Author: Naveed Ahmad

Enterprises have struggled to find a return on investment from adopting AI instruments. Now, AI firms try a brand new tactic to get their tech to stay by partnering with consultants. On Thursday, French AI analysis lab Mistral AI and world consulting big Accenture announced a multi-year partnership. The deal entails the 2 firms working collectively to develop enterprise tech powered by Mistral’s AI fashions for shoppers. Monetary phrases and period of the deal weren’t disclosed. TechCrunch reached out for extra info. This deal additionally consists of Accenture turning into a Mistral buyer and rolling out its expertise to its…

Within the escalating ‘race of “smaller, sooner, cheaper’ AI, Google simply dropped a heavy-hitting payload. The tech large formally unveiled Nano-Banana 2 (technically designated as Gemini 3.1 Flash Picture). Google is making a definitive pivot towards the sting: high-fidelity, sub-second picture synthesis that stays solely in your gadget. The Technical Leap: Effectivity over Scale The primary model Nano-Banana was a proof-of-concept for cell reasoning. Model 2, nonetheless, is constructed on a 1.8 billion parameter spine that rivals fashions 3x its dimension in effectivity. Google AI workforce achieved this by Dynamic Quantization-Conscious Coaching (DQAT). In software program engineering phrases, quantization sometimes…

Assembly notetaker Learn AI on Thursday launched an AI-powered email-based assistant known as Ada, saying it helps customers handle their schedules, reply questions based mostly on an organization’s information base, and reply to out-of-office emails. The corporate is looking Ada a “digital twin” that handles duties for you across the clock. Learn AI stated that the assistant will likely be accessible to all customers, they usually can begin configuring it by sending an electronic mail to “ada@learn.ai” and writing “Get me began.” Whenever you ask Ada to discover a time to satisfy with somebody, it replies to the opposite particular…

OpenAI has introduced plans to show its London workplace into its largest analysis hub outdoors of the US.The corporate—which established a UK office in 2023—says it is going to broaden its London-based analysis group, scooping up expertise rising from main British universities. It has not indicated what number of researchers it is going to rent.“The UK brings collectively world-class expertise and main scientific establishments and universities, making it a perfect place to ship the necessary analysis which is able to guarantee our AI is protected, helpful, and advantages everybody,” mentioned Mark Chen, chief analysis officer at OpenAI, in an announcement.The…

eBay is reducing round 800 jobs, or 6% of its full-time staff. “We’re taking steps to reinvest throughout our enterprise and align our construction with our strategic priorities, which is able to have an effect on sure roles throughout our workforce,” the corporate stated in a press release. “We’re grateful for the contributions of the staff impacted and are dedicated to supporting them with care and respect.” Bloomberg first reported the information. The transfer comes per week after eBay stated it might purchase Depop, a second-hand clothes app fashionable with Gen Z and millennials, from Etsy for $1.2 billion in money.…

For all their potential, AI brokers have been sluggish to make an impression within the enterprise, and one new startup is betting that the rationale they haven’t is a scarcity of context. Launched as a part of Y Combinator’s 2025 summer time cohort, Trace is a workflow orchestration startup aimed toward filling that hole. The corporate maps advanced company environments and processes in order that brokers have the context they should scale shortly. “OpenAI and Anthropic are constructing these sensible interns that may be leveraged throughout the firm,” says Hint CEO Tim Cherkasov, referring to the AI labs’ instruments. “We’re…

This week on TechCrunch’s founder-focused podcast, Construct Mode, Isabelle Johannessen is joined by Sarah Lucena, the CEO and co-founder of Mappa, a behavioral intelligence platform that makes use of voice AI to decode human conduct in lower than 60 seconds.  Lucena bought the concept for Mappa after making an attempt to construct a advertising and marketing workforce however regularly feeling like she had made the unsuitable hires. “And I used to be so pissed off as a result of I used to be hiring for what I believed have been the precise expertise. It appeared nice on paper however didn’t actually work in actual life,” Lucena mentioned.   She had discovered firsthand that…

The primary time Alesandra Madison’s husband integrated AI into their relationship was in late 2024.She’d forgotten to do her “nightly kneeling ritual,” and he requested ChatGPT the best way to correctly self-discipline her. The big language mannequin steered “a two-in-one punishment,” she says—write 100 strains of “I’ll keep in mind to kneel for my Dom each evening” whereas kneeling the complete time.Although the couple began exploring kink of their marriage 15 years in the past—they’re in a dominant-submissive relationship—the AI-generated punishment was new territory for them.Since then, Madison, who’s 44 and lives in Los Angeles, says she has come to…

Snapchat announced on Wednesday that it’s internet hosting its first-ever awards present on March 21. The social media big says the awards present, referred to as “The Snappys,” is designed to rejoice “the creators shaping tradition on Snapchat.” Creators will obtain awards like “Highlight MVP,” “Greatest Storyteller,” and “Breakout Creator of the 12 months,” alongside awards throughout style, magnificence, sports activities, music, meals, and video games. Extra classes embrace collaboration, comedy, and cultural impression. “Collectively, these honors mirror the various methods creators spark conversations, construct group, and outline tradition on Snapchat,” the corporate wrote in a blog post. “The Snappys…

Google is shifting additional into bodily AI by bringing a well-known robotics software program platform underneath its wing. Alphabet-owned Intrinsic, which builds AI fashions and software program designed to make industrial robots extra accessible, is becoming a member of Google, the businesses announced on Wednesday. Intrinsic will stay a definite entity inside Google however will work intently with Google DeepMind and can faucet into Google’s Gemini AI fashions and cloud companies. Alphabet declined to share info concerning funding or buy value. Intrinsic “graduated” into an unbiased Alphabet-owned firm in 2021 after 5 years of growth inside Alphabet’s X, the corporate’s…