Philips has unexpectedly announced the imminent departure of CEO Frans van Houten, in the midst of a massive product recall. Van Houten would be replaced on October 15 by Roy Jakobs. During his almost 12 years at the helm, Van Houten led the transformation of the once-sprawling conglomerate into a focused healthcare specialist.
Amazon India announced the release of its Rufus artificial intelligence (AI) assistant in the desktop-based web interface on Monday. The e-commerce giant highlighted that the AI-powered shopping assistant will help users during the Prime Day sale between July 12-14 in making informed decisions. Notably, Rufus was first introduced in India in August 2024.
TikTok is building a new version of its app for users in the United States ahead of a planned sale of the app to a group of investors, The Information reported on Sunday, citing unnamed sources.
OpenAI has generally been tight-lipped about the next-generation of its frontier artificial intelligence (AI) model, GPT-5. However, the company has recently shared some hints at what users can expect once the model is available. An OpenAI executive has claimed that the GPT-5 large language model (LLM) could witness the merger of the GPT and o-series models.
Google's AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries that appear above traditional hyperlinks to relevant webpages and are shown to users in more than 100 countries. It began adding advertisements to AI Overviews last May.
Baidu reportedly released a new artificial intelligence (AI) video generation model on Wednesday. As per the report, the MuseStreamer AI model can also integrate Chinese audio in the generated videos, making it the second such model after Google’s Veo 3. The tech giant claims it to be the world’s first AI model with native Chinese audio generation support.
Sakana AI released an open-source algorithm on Tuesday, which allows multiple artificial intelligence (AI) models to collaborate on complex problems. Dubbed Adaptive Branching Monte Carlo Tree Search (AB-MCTS), it is an inference-time scaling or test-time scaling algorithm that adds a third dimension to the existing framework of large language models (LLMs).
Google has been under pressure after being hit in March with European Union antitrust charges of unfairly favouring its own services such as Google Shopping, Google Hotels and Google Flights over competitors.
Google Workspace users are finally getting access to Gems within the apps, the company announced on Wednesday. Gems are custom artificial intelligence (AI) experts that can be programmed to perform specific tasks. They have been available within the Gemini app and website since August 2024, but now the Mountain View-based tech giant is finally expanding them to Workspace apps.
Meta Platforms has been on a banning spree which is affecting users across the many social media apps under its umbrella. Amidst the ongoing mass bans, even those who are paying a premium for the Meta verified subscription have been left disappointed by tech giant’s customer support. Users have deemed the service “useless”, despite Meta claiming to offer access to direct account support as part of the benefits of its Verified check mark subscription.
Perplexity introduced its most expensive subscription tier on Tuesday. Dubbed Perplexity Max, the new plan is aimed at the platform’s heavy users and costs $200 (roughly Rs. 17,000) a month. To entice users to purchase the subscription, the San Francisco-based artificial intelligence (AI) firm is also offering early access to new features, priority access to services that utilise third-party models, and higher rate limits.
Qualcomm announced its Snapdragon Auto Day event in India on Wednesday. This is the first time the chipmaker is hosting an automobile-focused event in the country. The event is being hosted in collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and will take place on July 30 in New Delhi. During the event, the company plans to showcase in-vehicle technology, strategic partnerships, and cross-border learnings.
Amazon Prime Day 2025 kicks off in India next week. Ahead of the two-day event, Amazon has teased some of the upcoming deals. The sale will provide up to 40 percent off on smartphones and accessories. It will be exclusive to Prime members and will also include discounts across TVs, appliances, Amazon devices, fashion, home essentials, and more. Additional offers will be available to ICICI and SBI Bank card holders.
Meta Superintelligence Labs (MSL) was reportedly created by the company CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, on Monday. As per multiple reports, the new group was created as a part of the restructuring of the existing Meta AI division. The MSL group is now said to be heading the division with a focus on developing the next generation of large language models (LLMs) and artificial intelligence (AI) technology for the company.
Baidu released the Ernie 4.5 series of artificial intelligence (AI) models in open-source on Monday. The Chinese tech giant had previously said that it would make its proprietary large language models (LLMs) available to the open community on July 31. It has now released 10 different variants of the series, with each of the models built on Mixture-of-Experts (MoE) architecture.
Alibaba’s Qwen team released a new image generation artificial intelligence (AI) model last week. Dubbed Qwen VLo, it is a successor to the Qwen 2.5 vision language model and comes with several upgrades compared to the older models. The latest AI image model supports both text-to-image and image-to-image generation. It also supports text input in multiple languages, including English and Chinese.
Runway, a video-focused artificial intelligence (AI) startup, unveiled its new gaming-focused offering last week. Dubbed Game World, a microsite for the platform is currently live, although users will have to wait a little before they can play the games. As per a report, the New York-based AI firm plans to start with text and image-based gaming experience, and scale it up to a full-fledged video gaming experience later this year.
