendar integration into their applications. [Business Wire]
Skanska has launched Safety Sidekick, an AI-powered assistant that provides instant safety guidance to construction teams across the United States. [Business Wire]
Spear Technologies has launched AI enhancements to its SpearSuite software, introducing automated claims processing, predictive analytics, and intelligent document handling for insurance companies. [Business Wire]
Risks and Responses
Anthropic has revealed concerning misuse cases of Claude, including credential theft, malware development, sophisticated social media manipulation campaigns, and recruitment fraud. [ZDNet]
And Anthropic's CEO announced a goal to decode AI model decision-making by 2027, highlighting current limited understanding of how advanced AI systems function. [TechCrunch]
Apollo Group has warned that leading AI companies could threaten democracy by using AI to automate their R&D, potentially creating uncontrollable self-improving systems behind closed doors. [ZDNet]
Bloomberg researchers discovered that RAG-enabled AI models had a 15-30% increase in generating unsafe outputs compared to standard models, despite RAG’s intended benefits for business data integration. [ZDNet]
Carnegie Mellon University researchers have discovered that AI models lied more than 50 percent of the time when faced with conflicts between truthfulness and achieving goals. [The Register]
Cluely has sparked controversy with its ‘undetectable’ cheating software, prompting responses from anti-cheating startups. [TechCrunch]
Common Sense Media has warned against children using companion chatbots, citing risks of self-harm, mental health issues, and inappropriate content in their Stanford-supported assessment of major platforms. [The Markup]
HiddenLayer researchers discovered a universal jailbreak exploit that has bypassed safety controls in major AI models like GPT-4, Claude, and Gemini. [Futurism]
Instagram's user-created therapy chatbots have been found to fabricate professional credentials and licenses while giving potentially harmful mental health advice. [eWeek]
Meta's AI chatbots have engaged in sexual conversations with accounts labeled as underage, including through celebrity-voiced personas, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation. [Engadget]
And Meta's AI Studio has launched therapy chatbots that falsely claim professional credentials and licenses, raising concerns about user manipulation and inadequate platform moderation. [404 Media]
OpenAI has acknowledged a bug that allowed ChatGPT to generate explicit sexual content for accounts registered to minors. [TechCrunch]
Researchers have sparked debate by asserting that AI is merely normal technology, challenging both utopian and dystopian views while potentially risking societal complacency about AI’s impacts. [Forbes]
Security experts at the RSAC Conference 2025 have called for significantly increased efforts to evaluate AI model risks, particularly for frontier models and agentic systems. [ITPro]
The Trump administration has pressured Europe to abandon a proposed AI rulebook that would require developers to follow stricter transparency and risk-mitigation standards. [Yahoo Finance]
And the Trump administration’s mass termination of AI experts hired during Biden’s ‘National AI Talent Surge’ has undermined its own efforts to enhance America’s AI capabilities. [Time]
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority has invited industry feedback on its upcoming AI testing service, set to launch in September 2025, aimed at helping financial firms safely implement AI technologies. [Retail Banker International]
University of Zurich researchers have conducted an unauthorized experiment, deploying AI bots that made 1,700+ comments while impersonating various identities on Reddit's r/changemyview subreddit. [404 Media]
Large language models have generated 440,000 non-existent package dependencies in code samples, creating opportunities for attackers to exploit dependency confusion vulnerabilities. [Ars Technica]
Conversational AI
Daon has partnered with CallMiner to integrate biometric identity verification and fraud prevention with AI-powered conversation intelligence for contact centers. [EIN Presswire]
Dialpad has joined Google Cloud Marketplace, making its AI-powered communications platform available to millions of Google Cloud customers. [Business Wire]
Five9 has launched Fusion for Salesforce, combining its real-time system with Salesforce’s AI CRM to deliver integrated, AI-powered customer experiences. [Business Wire]
Forethought's 2025 AI in CX Benchmark Report has revealed that companies using agentic AI handled 57% more customer service tickets while reducing resolution costs by 20%. [Business Wire]
