AI Startups
Character AI Launches “Stories” — A New Interactive Storytelling Format After Barring Minors from Converse with Chatbots
With Stories, users choose two or three characters, select a genre, and write or auto-generate a story premise.
The Left Shift Bureau
Partnerships
Warner Music Group Reaches Settlement, Forms Major Partnership with AI Music Platform Suno
WMG sued Suno and fellow AI startup Udio last year, accusing them of “widespread infringement” of copyrighted recordings on an “almost unimaginable scale.”
Acquisition
Snowflake Acquires Metadata Platform Select Star to Boost AI-Driven Data Discovery
Select Star, founded by CEO Shinji Kim, brings tools that track where data comes from, how it's used, and by whom — turning raw data into rich, usable context.
Data Centre
Amazon Commits $50 Bn to Boost AI & Supercomputing for U.S. Federal Agencies
The investment will add nearly 1.3 gigawatts of compute capacity using advanced networking and compute technologies.
AI Models
Anthropic Launches Claude Opus 4.5, Its Most Capable AI Model Yet
The model also offers stronger support for long-running agentic workflows, making it well-suited for tasks such as multi-hour application rewriting.
AI Models
Microsoft Unveils Fara-7B — A Compact AI Agent That Uses Your PC Like a Human
Fara-7B visually perceives webpages through screenshots and uses a simulated mouse and keyboard to scroll, click, and type.
Partnerships
Zendesk Launches Agent 365 and Copilot Integrations to Transform Employee Service
As a launch partner for Microsoft Agent 365, Zendesk will bring its AI agents into Microsoft’s secure environment.
Chips
U.S. Charges Four in Scheme to Illegally Export NVIDIA GPUs to China
They allegedly sent 400 NVIDIA A100 GPUs to China via transshipment hubs in Malaysia and Thailand.
Indian IT
TCS Launches Next-Generation AI-Powered RBQM Platform for Smarter, Faster Clinical Trials
The enhanced platform introduces four new interoperable modules: risk assessment and categorisation, quality tolerance limits, clinical trial analytics, and subject data analytics.
Funding
Wealthy Raises ₹130 Crore in Series B Round to Expand AI-Powered Platform for Mutual Fund Distributors
The funds will be used to accelerate its mission to empower India’s rapidly growing community of mutual fund distributors (MFDs) through advanced AI-driven tools and digital infrastructure.
Partnerships
BillionE Mobility Deploys Netradyne’s AI Platform to Boost Safety and Performance Across Electric Fleet
BillionE Mobility will leverage the full suite of capabilities offered by the Driver•i platform, moving from basic in-cab alerts to a comprehensive, data-driven safety and coaching program powered by real-time insights.
Indian IT
Box and TCS Announce Global Partnership to Advance Intelligent Content Management
The collaboration combines TCS’ deep industry expertise with Box’s AI-first Intelligent Content Management (ICM) platform to help organisations unlock insights from legacy systems, accelerate innovation, and deliver stronger business outcomes.