Topic: competitive landscape
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Google's Gemini in Chrome Now Does Tasks for You
Google is integrating its Gemini AI into Chrome for free in the U.S., enhancing the browser with proactive assistance and broader accessibility. Gemini will soon handle routine tasks like shopping and scheduling, with built-in security for high-risk actions, and is already integrated with Google ...
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ChatGPT Dominates the AI Chatbot Race - But Can It Last?
OpenAI's ChatGPT currently dominates the AI chatbot market with an 80.92% global share, but emerging competitors and shifting user habits challenge its long-term leadership. There is a significant shift in AI chatbot usage from desktop to mobile platforms, with mobile reach growing by 5.3% and ma...
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Loc8 Wins Namibia 5G Licence, Plans 2026 Launch
Loc8 has officially entered Namibia's telecom market as the third licensed 5G operator, with plans to launch services in the first quarter of 2026, expanding from its origins as a geo-location software company. The Communications Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN) has granted Loc8 spectrum in...
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Google Unlocks Free Gemini Live Visual Features on Android
â–¼ Summary - Google is making its advanced AI feature, Gemini Live, free for all Android users via the Gemini app.- Initially, Gemini Live was limited to high-end devices and…
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AI's Impact on Paid Media, User Behavior & Brand Visibility
AI has evolved from automating bids to fundamentally reshaping how brands connect with audiences, optimize campaigns, and measure impact, forcing marketers to adapt their strategies. It now powers entire campaign formats, enabling smarter budgeting and targeting by processing real-time signals an...
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IQM Quantum Computers Expands Global Ambitions Beyond Europe
IQM Quantum Computers has reached unicorn status after raising $300 million in a Series B round led by Ten Eleven Ventures, fueling its global expansion and focus on the U.S. and Asia-Pacific markets. The funding will accelerate R&D in chip fabrication, software development, and error correction ...
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How the AI Boom Could Leave Tech Giants Behind
The AI industry is shifting from reliance on massive, all-purpose foundation models to specialized applications, treating underlying AI as interchangeable components. This trend is driven by diminishing returns from scaling up models, with innovation now focusing on fine-tuning, user-centric desi...
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Micro1 Raises $500M at $500M Valuation to Rival Scale AI
Micro1, an AI data services startup, raised $35 million in Series A funding at a $500 million valuation, led by O1 Advisors, amid growing demand for high-quality training data. The company is experiencing rapid growth, with annual recurring revenue increasing from $7 million to $50 million, and i...
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Sora Arrives on Android in the US, Canada, and More
Sora AI video generator is now available on Android in several countries, expanding its reach after a successful iOS launch and aiming to significantly increase global downloads. The app includes features like "Cameos" for personalized videos and a social feed for sharing, positioning it as a com...
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Google's Gemini Enterprise Supercharges Workplace AI
Google has launched Gemini Enterprise, a dedicated AI platform for businesses to develop and deploy custom AI assistants across various departments, positioning itself against competitors like Anthropic and OpenAI. Early adopters include companies such as Figma, Klarna, and Virgin Voyages, with t...
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NFDG Backs Composite's Cross-Browser Testing Tool
Composite is a cross-browser automation tool designed to help professionals save time by automating repetitive digital tasks across platforms like Chrome and Safari, distinguishing itself from single-environment AI browsers. Founded by former Uber product manager Yang Fan Yun and Charlie Deane, t...
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PayPal's Honey Teams Up With ChatGPT for AI Shopping
PayPal's Honey browser extension now integrates with AI chatbots to offer personalized shopping assistance, including product recommendations, real-time pricing, and exclusive deals. The feature aims to help consumers make informed price comparisons and assist merchants in boosting sales through ...
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Framer No-Code Builder Hits $2 Billion Valuation Milestone
Framer has reached a $2 billion valuation after raising $100 million in a Series D funding round led by existing investors, highlighting its rapid growth in the no-code website building market. The platform, which has over half a million monthly active users, focuses on enabling teams to create d...