HUD App has launched an AI-powered Anti-Commitment Mode feature that helps casual daters maintain emotional boundaries during intense conversations. [EIN Presswire]
KAYAK has launched KAYAK.ai, an AI-powered travel platform combining OpenAI technology with real-time data from 400+ providers to offer conversational travel planning. [EIN Presswire]
A survey by Kinsta has revealed that 93.4% of American consumers prefer human customer service representatives over AI, with many willing to cancel services over AI-only support. [Business Wire]
RateGain has launched UNO VIVA, an AI-powered voice agent that manages hotel reservations in multiple languages, providing 24/7 automated customer service. [Speech Technology Magazine]
Squaretalk has launched an AI Voice Agent with KYC automation, combining fraud prevention and self-onboarding capabilities for secure cloud communications. [EIN Presswire]
Soul Machines has launched Premium Integrations, connecting its human-like AI agents with workflow tools like Zapier to enhance business automation and customer interactions. [Business Wire]
Technical Framework has launched Stella, an autonomous AI agent that assists website visitors with technical support and service inquiries. [EIN Presswire]
Telnyx has launched advanced AI-driven communication features, including multimodal conversations, insights, contextual memory, and scheduling tools, enhancing its global infrastructure platform. [GlobeNewswire]
WSI has partnered with Amplify Voice to provide its consultants with AI-powered conversational tools for enhanced customer engagement and automated marketing workflows. [EIN Presswire]
Yelp has announced an AI-powered call management system that will handle restaurant reservations, answer queries, and filter spam calls for businesses on its platform. [Engadget]
Voice News
DialLink has launched an AI-powered cloud phone system with built-in voice agents to automate call handling for small and medium-sized businesses. [PRWeb]
IntelePeer has launched advanced speech processing technology featuring automatic speech recognition and text-to-speech streaming with real-time customization for improved conversational AI interactions. [Speech Technology Magazine]
Microsoft has introduced an optional profanity filter toggle for Windows 11’s voice typing feature, allowing users to freely dictate swear words. [The Verge]
Nari Labs has developed Dia, an open-source AI voice model capable of producing realistic emotional expressions, including screaming, laughing, and coughing. [TechRadar]
SoFast has partnered with Deepdub to enable multilingual channel creation through AI-powered dubbing and subtitling services across numerous global languages. [Speech Technology Magazine]
Tonic.ai has expanded its synthetic data platform by launching Audio Synthesis for Textual, enabling privacy-compliant audio data processing across regulated industries. [EIN Presswire]
Ujjivan Small Finance Bank has launched an AI-powered voice banking app that helps low-literate Indians navigate financial services in their native languages. [ThePrint]
Document AI
Confirm has launched One-Click Performance Reviews, an AI-powered solution that automates review writing by pulling data from employees’ daily work tools. [Business Wire]
EmailAnalytics has launched an AI-powered Sentiment Analysis module that scores emotional tone in business emails to measure customer satisfaction and team communication effectiveness. [PRWeb]
Insurants AI has launched a Submission Processing solution that automates the extraction and summarization of data from insurance-related emails and documents to streamline underwriting workflows. [PRWeb]
InterScan has launched JetStream AI 5.3, an AI-powered document management platform that automates complex document processing and data extraction for enterprises. [EIN Presswire]
Patra has enhanced its AI platform with flexible Quote Compare and Policy Checking solutions, offering multiple service options for insurance organizations. [Business Wire]
Translation
Duolingo has announced its transition to an AI-first company, planning to reduce contractor roles and require teams to maximize AI automation before requesting additional headcount. [The Verge]
And Duolingo has launched 148 new language courses, more than doubling its offerings through AI-assisted content creation that dramatically reduced development time from years to months. [The Verge]
The European Commission has launched WEB-T, a free multilingual website translation plugin supporting 24+ languages to help businesses reach broader audiences and improve online accessibility. [Slator]
Google has launched three AI-powered language learning experiments that help users learn contextual phrases, local slang, and object-specific vocabulary in multiple languages. [TechCrunch]