Nvidia insiders sold over $1 billion worth of company stock in the past year, with a notable uptick in recent trading activity as executives capitalize on surging investor interest in artificial intelligence, the Financial Times reported on Sunday.
Gmail has introduced a new page which makes it easier to manage your subscriptions. Listed as Manage Subscriptions, it appears in the left-hand toolbar of the web client and shows all of the newsletters and mailing lists you have subscribed to in the past. Alongside, it is also reported to have introduced a new option to mark emails as read directly from the notification window on the Gmail for Android app.
Baidu, the Chinese tech giant, is making its Ernie artificial intelligence (AI) model open-source on Monday. The company announced the move in February, and has already made its chatbot free to use. This is being viewed as a watershed moment in China’s AI space, as this is the first time a major AI player has decided to release its proprietary technology to the open community.
Canva introduced two new artificial intelligence (AI) features for its visual communications platform on Thursday. While these are backend features that will not be visible on the frontend to the user, they significantly improve its capabilities in terms of platform integration. The first new feature is Canva’s deep research connector for ChatGPT. This allows OpenAI’s chatbot to answer queries about the user’s Canva projects.
Meta is reportedly planning to acquire the Palo Alto, California-based artificial intelligence (AI) startup PlayAI. As per the report, the acquisition is aimed at bolstering its AI division to compete with the likes of OpenAI and Google. The Menlo Park-based social media giant has been aggressively pushing out new AI models and AI features for its platforms.
Flipkart is using social videos and livestreams to convert young consumers spending a lot of time on their smartphones into loyal customers. While the concept of online retailers using videos to boost sales has been around for years, Flipkart hopes this strategy will give it an edge over rivals like Amazon.com and Reliance Industries in India.
Apple has changed rules and fees in its App Store in the EU after the bloc's antitrust regulators ordered it to remove commercial barriers to sending customers outside the store. Apple said developers will pay a 20 percent processing fee for purchases made via the App Store, though the fees could go as low as 13 percent for Apple's small-business program.
Anthropic released a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature for Claude on Wednesday. This new feature will allow users to create interactive AI-powered applications using the chatbot. Once created, users can also host and share these apps on the platform to let others use them. Interestingly, when others use these apps, the maker will not have to bear the application programming interface (API) charges.
Smart security device brand Ring introduced a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature on Wednesday that can analyse motion activity around a house and send text-based notifications to users. The new feature is currently only available in Canada and the US to Ring Home Premium subscribers. It supports all the currently available doorbells and cameras.
SonicWall has warned customers about a malicious version of its SSL VPN NetExtender app that was used to steal VPN configurations and credentials. Threat actors modified two NetExtender application files, impacting organisations allowing remote network access. Both Microsoft and SonicWall have implemented measures to block the spread of these altered NetExtender versions, urging users to remain vigilant against this credential-harvesting threat.
Grok, the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot developed by xAI, might soon get a file editor feature. A tipster claimed that the Elon Musk-owned AI firm is working on this feature, which might support different file types, including spreadsheets. With this, users can chat with Grok and ask it to make changes to various documents.
UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is proposing to designate Alphabet-owned Google with "strategic market status", it said on Tuesday, giving it more power to intervene in search services to increase innovation and economic growth. The CMA aims to use its expanded power to rein in the power of tech giants such as Google, Apple, Meta and Microsoft without stifling investment or growth.
Amazon Prime Day 2025 sale date has been announced, and the sale event will offer significant discounts across a wide range of electronics, including smartphones, laptops, and smart TVs, along with home appliances. Shoppers can also expect exclusive bank offers, potentially slashing an additional 10 percent off the cost of their purchases.
Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, called on the government to reverse its controversial exemption for YouTube from a social media ban for under-16s. In a blog post, YouTube said Inman Grant’s comments ignored the benefits YouTube offered to school students and teachers.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and former Apple designer Jony Ive’s hardware company is reportedly not building a wearable device. On Sunday, the company removed its “io” branding from everywhere due to a trademark lawsuit. Now, as per the report, court filings for the suit have revealed that the artificial intelligence (AI) device in the works is not a wearable.
Amazon Diagnostics was launched by Amazon India on Sunday. The new service is an expansion of Amazon Medical, which includes its Pharmacy and teleconsultation services as well. The diagnostics service, which was developed in collaboration with Orange Health Labs, is currently available in six Indian cities, including Bengaluru, Delhi, Gurugram, Noida, Mumbai, and Hyderabad.
Google is looking to tweak its search results to better highlight rival services, aiming to avoid a hefty EU antitrust fine. This move follows charges from the European Commission accusing the tech giant of violating the Digital Markets Act by prioritising its own services like Google Shopping, Hotels, and Flights on its Search browser.
BSNL recently soft launched its Q-5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) service in select Indian circles. Aimed at businesses and enterprises, it has been introduced with plans starting at Rs. 999 per month, which offer 100Mbps speed. Further, it will offer another higher-priced plans with faster data speeds. The pilot for the BSNL 5G FWA service will begin in September 2025 beginning with Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Pune, and select other cities in India.