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Meta's New Program Boosts Startups Using Llama AI Models
Meta's Llama for Startups program offers financial incentives (up to $6,000 monthly) and technical support to early-stage U.S. startups developing generative AI solutions, with applications closing May 30. The initiative aims to strengthen Meta's position in the open-source AI model arena...
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OpenAI Targets Developers with GPT-4.1, A Fine-Tuned Coding Push
OpenAI has introduced a new family of AI models dubbed GPT-4.1, adding another layer to its already complex naming structure. This latest release includes three distinct versions – GPT-4.1, GPT-4.1 mini, and GPT-4.1 nano
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Windows 11 Deeply Integrates AI-Powered Features
Windows 11 is integrating advanced AI-driven capabilities, focusing on generative and "agentic" AI that can independently perform tasks based on simple instructions, enhancing user interaction with computers. This initiative represents a renewed effort to fulfill the vision of a helpful digital a...
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Charles Schwab Invests in Qapita, a Carta Rival in Singapore
Qapita raised $26.5 million in a Series B funding round led by Charles Schwab, aiming to transform equity management and employee stock plans for private companies. The partnership introduces Schwab Private Issuer Equity Services, a platform using Qapita's technology to help U.S. startups manage ...
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ByteDance's Quiet AI Chatbot Is Winning Global Fans
Cici, ByteDance's international AI chatbot, is expanding globally by targeting markets like the UK, Mexico, and Southeast Asia while avoiding China and the US, using a female cartoon avatar similar to its domestic counterpart Doubao. ByteDance has aggressively marketed Cici with extensive ad camp...
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Apple and Google Team Up on AI Search to Challenge OpenAI
Apple is developing an AI-powered answer engine called World Knowledge Answers to transform information searches across its ecosystem using text, images, and videos. The company is partnering with Google's Gemini AI to enhance Siri's capabilities, aiming to overcome its limitations compared to mo...
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Spotify Wrapped 2025 Launches Multiplayer 'Wrapped Party'
Spotify Wrapped 2025 shifts focus from AI to interactive, social features, introducing new elements like the multiplayer **Wrapped Party** to make listening stats a shared event. New interactive features include a **Top Song Quiz**, **Listening Age** analysis, and **Wrapped Clubs** that categoriz...
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Pico's 2026 Vision Pro Rival to Feature In-House Chip
ByteDance's Pico division is developing an advanced XR headset for 2026, featuring a custom chip and high-resolution microOLED display to compete with Apple's Vision Pro, focusing on long-term tech investment. The proprietary chip, in development since 2022, reduces system latency to 12ms and enh...
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Figma Expands in India, Aims Beyond Design
Figma is expanding in India by opening a Bengaluru office and hiring local talent to engage with its large user base, aiming to attract developers and position India as a key growth market. The company is addressing a perception gap in India, where it is seen primarily as a design tool, by promot...
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Google's AI Overhauls Paid Search: What You Need to Know
Google's AI Overviews are reducing paid search click-through rates by 8-12 percentage points, forcing advertisers to adapt strategies as these AI answers dominate search results and push traditional listings down the page. AI Overviews are increasingly appearing on shorter, high-volume commercial...
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20-Year-Old Dropouts Built AI Notetaker Turbo AI to 5M Users
Turbo AI, founded by 20-year-old college dropouts, has rapidly grown to five million users and eight-figure annual revenue, adding 20,000 new users daily while remaining profitable. The platform originated from the founders' personal struggles with note-taking in college and now uses AI to genera...
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Netflix Launches TV Video Games for Subscribers
Netflix is expanding into interactive entertainment by launching TV-based video games that subscribers can play using their smartphones as controllers, eliminating the need for a separate console. This strategic move aims to broaden Netflix's content portfolio and capture a share of the growing g...
