Apple has entered into a deal with OpenAI to deliver GTP-4o to its devices, which beginning this fall will feature Apple Intelligence, or “AI.” Announced during this week’s WWDC 2024, Apple Intelligence is “deeply integrated into iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia,” according to the company. The new AI features will be available to users of the iPhone 15 Pro, or any devices powered by M1 or newer chips “to understand and create language and images, take action across apps, and draw from personal context to simplify and accelerate everyday tasks.” Continue reading WWDC: Apple Intelligence Brings AI to iPhone, iPad and Mac

California tech companies are bristling at a state bill that would force them to enact strict safety protocols, including installing “kill switches” to turn-off AI models that present a public risk. Silicon Valley has emerged as a global AI leader, and the proposed law would impact not only OpenAI, but Anthropic, Cohere, Google and Meta Platforms. The bill, SB 1047, focuses on what its lead sponsor, State Senator Scott Wiener, calls “common sense safety standards” for frontier models. Should the bill become law, it could affect even firms like Amazon that provide AI cloud services to California customers even though they are not based in the state. Continue reading Tech Firms Push Back Against California AI Safety Regulation

Work management platform Asana is attempting to rebrand the “AI assistant” as “AI teammates” — custom assistants designed to execute key parts of workflows. Currently in beta, AI teammates are more collaborative and goal-oriented and able to “take action with the relevant context and rules of engagement,” Asana explains, contrasting that with “other AI solutions that aimlessly scour data and take action based on unreliable information.” The firm is also debuting a conversational AI chat agent that can answer questions such as: “What blockers are putting this goal at risk?” or “Who at my company knows about this topic?” Continue reading Asana’s Customizable AI Teammates Work Alongside Humans

Stability AI has added another audio product to its lineup, releasing the open-source text-to-audio generator Stable Audio Open 1.0 for sound design. The new model can generate up to 47 seconds of samples and sound effects, including drum beats, instrument riffs, ambient sounds, foley and production elements. It also allows for adapting variations and changing the style of audio samples. Stability AI — best known for the image generator Stable Diffusion — in September released Stable Audio, a commercial product that can generate sophisticated music tracks of up to three minutes. Continue reading Stability AI Releases Free Sound FX Tool, Stable Audio Open

Rene Haas, CEO of UK chip designer Arm Holdings, thinks his company’s platform architecture could nab as much as 50 percent of the Windows PC market by 2030. That would essentially be a 400 percent leap from its current 11 percent share in a market dominated by Intel’s x86 design. Because Arm was developed for smartphones, it was driven by energy efficiency, an approach that is paying off in the era of power-hungry AI applications. Now the technology is being used for the first wave of Microsoft Copilot+ Windows laptops, and Arm has also set its sights on desktop PCs. Continue reading Arm CEO Says Company Aims to Capture Half of PC Market

ElevenLabs has launched its text-to-sound generator Sound Effects for all users, available now at the company’s website. The new AI tool can create audio effects, short instrumental tracks, soundscapes and even character voices. Sound Effects “has been designed to help creators — including film and television studios, video game developers, and social media content creators — generate rich and immersive soundscapes quickly, affordably and at scale,” according to the startup, which developed the tool in partnership with Shutterstock, using its library of licensed audio tracks. Continue reading ElevenLabs Launches an AI Tool for Generating Sound Effects

Intel launched new Xeon 6 processors built for high-density AI work in data centers. Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger emphasized performance and power efficiency as he introduced the next-gen Xeon, and said that the Gaudi 3 chips for AI model training and deployment that were released two months ago are less expensive than comparable silicon from Intel rivals. “Intel is one of the only companies in the world innovating across the full spectrum of the AI market opportunity — from semiconductor manufacturing to PC, network, edge and data center systems,” Gelsinger said, embracing open standards during his keynote at Computex. Continue reading Intel’s Xeon 6 Coming to Data Centers and Lunar Lake to PCs

Qualcomm is expanding beyond mobile and into the desktop market in a big way, bringing its AI-enabled Snapdragon X series chips to “all PC form factors,” CEO Cristiano Amon said onstage at Computex this week. Under the theme of “the PC reborn,” Amon said the Snapdragon X Elite and Snapdragon X Plus processors powering Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC experiences are also upping their mobile game. In addition to improving AI experiences with “the world’s fastest and most efficient NPU for laptops,” the chips can deliver “up to multiple days of battery life,” unfettered those on the go from power outlets. Continue reading Qualcomm All-In on Copilot+ PCs Boosting Speed, Battery Life

