Latest news, developments and reporting on Companies.
Meta and OpenAI have launched consumer AI agents, Muse and Dots, as always-on assistants that can book reservations, triage email and take on workplace tasks. The Verge reports the race raises questions about trust, privacy and Meta's lack of a frontier model.
Zach Yadegari, Cal AI's teen co-founder, raised $10M for Persona, an AI assistant with a $179 wearable band.
Atari is reissuing the 800XL, an 8-bit home computer first released 43 years ago, through a collaboration with Plaion. Preorders are open at $219.99, with shipping expected in April 2027.
Shengshu Technology has released a preview of its flagship Vidu Q4 video model, which QbitAI tested at as little as 0.09 yuan per second in 720p. The build adds 4K output, up to 15 reference images and three reference audio clips for character consistency.
Google says hackers hijacked three country-code domains to issue fake HTTPS certificates for sites, then revoked them.
Google has released Google AI Edge Foresight, a free experimental Mac app that transcribes meetings entirely offline using an on-device EmbeddingGemma 2 model. It competes with Granola and other AI note-takers.
French AI startup Sesterce has unveiled a data center project in Finland valued at €10 billion, according to Le Monde.
Amazon announced the Alexa Tablet 8, 11 and 12 Pro, replacing its budget Fire tablets with Android devices that include Google Play and Alexa+. Prices run from $230 to $550, with shipments starting Oct. 14.
Butterfly Effect, parent of Chinese AI lab Manus, said it raised more than $500 million in its first funding round since Chinese authorities ordered it to unwind a $2 billion acquisition by Meta. Boyu Capital and IDG Capital led the round, with Tencent, HSG and ZhenFund participating.
Zhengxing Innovation unveiled a Physical AI solution for human-robot collaboration in open retail settings at APRCE 2026, pairing H1 humanoid and C1 wheel-arm robots with an M1 management platform and planning commercial service in 2027.
Uber and Pony.ai plan a robotaxi service in London and will begin testing Pony.ai’s Gen-7 robotaxis in the coming weeks, expanding their partnership into Europe.
Google Cloud launched Gemini agent, an autonomous AI assistant that works across apps and devices.
Dyson launches Total Restore, a £99.99 door-to-door clean and repair service for vacuums and wet cleaners in Britain.
Lenovo opened blind preorders for the YOGA Pro 15 RTX Spark on Oct. 8. The laptop is among the first local-agent AI PCs powered by Nvidia’s RTX Spark N1X superchip and targets AI creators, developers and researchers.
A TechRadar article says global employee engagement has dropped to 20%, its lowest level since 2020, and argues that companies must adopt broadcast-style visual storytelling to hold employee attention and execute strategy.
Jaguar unveiled the Type 01, a four-door electric luxury GT with more than 1,000 hp and a new design language, in New York on Oct. 6. The car is priced from £130,000 in the UK and is set to launch in early 2027.
Asos says a hacker impersonated a trusted contact to access customer names and contact details; shares fell about 10% after a push alert.
TechRadar: 60 Amazon Prime Day deals still live, including AirPods, Sony headphones and Pixel 11.
MIT Technology Review released its 2026 Climate Tech Companies to Watch list, highlighting firms in China, next-generation batteries, geothermal and nuclear power for data centers, and long-duration energy storage.
Manus parent Butterfly Effect raised over $500 million and is rebuilding a Beijing team for China AI agents.
Hu Han, formerly of Tencent Hunyuan, has a new multimodal startup that plans to raise tens of millions of dollars at a target valuation of hundreds of millions, Leifeng reports. Yuanshi Capital is the financial adviser.
Geely Auto Group launched its AI-powered Smart Charge system on Sept. 23, 2026, claiming a 2,250 kW single-gun peak, battery temperatures held below 65 C and 20 percent longer cycle life, along with new batteries, charging robots and a 2027 county-coverage plan.
Architect Financial Technologies has launched Liquid Inference, a router that auctions every LLM request across competing providers and locks a maximum price before generation begins.
Coupang has filed two lawsuits seeking to void fines of 620 billion won (US$462 million) imposed by South Korea's data protection watchdog over a massive data leak and other privacy violations.