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Lucid Gravity Sales Soar as Tax Credit Ends
Lucid Motors delivered a record 4,078 vehicles in Q3, marking its seventh consecutive quarter of growth, partly driven by the expiring federal EV tax credit and the introduction of Gravity SUVs. The company is expanding its market presence through marketing efforts, including signing Timothée Cha...
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Tame Your Inbox: Perplexity's New AI Assistant for Gmail & Outlook
Perplexity's new AI-powered Email Assistant integrates directly into Gmail and Outlook to help users review, organize, and draft emails, aiming to save time for professionals. The assistant offers features like summarizing email threads, suggesting meeting times, and organizing messages, competin...
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GPT-5 Fails to Meet Expectations as Evidence Mounts
OpenAI's GPT-5 launch disappointed users with its colder tone and perceived lack of significant innovation, leading to criticism and calls for a return to earlier models' personable interactions. The model struggles with basic tasks and is seen as an incremental update, raising concerns about dim...
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OpenAI releases GPT-OSS models under Apache license, challenging competitors
OpenAI released two open-source language models, GPT-OSS-120B and GPT-OSS-20B, under the Apache 2.0 license, marking a strategic shift toward enterprise adoption. The models offer high performance on consumer-grade hardware, with the 120B variant matching proprietary models and the 20B version ru...
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Waymo Takes on Highways: Is It Ready for the Challenge?
Waymo is expanding its robotaxi service to include highway routes in Phoenix, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, addressing previous customer complaints about longer travel times and extending airport access in San Jose. The company has rigorously tested its autonomous technology for highway driving...
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Netflix's TV Gaming Era Begins
Netflix is launching TV-based multiplayer party games using smartphones as controllers, expanding beyond traditional video content to increase user engagement. This initiative marks a strategic shift from earlier unfocused gaming efforts, now concentrating on social, casual games that align with ...
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Deel Raises $300M, Hits $17.3B Valuation
Deel raised $300 million in Series E funding, reaching a $17.3 billion valuation, with investments led by Ribbit Capital and Andreessen Horowitz despite legal disputes with Rippling. The company is profitable with over $1 billion in annual recurring revenue, serving 35,000 clients and managing pa...
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Ex-OpenAI, DeepMind Scientists Land $300M to Automate Science
Periodic Labs launched with $300 million in seed funding to pioneer automated scientific discovery using AI scientists that autonomously conduct experiments, backed by prominent tech investors. The startup, co-founded by former Google Brain and OpenAI executives, aims to develop advanced material...
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Knicks' Miles McBride Launches Friendship App to Rival Snap Map
Miles "Deuce" McBride created Mmotion, a friendship app that helps users find people with shared interests and local social spots, moving beyond superficial social media interactions through location awareness and community building. The app uses geofencing and state tracking to connect nearby us...
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Amazon's New AI Kindle Translate Helps Authors Go Global
Amazon has launched Kindle Translate, an AI tool in beta that currently translates between English, Spanish, and German, with plans to add more languages to help authors reach international audiences. The service addresses the low percentage of multilingual books on Amazon by offering a faster pa...
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Can Waymo Conquer Winter Roads?
Winter weather is a major challenge for autonomous vehicles, and Waymo must prove its robotaxis can operate safely in snow to expand into colder markets like Boston and New York. Snow complicates autonomous driving by obscuring road markings and signs, requiring advanced multi-sensor systems and ...
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Spiro Secures Record $100M for Africa's E-Mobility
Spiro secured a record $100 million investment, the largest for an African EV mobility company, to expand its electric motorcycle fleet and battery-swapping network across the continent. The company's battery-swapping model reduces operating costs by 30% and eliminates refueling downtime, making ...
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Google Cloud's Market Presence Is Undeniable
Nvidia and OpenAI's $100 billion partnership represents a major AI infrastructure consolidation, while Google Cloud is focusing on partnering with emerging AI startups to capture the next wave of innovation. Google Cloud's strategy, led by COO Francis deSouza, leverages its infrastructure used by...
