Humane Inc. is reportedly seeking a buyer for its business. The company is reportedly working with a financial adviser to assist with the sale and is seeking USD750M-1B from prospective buyers. The company previously raised USD230M from investors, including OpenAI’s Sam Altman. While Humane had said it would improve the AI Pin over time with software updates, founders Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno have largely remained silent about the product and the company’s future. (Android Authority, Bloomberg, The Verge)
To facilitate the deployment of Gemini Nano on devices, Google created a new system service in Android called AICore. AICore simplifies things for developers by handling Gemini Nano model downloads/updates and leveraging on-device hardware to accelerate inference when apps call the Gemini Nano API. Google has revealed some of the companies it allowed to have early access to the AI Edge SDK for Android. These early adopters include Patreon, Grammarly, and Adobe. Google is set to debut a more powerful version of Gemini Nano, called Gemini Nano with multimodality, on its upcoming Pixel 9 series. Current Gemini Nano models come in 1.8B or 3.25B parameter sizes, while the new model will come in a 3.8B parameter size and also support audio and image processing. (Phone Arena, Android Authority)
Adobe is adding an artificial-intelligence-powered Generative Remove feature to its Lightroom photo editor. Lightroom’s Generative Remove uses Adobe’s Firefly AI engine to smoothly replace unwanted elements. Simply paint over the area you want to remove and Lightroom will send that information to Adobe’s Firefly servers, which then crunch the data and send it back. Unlike Adobe Photoshop’s Reference Image feature, which launched less than a month ago and allows users to generate new images using Firefly, Lightroom’s AI features are very much focused on a photographer’s workflow.(Android Authority, Adobe, Adobe, DPReview, Wired)
Microsoft has partnered with Truecaller to create AI-generated assistants. These assistants will actually imitate user’s voice. Truecaller is an app that blocks spam calls in order to help user avoid scams. Along with blocking calls, it has a feature that gives user a personalized assistant that will answer calls for the user. Truecaller has partnered with Microsoft to implement Azure AI Speech into its service. With this integration, users are able to create an AI version of their voice to use as the assistant. (Android Headlines, The Verge, TechCrunch, Truecaller)
Meta and Google are reportedly making some major offers to Hollywood studios in an effort to secure licensing agreements that could boost their capabilities in AI-generated video content. Both companies have put forward deals worth “tens of millions of dollars” to the studios, although the final outcome of the negotiations remains uncertain. While Netflix and Disney are reportedly cautious about licensing their content, they have shown interest in exploring alternative forms of collaboration. In contrast, Warner Brothers Discovery seems more receptive to the idea of licensing certain programs. (Engadget, Bloomberg, Hypebeast, Firstpost)
