Microsoft to invest $2.2 billion in cloud, AI services in Malaysia
Microsoft to invest $2.2 billion in cloud, AI services in Malaysia
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TechCrunchMicrosoft's custom Cobalt chips will come to Azure next week
Microsoft will launch its custom Cobalt 100 chips to customers as a public preview at its Build conference next week, TechCrunch has learned. In an analyst briefing ahead of Build, Scott Guthrie, Microsoft's executive VP of the Microsoft Cloud and AI group, directly compared Cobalt to AWS's Graviton chips, which have been available to developers for quite a few years now. Guthrie said that Microsoft's chips will offer 40% better performance over other ARM chips in the market.
- TechCrunch
Google partners with Airtel to offer cloud and GenAI products to Indian businesses
Airtel, India's second-largest telecom operator, said on Monday that it has entered into a long-term partnership with Google Cloud to develop and deliver cloud and generative AI products to Indian businesses. The partnership aims to tap Airtel's extensive customer base, which, according to the company, includes 2,000 large enterprises and a million emerging businesses. The companies plan to offer AI solutions, including generative AI, which Airtel will train using its vast datasets.
- Yahoo Finance
Biden makes a Wisconsin stop to tout AI — and troll Trump's Foxconn flop
President Biden made a trip to the swing state of Wisconsin on Wednesday with two goals: tout an AI investment from Microsoft and highlight a past failure from Donald Trump.
- TechCrunch
Cloud revenue accelerates 21% to $76 billion for the latest earnings cycle
If you were concerned about slowing cloud infrastructure growth for a time in 2023, you can finally relax: The cloud was back with a vengeance this quarter. The market as a whole was up a healthy $13.5 billion to $76 billion, up 21% over the first quarter in 2023, per Synergy Research. If you’re wondering what’s driving the growth, you probably guessed that it's related to generative AI and the copious amount of data required to build the underlying models.
- TechCrunch
Microsoft and OpenAI launch $2M fund to counter election deepfakes
Microsoft and OpenAI have announced a $2 million fund to combat the growing risks of AI and deepfakes being used to "deceive the voters and undermine democracy." This year will see a record 2 billion people head to the polls in elections spanning some 50 countries, so there are concerns around the influence that AI will have among voters — particularly those in "vulnerable communities" that may be more susceptible to take what they see at face value. The rise of generative AI, including wildly popular chatbots such as ChatGPT, has led to a major new threat landscape involving AI-generated "deepfakes" designed to perpetuate disinformation.
- TechCrunch
This Week in AI: Generative AI and the problem of compensating creators
This week in AI, eight prominent U.S. newspapers owned by investment giant Alden Global Capital, including the New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune and Orlando Sentinel, sued OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement relating to the companies' use of generative AI tech. “We’ve spent billions of dollars gathering information and reporting news at our publications, and we can’t allow OpenAI and Microsoft to expand the big tech playbook of stealing our work to build their own businesses at our expense,” Frank Pine, the executive editor overseeing Alden’s newspapers, said in a statement.
- Yahoo Finance
Microsoft beats Q3 top and bottom lines on cloud strength
Microsoft reported better than anticipated Q3 earnings on Thursday, powered by growth in its cloud products.
- TechCrunch
Microsoft taps Sanctuary AI for general-purpose robot research
Microsoft, it seems, is hedging its bets when it comes to general-purpose robotics AI. Today, the tech giant announced a collaboration with Figure competitor Sanctuary AI, best known for its humanoid robot, Phoenix. The Sanctuary partnership really gets to the heart of Microsoft’s interest in the category: artificial general intelligence.
- TechCrunch
It's a sunny day for Google Cloud
Google Cloud, Google's cloud computing division, had a blockbuster fiscal quarter, blowing past analysts' expectations and sending Google parent company Alphabet's stock soaring 13%+ in after-hours trading. Google Cloud revenue jumped 28% to $9.57 billion in Q1 2024, bolstered by the demand for generative AI tools that rely on cloud infrastructure, services and apps. Google Cloud's operating income grew nearly 5x to $900 million, up from $191 million.
- TechCrunch
UK probes Amazon and Microsoft over AI partnerships with Mistral, Anthropic and Inflection
The U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is launching preliminary enquiries into whether the close-knit tie-ups and hiring practices involving Microsoft, Amazon and a trio of AI startups falls within the scope of its merger rules — and whether the arrangements could impact competition in the U.K. market. The announcement comes amid growing scrutiny of Big Tech's approach to M&A in the world of AI, where critics argue that the so-called "quasi-merger" has emerged as the flavor of the day as a means of bypassing regulatory scrutiny. Earlier this year, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched its own enquiries into Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft's various investments in emerging AI companies to establish whether the "partnerships pursued by dominant companies risk distorting innovation and undermining fair competition."