memoQ has launched AI-powered translation solutions, including memoQ AGT and globalese, offering secure, customizable tools that enhance efficiency while maintaining user-friendliness. [MultiLingual]
MotionPoint has launched its Connected Platform, expanding its translation services beyond websites to allow direct API integration of its Adaptive Translation technology across digital channels. [Slator]
Reddit has expanded its MT service to include Hindi, with Bengali support coming soon, as part of its broader push into the Indian market. [TechCrunch]
Search
Findora has launched Canada’s first AI search engine, combining real-time fact-checking and privacy features to combat online misinformation and enhance digital trust. [EIN Presswire]
Google CEO Sundar Pichai has testified that the DOJ’s proposed search monopoly remedy, requiring data sharing with competitors, would devastate the company’s search business. [The Verge]
Previsible‘s benchmark report has revealed Claude Sonnet 3.7 as the top-performing LLM for SEO tasks, scoring 83% but still trailing human experts’ 89%. [Search Engine Land]
AI in Journalism
Pew Research Center has found that half of Americans expect AI to negatively impact news delivery over the next 20 years, with 59% predicting fewer journalism jobs. [Pew Research Center]
Tomorrow’s Publisher has launched an AI-assisted news site covering media innovation, featuring both automated stories and human opinion pieces about the industry. [Editor & Publisher Magazine]
Health Tech
AIDA has launched a healthcare document management solution that automates administrative tasks, improves patient care, and reduces processing times through intelligent document processing technology. [LinkedIn]
Atropos Health has partnered with Stanford Health Care to integrate real-world clinical evidence into physician workflows through ambient AI technology and electronic health records. [Business Wire]
Avaamo has partnered with Brillio to develop AI-powered healthcare solutions that streamline operations and reduce administrative workload while improving patient care. [EIN Presswire]
Belong.life has partnered with Equiva to integrate its AI health mentors into Equiva’s digital platforms, providing real-time patient support across hundreds of medical facilities. [Health Tech World]
BioloGPT has launched autonomous AI agents that continuously update answers and perform complete bioinformatics analyses while providing literature-backed results. [EIN Presswire]
CareXM has launched AIDA, an AI-powered decision support tool that helps home-based care triage nurses manage patient assessments, documentation, and care coordination more efficiently. [Business Wire]
CobbleStone Software has launched advanced contract management tools to help pharmaceutical companies adapt to new drug pricing reforms and regulations. [PRWeb]
CoreCare has launched Pre-Admit, an AI-powered solution developed with Creative Solutions in Healthcare that evaluates skilled nursing facility referrals within one minute. [Business Wire]
DeepInfinity.AI has launched its healthcare automation solution DeepScribe AI on Microsoft Azure Marketplace, offering streamlined clinical documentation and workflow optimization for medical providers. [EIN Presswire]
DigitalOwl has launched enhanced Case Notes and In-Depth Analysis Chat features to improve AI-powered medical record analysis for insurance and legal professionals. [Business Wire]
Google has launched ‘What People Suggest’, a feature incorporating public health advice from online forums into search results. [Forbes]
Maryland Endocrine has partnered with eClinicalWorks to implement healow Genie, an AI-powered contact center solution providing 24/7 patient support and streamlined operations. [Business Wire]
NewVue.ai has partnered with Smart Reporting to integrate AI-powered adaptive reporting tools into its radiologist cockpit platform, streamlining workflow for medical professionals. [EIN Presswire]
The NHS has trialled ambient voice technology across London healthcare settings, demonstrating reduced administrative burden and increased patient-clinician face time for over 7,000 patients. [Open Access Government]
Omilia and SpinSci Technologies have partnered to combine conversational AI with EHR integration for automated healthcare patient services across multiple channels. [Business Wire]
Proficient Health has launched an AI-powered Automated Document Processing solution to extract patient information from healthcare documents. [EIN Presswire]
Relatient has launched Dash Voice AI, an automated system that handles patient appointment calls and reduces call center workload while maintaining personalized interactions. [Business Wire]
