DeepSeek Weighs a Move Into Robotics as Liang Wenfeng Meets Founders
DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng has been holding talks with founders working on embodied intelligence and is weighing whether the company should move into robotics, according to a report from Phoenix Tech. People familiar with the matter said two routes are under discussion, with one being a dedicated internal team and the other a set of stakes in companies already working in the field. DeepSeek has not commented.
8 minutes ago
Adobe Finds 57% of Southeast Asian Firms Stuck in AI's Frozen Middle
About 57% of organisations in Southeast Asia are stuck in what Adobe calls the frozen middle, running AI pilots or early deployments without the coordination needed to scale them. For agentic AI, the share is 40%. The figures come from Adobe's 2026 State of AI Readiness Report, built on a survey of 5,633 senior executives across 12 industries and 11 markets, including 461 in Southeast Asia, and conducted by Incisiv for Adobe.
12 hours ago
Character.AI Files for Chapter 11 and Agrees to Sell Assets to Disney
Character.AI has begun a Chapter 11 bankruptcy case in the United States and agreed to sell some of its assets to Walt Disney for $20 million. The filing was made in the bankruptcy court for the District of Delaware and is voluntary, the company said. Character Technologies, which owns the chatbot platform, put its estimated assets and liabilities between $50 million and $100 million in a court filing that also sets out the sale process.
13 hours ago
China's Smartphone Shipments Fall 15.4% in a Sixth Straight Quarter
China's smartphone shipments fell 15.4% in the third quarter from a year earlier to 57.9 million units, according to the research firm IDC. It was the sixth consecutive quarterly decline, and a far steeper one than the roughly 4% fall recorded in the first half of the year. Two forces sit behind the number, with weak consumer spending in China on one side and the rising cost of components on the other.
16 hours ago
Unitree's Wang Xingxing Says GPT-6 Could Unlock Embodied Intelligence
Unitree Robotics founder and chief executive Wang Xingxing says OpenAI's newest artificial intelligence models may bring a robotics breakthrough as soon as next year, a sharp change from the guidance he gave earlier in the year. He puts the window at one or two years. His remarks carry weight because Unitree, based in Hangzhou, is China's best known humanoid robot maker, and investors and analysts treat them as a bellwether for the domestic sector.
24 hours ago
Fitbit Edge
Google has announced the Fitbit Edge, a slim fitness tracker that sits between its advanced Pixel Watch and the simpler Fitbit Air band. The company describes the device as lightweight and comfortable, a daily companion rather than a full smartwatch. Google says it built the Edge for people who want a middle path between a screenless band and a smartwatch worn on the wrist.
1 day ago
NC State Develops Feather Star-Inspired Underwater Robot
Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a soft underwater robot capable of three dimensional movement. This new device, drawing inspiration from feather stars, uses only two actuators to achieve a range of motion typically requiring six. The design enables movement forward, backward, upward, downward, and rotation around its central axis, significantly reducing mechanical complexity for such maneuverability.
2 days ago
Sony Launches World's First Eclipsa Audio Certified Smartphone Microphone
Sony has announced a spatial audio microphone that plugs straight into a smartphone over USB C. The company calls it the first microphone for phones to carry Eclipsa Audio certification, a standard built on the IAMF specification. It reaches Singapore shops at a suggested retail price of SGD 249.
2 days ago
Alibaba Chairman: Open Source Europe's Tech Independence
According to the South China Morning Post, Alibaba Group Holding chairman Joe Tsai stated that Europe's path to technological independence lies solely in adopting an open source approach. He referenced China's own open source initiatives as a model for innovation developed under restrictions.
2 days ago
Anthropic Bans Sustained Cruelty to AI Models
Anthropic, an artificial intelligence organisation, has recently modified its online usage guidelines. The new rules prohibit sustained and unnecessary cruelty towards its AI models. Under this policy, models such as Claude will cease communication if a user consistently exhibits abusive behaviour, a measure the company attributes to its internal belief that AI may eventually achieve consciousness.
2 days ago