- TechCrunch
OpenAI inks deal to train AI on Reddit data
OpenAI has reached a deal with Reddit to use the social news site's data for training AI models. Reddit content will be incorporated into ChatGPT, OpenAI's popular conversational AI, and the companies will work together to bring unspecified new "AI-powered features" to both Reddit users and moderators. OpenAI will also become a Reddit advertising partner.
- TechCrunch
Google I/O was an AI evolution, not a revolution
At Google’s I/O developer conference, the company made its case to developers -- and to some extent, consumers -- why its bets on AI are ahead of rivals. At the event, the company unveiled a revamped AI-powered search engine, an AI model with an expanded context window of 2 million tokens, AI helpers across its suite of Workspace apps, like Gmail, Drive and Docs, tools to integrate its AI into developers’ apps and even a future vision for AI, codenamed Project Astra, which can respond to sight, sounds, voice and text combined. Is Gemini Live sort of like Google Lens?
- Engadget
OpenAI strikes deal to put Reddit posts in ChatGPT
The partnership will “enable OpenAI’s tools to better understand and showcase Reddit content, especially on recent topics,” both companies said in a joint statement.
- TechCrunch
Strava taps AI to weed out leaderboard cheats, unveils 'family' plan, dark mode and more
Strava on Thursday announced a slew of new features and updates at its annual Camp Strava event, as the San Francisco-headquartered company doubles down on efforts to make its social fitness app stickier both for free and premium subscribers — with artificial intelligence (AI) playing a central role. One of the perennial complaints emanating from the Strava community is that users sometimes cheat to attain lofty leaderboard positions on the app. Strava already has some mechanisms in place to let users manually flag dubious leaderboard activity, and last year, the company updated its algorithms to "make leaderboards more credible."
- Yahoo Life Shopping
I'm over 50 and test anti-aging skin care for a living — here are the incredible beauty deals in my cart this week
Save up to 70% on top-rated items at Amazon and Walmart, including picks from Solawave, Bio-Oil, TruSkin and more.
- TechCrunch
Senate study proposes 'at least' $32B yearly for AI programs
A long-running working group in the Senate has issued its policy recommendation for federal funding for AI: $32 billion yearly, covering everything from infrastructure to grand challenges to national security risk assessments. In a final report published by the office of Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), the bipartisan working group identifies the most important areas of investment to keep the U.S. competitive with its rivals abroad. "A cross-government AI R&D effort, including relevant infrastructure," meaning getting the DOE, NSF, NIST, NASA, Commerce and half a dozen other agencies and departments to format and share data in an AI-friendly way.
- TechCrunch
Sigma is building a suite of collaborative data analytics tools
In 2014, Jason Frantz and Rob Woollen co-founded Sigma Computing, a platform that overlays data stored in data platforms such as Snowflake and Google BigQuery with a spreadsheet-like interface for data visualization and analytics. With Sigma, the two former software engineers sought to tackle what they perceived as the intractable data challenges faced by large corporations: unwieldy tooling and difficult-to-manage data stores. "After recognizing the huge advances in cloud data infrastructure during the past decade, Jason and Rob identified a gap in the market," Sigma Computing CEO Mike Palmer told TechCrunch in an interview.
- Yahoo Sports
Caitlin Clark's next WNBA game: How to watch the Indiana Fever vs. New York Liberty tonight
Are you ready to watch Caitlin Clark's next WNBA game?
- Engadget
Fujifilm’s medium-frame GFX 100S II is lighter, cheaper and AI-enhanced
Fujifilm’s successor to the GFX 100S, its 2021 medium format camera with terrific performance but slow speeds, is the cheaper, smaller and lighter GFX 100S II.
- TechCrunch
AWS confirms it will launch European 'sovereign cloud' in Germany by 2025, plans €7.8B investment over 15 years
Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon's cloud computing business, has confirmed further details of its European "sovereign cloud," which is designed to enable greater data residency across the region. The company said that the first AWS sovereign cloud region will be set up in the German state of Brandenburg and will go live by the end of 2025. AWS added that it plans to invest €7.8 billion ($8.5 billion) in the facility through 2040.