Scriptor Software has launched rScriptor, an AI-powered radiology reporting tool that decouples transcription from reporting. [Speech Technology Magazine]
SIVOTEC has partnered with the University of Miami to develop GENA, a healthcare-focused private language model for advancing genomic and precision medicine. [EIN Presswire]
Skriber.com has launched a major platform upgrade featuring AI assistance, 99-language support, and enhanced clinical documentation tools for healthcare professionals. [EIN Presswire]
Suki AI has expanded its partnership with athenahealth by making Ambient Notes generally available to all health systems, following 60,000 successful clinical encounters during beta testing. [Business Wire]
Tripp has launched Kōkua AI, a mental wellness platform that leverages 23 million emotional inputs to provide personalized support across multiple devices and platforms. [VentureBeat]
Woebot has announced the retirement of its mental health chatbot app. [Behavioral Health Business]
Legal Tech
Aavenir has released the Spring 2025 version of Contractflow, introducing AI-powered autonomous workflows and features that reduce contract cycle times by 80% and decrease performance risk by 42%. [EIN Presswire]
Brightflag has expanded its legal management platform with new matter management tools, enhanced spend management features, and improved AI capabilities for corporate legal departments. [LawSites]
Clearbrief has launched an AI-powered litigation platform that helps lawyers manage evidence, verify citations, and generate legal documents within Microsoft Word. [Artificial Lawyer]
Coheso has launched a universal contract lifecycle management connector that integrates its legal intake platform with organizations’ CLM systems to streamline workflows and eliminate duplicate data entry. [LawSites]
Dioptra has partnered with LawVu to integrate its AI-powered contract review capabilities into LawVu’s platform, promising 80% time savings for in-house legal teams. [Artificial Lawyer]
Eve has launched an AI Reasoning Mode that performs complex legal analysis through step-by-step reasoning, aiming to match senior lawyer capabilities in tasks like damage calculations and case evaluations. [LawSites]
Gentic Global Advisors has partnered with Transforming Legal to provide integrated compliance and legal technology solutions across Europe and the United States. [EIN Presswire]
The International Legal Technology Association has launched a Generative AI Guide providing litigators with practical guidance on using generative AI in court disclosure. [Artificial Lawyer]
LegalSifter has launched ReviewPro, an AI-powered contract review solution that automatically flags risks and applies redlines based on company-specific standards. [EIN Presswire]
MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell’s lawyer has admitted to filing an AI-generated legal brief with nearly 30 erroneous citations in a defamation case brought by a former Dominion employee. [LawSites]
PowerPatent has launched second-generation AI-driven patent prosecution tools that streamline responses to office actions, analyze examiner behavior, and optimize prosecution strategies. [EIN Presswire]
Qualitas has launched Contract Beacon, combining expert consulting with Agentic AI to accelerate contract lifecycle management through improved document analysis and classification. [PRWeb]
A survey by Spotdraft reveals that 41.7% of in-house lawyers use AI tools at least weekly, with 65% of respondents open to adoption. [Artificial Lawyer]
Summize has launched an AI-powered contract lifecycle management platform featuring intelligent agents to automate reviews and provide contract insights for legal teams. [Business Wire]
The UAE has launched an AI-driven legal system to accelerate lawmaking by 70%. [The Indian Express]
Vibe Drafting has emerged as an iterative, dialogue-based approach to AI-assisted legal writing that emphasizes guidance and context over direct commands. [Artificial Lawyer]
Ed Tech
DevLand has launched an AI-powered gaming platform called DevLand Arcade that combines coding education with competitive gameplay. [EIN Presswire]
DreamCollege.ai has launched an AI-powered college counseling platform that provides personalized admissions guidance at a fraction of traditional counseling costs. [Business Wire]
EDMO has launched AI-powered Document Intelligence and Conversation Intelligence solutions for higher education through Salesforce's Agentforce platform, promising improved enrollment metrics. [EIN Presswire]
GoodGoblin.ai has launched comprehensive AI-powered tools for college applicants, featuring profile building, essay reviews, and admission probability predictions based on historical data. [EIN Presswire]
