Google is testing a conversational AI search feature on YouTube called “Ask YouTube.” Jay Peters reports for The Verge that the feature is currently available to YouTube Premium subscribers in the United States who are 18 or older. Instead of typing keywords into a search bar, users can ask full questions in natural language. YouTube …
OpenAI has missed several internal targets for revenue and new users, raising questions inside the company about how it will fund its enormous spending on data centers. The Wall Street Journal reported that Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar has warned other company leaders that OpenAI may not be able to cover future computing contracts if …
Xiaomi has launched two new open source artificial intelligence models: MiMo-V2.5 and MiMo-V2.5-Pro. Carl Franzen reports for VentureBeat that both models are available under the permissive MIT License, meaning businesses and developers can use, modify, and deploy them commercially without restrictions. The models are designed for so-called agentic tasks, where an AI system autonomously completes …
ComfyUI, a startup offering precise control over AI-generated images, video, and audio, has raised $30 million in a new funding round at a $500 million valuation. Marina Temkin reports for TechCrunch that Craft Ventures led the round, with Pace Capital, Chemistry, and TruArrow also participating. The company began as an open-source project in 2023. Its …
Google plans to invest up to $40 billion in AI startup Anthropic, deepening a relationship between two companies that compete directly in the AI market while also depending on each other commercially. Google will commit $10 billion immediately, valuing Anthropic at $350 billion. An additional $30 billion may follow if Anthropic meets certain performance targets, …
Elon Musk’s lawsuit against Sam Altman and OpenAI begins this week in Oakland, California. A nine-person jury will hear claims that Altman betrayed the company’s founding mission by transforming OpenAI from a nonprofit into a for-profit enterprise. Dara Kerr and Nick Robins-Early report for The Guardian. Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015 alongside Altman and others. …
China’s top economic planning body, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), has ordered Meta to reverse its acquisition of AI startup Manus. The deal was valued at over $2 billion when Meta completed it in late 2025. The NDRC said it would “prohibit foreign investment in Manus in accordance with laws and regulations” and …
Chinese AI company DeepSeek has released two new open-source language models under the name DeepSeek-V4. The models, called V4-Pro and V4-Flash, are available for download and via API. Both support a context window of one million tokens, meaning they can process roughly eight times the length of a long novel in a single interaction. DeepSeek’s …
Anthropic’s valuation has surged to $1 trillion on secondary markets, overtaking rival OpenAI in investor demand despite being valued at less than half of OpenAI’s $852 billion in their most recent funding rounds. Business Insider reports that the AI company’s shares are now trading above $1 trillion on Forge Global, a leading private marketplace exchange. …
Microsoft has expanded its artificial intelligence assistant Copilot with new capabilities that allow it to take direct, multi-step actions inside Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Sumit Chauhan, President of the Office Product Group, writes that these so-called agentic features are now generally available and the default experience for subscribers. Previously, Copilot could answer questions but struggled …