Google’s fight against a record EUR 4.1 billion ($4.7 billion) European Union antitrust fine has suffered a blow. Advocate General Juliane Kokott of the EU’s Court of Justice said in a non-binding opinion that Google’s appeal should fail because the legal arguments put forward by the US tech giant fell short.
US President Donald Trump on Thursday extended to September 17 a deadline for China-based ByteDance to divest the US assets of short-video app TikTok. Trump signed an executive order pushing back Thursday's deadline for 90 days, a step he had previously signaled.
Cybersecurity researchers have discovered a “mysterious database” comprising a staggering 16 billion login credentials, in what is being called one of the biggest data breaches in history. According to a report, it impacted some of the world’s biggest technology companies including Apple, Facebook, and Google, along with government portals from multiple countries. The data breach gave threat actors brief but unprecedented access to personal credentials, posing risk of account takeover, identity theft, and phishing attacks.
YouTube will soon integrate Google’s latest artificial intelligence (AI)-powered video generation model, CEO Neal Mohan announced at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity 2025 on Wednesday. It will support improved video generation capabilities powered by the Mountain View-based tech giant’s recently released Veo 3 video generation AI model. It is said to enable users to create AI-generated backgrounds and video clips for Shorts, delivering improved video quality alongside more upgrades.
Vodafone Idea (Vi) on Wednesday announced a strategic partnership with US-based satellite technology company AST SpaceMobile to introduce direct-to-device satellite broadband connectivity in India. With this move, the telecommunications provider aims to expand broadband-based cellular access at locations with challenging terrains where deployment of terrestrial infrastructure is difficult.
Google on Wednesday rolled out Search Live in AI Mode as part of a small experiment in the US. This feature lets users have back-and-forth conversations in real-time in Search, similar to Gemini Live but in the Google app. It was first announced during the Mountain View-based tech giant’s I/O 2025 keynote session in May as an extension to the AI Mode. Search Live is powered by a custom version of Gemini and has voice input capabilities, enabling the ability to not just ask queries, but also follow-up questions.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) announced the name of its 5G service via its social media handle on Wednesday. It is dubbed Q-5G, short for Quantum 5G. This move comes nearly a week after the state-owned telecommunications provider invited public input for naming its 5G services before it commences trial. Further, BSNL has also launched the Q-5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) service in select circles, promising “blazing fast” network speeds and a SIM-less operation.
Canva is now adding a new artificial intelligence (AI) video generation tool dubbed Create a Video Clip. Powered by Google’s latest video AI model, Veo 3, the new tool can generate high-resolution realistic video clips alongwith native audio. The new feature is currently available to Canva’s paid subscribers, the Canva nonprofit users, as well as the subscribers of the Canva-owned Leonardo.ai platform.
Gemini 2.5 Pro and Gemini 2.5 Flash artificial intelligence (AI) models are now generally available to all users on the Gemini app and website. Google announced the release of the stable versions of these models on Tuesday, highlighting that these will replace the preview versions. Additionally, the company also introduced a new Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, its fastest and most cost-efficient model.
Web search in ChatGPT received an update last week. With this, users will now experience higher quality responses, and better instruction following when making a query. Additionally, the artificial intelligence (AI) firm claims that the feature can now handle more complex queries, and work with longer context of the conversation.
ElevenLabs announced the language expansion of its latest artificial intelligence (AI) text-to-speech (TTS) model last week. With this expansion, the AI model now supports 41 new languages, taking the total count to 70 supported languages. The New York City-based AI startup said that with this expansion, the model is now accessible to 90 percent of the global population.
The Justice Department's antitrust officials are examining whether Google's proposed $32 billion (roughly Rs. 2,75,441 crore) purchase of cybersecurity firm Wiz could unlawfully restrict market competition. The review, which is in its early stages, could last months more. It will ultimately determine whether US officials let the deal proceed.
Meta has internally promoted Arun Srinivas to lead its India operations starting next month. At present, Srinivas currently heads the tech giant's India ads business, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Google said on Thursday it had resolved a brief global service disruption on its platforms that affected multiple services such as music streamer Spotify and instant messaging provider Discord. The outage disrupted services on platforms such as Spotify, Snapchat and Discord that rely on the tech giant's cloud managed services and infrastructure.
Amazon has nearly doubled the ad load on Prime Video, increasing it from about two or three minutes to four to six minutes per hour, according to a new report. While this expands ad space and lowers CPM, it may disrupt the viewing experience. Amazon reportedly informed investors but has yet to publicly acknowledge the change. The increased ad load, however, remains lower than traditional TV and some OTT rivals.
Brazil's Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that social media firms are responsible for certain user-posted content in the country. This could result in fines against social media companies in Brazil. The decision could impact the business of platforms including Meta's Facebook and Instagram, as well as TikTok, Elon Musk's X and other internet giants, such as Alphabet's Google, in a market of over 200 million people.