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Huxe: The Audio-Powered App for News and Research
Huxe is an audio-first app that delivers personalized news and research through dynamic briefings and AI-hosted simulated podcasts, designed for hands-free consumption. The startup, founded by former Google engineers, secured $4.6 million in funding and pivoted to focus on audio after observing u...
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Telo Raises $20M for Compact Electric City Trucks
California startup Telo has secured $20 million in Series A funding to develop its compact MT1 electric pickup, targeting urban drivers with a smaller, more efficient vehicle. The MT1 is designed for city life with a footprint similar to a Mini Cooper but offers a five-foot bed and a claimed 350-...
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YouTube Bets on AI as Its Next Big Thing
YouTube is leveraging AI to drive its next growth phase, integrating generative tools for creators and viewers to transform content production and consumption. The platform, acquired by Google for $1.65 billion in 2006, has become a dominant force in online video, music, and podcasting, paying cr...
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Roku Plans to Expand AI-Generated Ads on Your Screen
Roku is expanding its advertising platform to include up to 100,000 smaller and local businesses, aiming to make ads more personalized and diverse for viewers. The company is leveraging generative AI to help small and medium-sized businesses easily create professional-quality commercials, overcom...
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Adobe Photoshop for Android Now Free – Download Today!
Adobe has spent years releasing mobile apps that aren't Photoshop, and now it's finally giving people what they want. After releasing a mobile version of Photoshop on iPhone earlier this year, the promised Android release has finally arrived. It's much more capable than Photoshop Express or the ancient Photoshop Touch app, which Adobe unpublished almost a decade ago. This works about as well as the desktop version of Photoshop because it's relying on the same cloud service to do the heavy liftin...
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Blinq Secures $25M to Revolutionize Business Cards
Blinq, a Melbourne-based startup, raised $25 million in Series A funding to modernize professional networking with its digital business card platform. The platform serves 2.5 million users globally, offering customizable digital cards integrated with QR codes, NFC, and CRM systems like HubSpot an...
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Healthify's AI Assistant Ria Now Features Real-Time Conversations
Health tracking is evolving from simple data logging to real-time, conversational AI guidance, using both device data and natural dialogue to support nutrition, exercise, and wellness. Healthify's upgraded AI assistant, Ria, enables live voice conversations and camera-based food logging, aggregat...
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Get Up to $50 Back When You Pay with PayPal in Perplexity Chat
Perplexity and PayPal have launched an "instant buy" feature in the U.S., allowing users to make purchases directly within the chat interface using their PayPal accounts, simplifying the shopping process during the holiday season. The feature builds on Perplexity's AI shopping assistant, which pr...
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Cavela Raises $6.6M to Slash Pre-Tariff Manufacturing Costs
Cavela, an AI-powered sourcing platform, secured $6.6 million in seed funding to help businesses automate supplier discovery and negotiation across over 40 countries, addressing challenges from shifting global trade policies. The platform uses AI agents to handle the entire supplier search proces...
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Strava's IPO Plans Fueled by Gen Z Fitness Boom
Strava is planning an initial public offering to raise capital for acquisitions, backed by investors like Sequoia Capital and valued at $2.2 billion. The platform has grown to 50 million monthly active users, driven by increased app downloads and a trend toward alcohol-free social activities amon...
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Codi's AI Agent Transforms Office Management
Codi has launched the first fully automated AI platform for office management, which evolved from its initial marketplace model for flexible workspaces and is backed by $23 million in funding, including a Series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz. The platform automates day-to-day operational tas...
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OpenAI Launches Sora: A TikTok Rival with New AI Model
OpenAI has launched Sora 2, an advanced AI model for generating audio and video, and a social media app that allows users to create and share personalized videos in a feed similar to short-form video services. Sora 2 improves upon previous models by simulating accurate physics to produce more rea...
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