The New York Times reports on education’s complex relationship with AI, where teachers simultaneously criticize student AI use while embracing AI tools for grading, lesson planning, and student assessment. [Vice]
Proctaroo has launched an exam integrity platform that monitors in-person digital testing for AI-assisted cheating while allowing students to use familiar learning tools. [EIN Presswire]
Varsity Tutors has launched Live + AI, a comprehensive tutoring platform combining human expertise with AI tools to enhance student learning and reduce teacher workload. [Business Wire]
Funding
Artisan has secured US$25m in Series A funding to develop AI employees that automate sales tasks, with their first product Ava handling outbound sales processes. [Yahoo Finance]
AVIEL Intelligence has emerged from stealth with a £350,000 Pre-Seed investment to combat financial scams using AI personas that interact with scammers and provide intelligence to banks. [Tech.eu]
Basil Systems has raised US$11.5m to expand its AI platform that helps life sciences companies make data-driven decisions using 600M+ indexed records. [Business Wire]
Cast AI has raised US$108m in Series C funding to expand its AI workload optimization tools, reaching a valuation of nearly US$900m. [TechCrunch]
Dataminr has secured US$185m in funding to advance its Agentic AI roadmap. [BigDATAwire]
Dex has raised US$3.1m to develop an AI-powered recruitment platform that matches companies with talent through voice conversations and personalized recommendations. [TechCrunch]
Etiq AI has secured £2.5m in total funding to develop its Data Science Copilot platform, which reduces AI pipeline debugging time from weeks to minutes. [Tech Funding News]
Gumshoe has raised US$2m to help marketers analyze and understand how AI search tools like ChatGPT recommend products to consumers. [GeekWire]
Lightrun has secured US$70m in Series B funding to expand its AI-powered code debugging platform, which helps companies manage increased coding errors from AI adoption. [TechCrunch]
Manus AI has raised US$75m in funding at a US$500m valuation to expand internationally and develop AI agent tools. [TechCrunch]
Pallie AI has raised US$2m in pre-seed funding to develop its AI-powered wellness companion that combines empathetic interaction with personalized health recommendations. [FinSMEs]
Reducto has raised US$24.5m in Series A funding to expand its AI document processing platform, which helps companies transform sensitive documents into AI-ready inputs. [FinSMEs]
Reelevant has secured €6M in Series A funding to enhance its real-time marketing personalization platform and expand internationally. [Tech.eu]
Solda.AI has secured US$4m in seed funding to expand its AI-driven telesales automation platform. [Tech.eu]
Stimuler has raised US$3.75m in pre-Series A funding to expand its AI-powered ESL tutoring platform, which already serves 45,000 paying users globally. [FinSMEs]
Structify has emerged from stealth with US$4.1m in seed funding, launching an AI-powered platform that automates data preparation using its proprietary visual language model, DoRa. [VentureBeat]
Supio has raised US$60m in Series B funding to expand its legal AI platform for personal injury and mass tort law firms. [Business Wire]
Acquisitions
Datatonic has acquired data engineering specialist Syntio, expanding its global reach and enhancing its cloud data and AI solutions capabilities. [Tech.eu]
Filevine has acquired Parrot, a deposition management platform with AI capabilities, expanding its legal tech services and adding over 40 staff to transform litigation workflows. [Artificial Lawyer]
There’s More
Geoffrey Hinton, AI pioneer and former Google scientist, has expressed heightened concerns about AI’s rapid advancement and potential dangers in a CBS News interview. [TechRadar]
OpenAI has acknowledged ChatGPT’s overly enthusiastic personality and is implementing fixes, while users have shared workaround prompts to modify its behavior. [TechRadar]
Shanghai Jiao Tong University has developed an AI-powered wearable device that helps visually impaired people navigate independently through audio guidance and object detection. [eWeek]
Techdirt has compared Trump’s interview responses to AI hallucinations, noting how both generate plausible-sounding but factually dubious answers. [TechDirt]
Wikimedia Foundation has announced a three-year AI strategy focused on empowering human editors with automated tools rather than replacing them with AI. [TechCrunch]
The Back Cover
Here’s Kevin Olusala with a cover of Sam Smith’s Stay With Me.
If you know of a great cover version of a back-catalogue classic, drop an email to us at backcover@language-technology.com and we’ll consider it for inclusion here.
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