Nvidia President and CEO Jensen Huang said the company will be upgrading its AI accelerators annually, with the Blackwell Ultra processor coming in 2025 and a next-generation platform called Rubin that is still in development planned for 2026. Rubin AI will utilize a type of high-bandwidth memory called HBM4 that addresses a bottleneck that has stifled the production of AI accelerators. Huang shared the news from Taiwan, where he delivered a keynote at the Computex trade show. Nvidia Inference Microservices were another focus, allowing AI applications to be deployed in minutes instead of weeks, Huang said. Continue reading Nvidia Teases Next-Gen AI Platform Rubin at Computex 2024

At Computex Taipei this week, AMD revealed its AMD Ryzen AI 300 Series third generation of AI-enabled mobile processors for next-generation laptops. It joins Intel’s upcoming Lunar Lake and the Snapdragon X platform from Qualcomm among the chips vying for a place in the exploding market for artificial intelligence processing, an area dominated by Nvidia. However, with AI PCs and laptops just hitting the market that field is somewhat in play. The Ryzen AI 300s are among those that will be used to power laptops equipped with Microsoft Copilot+ AI. At Computex, AMD also unveiled its Ryzen 9000 Series processors for desktop PCs. Continue reading AMD Unveils Its Next-Gen AI Chips in Battle for Market Share

A year after its announcement, Fable is launching Showrunner, a platform that lets anyone make TV-style animated content by writing prompts that are turned into shows by generative AI. The San Francisco company run by CEO Edward Saatchi with recruits from Oculus, Pixar and various AI startups is launching 10 shows that let users make their own episodes “from their couch,” waiting only minutes to see the finished result, according to Saatchi, who says a 15-word prompt is enough to generate 10- to 20-minute episodes. Saatchi is hoping Fable’s shows can garner an audience by self-publishing on Amazon Prime. Continue reading Fable Launches Showrunner Animated Episodic TV Generator

Big Tech players have joined forces to develop a new industry standard to advance high-speed and low latency communication among data centers by coordinating component development. AMD, Broadcom, Cisco, Google, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), Intel, Meta Platforms and Microsoft are backing the Ultra Accelerator Link (UALink) promoter group. The group plans to define and establish an open industry standard that will enable AI accelerators to communicate more effectively. The UALink aims to create a pathway for system OEMs, IT professionals and system integrators to connect and scale their AI-connected data centers. Continue reading Big Tech Forms a Group to Develop AI Connectivity Standard

French startup Mistral AI has released its first large language model for coding. Codestral gives developers looking for a code-native AI tool an option to Meta’s Code Llama, Microsoft’s GitHub Copilot and Amazon Q. Fluent in 80 programming languages — including Python, C++ and JavaScript — Codestral can complete code, write tests, and augment partial code “using a fill-in-the-middle mechanism,” while reducing “the risk of errors and bugs,” according to the company. The new LLM is described as open, but its license prohibits commercial use of both Codestral and its outputs. Continue reading Mistral Development Tool Knows 80 Programming Languages

After a limited introduction in select markets and to Premium subscribers, YouTube’s Playables free gaming catalog is rolling out to all users. More than 75 games are currently accessible on desktop, Android and iOS by visiting the main YouTube home page and selecting Playables in the Explore menu. Games can be shared by tapping the three-dot “more” menu. The lightweight offerings include popular titles like “Angry Birds Showdown,” “Words of Wonders,” “Cut the Rope” and “Trivia Crack,” among others. Availability will ramp up gradually over the coming months. Continue reading YouTube Adding ‘Playables’ Free Game Catalog for All Users

The Atlantic and Vox Media are the latest publishers to sign deals with OpenAI allowing its editorial products to be used with its artificial intelligence products. The agreements allow OpenAI to use content from The Atlantic and Vox (owner of The Verge and New York Magazine) to train AI models and display news within ChatGPT. Financial details were not disclosed. The publishers said the deals will expose their content to a broader audience as well as provide access to OpenAI technology to help create new products for readers. Continue reading OpenAI Media Push Continues in Pacts with The Atlantic, Vox