Amazon to end local processing of Alexa requests

Amazon will eliminate a privacy feature that allowed Echo users to process Alexa requests locally without sending voice recordings to the cloud. According to Scharon Harding at Ars Technica, this change takes effect March 28 and coincides with the rollout of Alexa+, Amazon’s new subscription-based assistant. All voice commands to Echo devices will now be …

Read more

Amazon launches Alexa+ with enhanced AI capabilities

Amazon has unveiled Alexa+, a significant upgrade to its voice assistant that incorporates advanced artificial intelligence technology. This revamped version, announced at a press event in New York City, represents the most substantial overhaul of the platform since its introduction over a decade ago. Alexa+ employs what Amazon describes as a “model agnostic” approach, utilizing …

Read more

Amazon introduces automated reasoning tool to reduce AI hallucinations

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is implementing automated reasoning technology to help prevent AI models from generating false information, according to a Wall Street Journal article by Belle Lin. The technology aims to provide mathematical proof that AI responses are accurate within specific domains. AWS’s new tool, called Automated Reasoning Checks, requires customers to establish definitive …

Read more

Stable Diffusion 3.5 launches on Amazon’s enterprise AI platform

Stability AI has released its latest text-to-image generation model, Stable Diffusion 3.5 Large, on Amazon’s Bedrock service. As reported by Sean Michael Kerner for VentureBeat, this marks AWS as the only public cloud service offering Stability AI’s flagship models. The integration allows enterprises to access multiple AI models through a single unified API, meeting the …

Read more

Amazon launches Nova family of AI models for text, image and video generation

Amazon Web Services has introduced Nova, a new family of artificial intelligence models designed for text, image and video generation. The announcement was made by CEO Andy Jassy at the AWS re:Invent conference. The Nova family consists of four text-generating models: Micro, Lite, Pro, and Premier. Micro, Lite, and Pro are immediately available to AWS …

Read more

AWS enhances Q Business AI assistant with new integrations

Amazon Web Services has announced significant updates to its Q Business AI assistant platform, expanding its capabilities through new third-party integrations and workflow automation features. According to TechCrunch reporter Frederic Lardinois, the system can now connect with additional enterprise tools and perform actions across applications like Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, and Smartsheet. Q Business will …

Read more

AWS announces major AI infrastructure and service updates at re:Invent 2024

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has unveiled several significant artificial intelligence developments at its re:Invent 2024 conference. The announcements focus on new hardware, software, and services designed to enhance AI capabilities for business customers. The company introduced the general availability of its Trainium2 chips, which AWS claims are four times faster than their predecessors. These chips …

Read more

Amazon increases investment in AI company Anthropic to $8 billion

Amazon has announced an additional $4 billion investment in artificial intelligence company Anthropic, bringing its total investment to $8 billion while maintaining a minority stake. The investment marks Amazon’s largest outside investment in its three-decade history. As part of the agreement, Amazon Web Services (AWS) will become Anthropic’s primary cloud and training partner. Anthropic will …

Read more

Amazon faces technical hurdles with new AI-powered Alexa

Amazon’s attempt to upgrade Alexa with generative AI capabilities has encountered significant challenges, according to internal documents obtained by Jason Del Rey at Fortune. The new version, codenamed Banyan, suffers from response delays and low customer satisfaction scores in testing. Documents reveal that the AI assistant’s latency issues could frustrate users, and nearly 10% of …

Read more

Amazon developing AI chips to reduce reliance on Nvidia

Amazon is investing heavily in developing its own AI chips through Annapurna Labs, an Austin-based startup it acquired in 2015 for $350 million. The company aims to boost efficiency in its data centers and reduce costs for both itself and its AWS customers, the Financial Times reports. According to Dave Brown, vice-president of compute and …

Read more