News

Artificial Intelligence
Anthropic Targets Pre-Thanksgiving IPO at $2 Trillion Valuation
October 01, 2026

Anthropic aims to start the formal marketing for its initial public offering as soon as the week of Nov. 9 and begin trading before the Thanksgiving holiday, Nov. 26, Bloomberg reported Thursday (Oct. 1), citing unnamed sources. The company is still considering its plans for...

Artificial Intelligence
Cars24 Turns Test Drive Chatter Into a 35% Sales Lift
October 01, 2026

A test drive at Cars24 lasts about an hour. Buyers raise loan worries, point out problems with the car and ask questions the salesperson may not answer well. Much of it used to go unnoticed. The Indian used-car retailer now records those conversations and uses...

Cross-border Payments
Europe’s Payee Checks Set the Pace as US Plans Take Shape
October 01, 2026

A payment moving from one country to another passes through banks, clearing systems and payment networks that operate under different rules. The recipient information used to check the payment and bolster security can be just as fragmented. Payee verification connects some of those far-flung systems....

Artificial Intelligence
OpenAI Cracks Down on Insiders Sharing Data With Safety Watchdog
October 01, 2026

OpenAI has “parted ways” with three employees who allegedly shared company information with an organization focused on artificial intelligence safety, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday (Oct. 1), citing unnamed sources. Asked about the report by the WSJ, an OpenAI spokesperson said, per the report:...

Artificial Intelligence
Microsoft Targets Contact Center Market With Real-Time AI Voice Models
October 01, 2026

Microsoft has launched three new artificial intelligence models that can be used to power customer service agents, multilingual assistants, interactive learning experiences and live captions and voice-driven interfaces, according to a Thursday (Oct. 1) blog post. “Together, they give developers more choice in how to...

Delivery
DoorDash Opens Beta Waitlist for AI Text Ordering
October 01, 2026

DoorDash customers can now order dinner by sending a text. The company’s new artificial intelligence (AI) agent works inside Apple’s Messages, builds the cart and handles checkout without the DoorDash app ever opening. DoorDash unveiled the text-to-order agent on Wednesday (Sept. 30) and opened a...

Retail
Amazon and Walmart Want Merchants’ Software Budgets
October 01, 2026

The retail landscape used to have four primary levers: share of shoppers, share of sellers, share of advertising dollars and share of wallet. However, artificial intelligence (AI) is creating the fifth and sixth levers: share of decision-making and share of intent infrastructure. Headlines this week...

Artificial Intelligence
St. Louis Fed Adapts FRED Database for AI Agents
October 01, 2026

Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) has introduced a FRED MCP Connector that uses the Model Context Protocol (MCP) to simplify connecting FRED data with artificial intelligence systems, Federal Reserve Board Governor Christopher J. Waller said Thursday (Oct. 1). In a speech delivered during FRED Con...

Investments
Armadin Raises $255 Million to Scale Agentic Cybersecurity Platform
October 01, 2026

Cybersecurity firm Armadin says it has raised $255.5 million in new funding. The company’s Series B round, announced Thursday (Oct. 1), values Aramdin at more than $2.5 billion and will help it scale its agentic security platform, research, training and go-to-market efforts. “Seven months after emerging from stealth, Armadin...