September 24 Afternoon Update
SCIENCE / The lead
Anthropic says Claude found a novel enzyme system with CRISPR-like repeats ↗
Anthropic
01 / Leading reports
The front line
China’s Alibaba unveils new powerful chip and ambitious AI model plans ↗
Associated Press reports on Alibaba’s announced chip and model-development plans.
Snorkel AI valued at $3.5 billion amid surging demand for complex AI training data ↗
Rapid commercial growth in AI training data, model evaluation, and enterprise tooling.
AI-AGENT SECURITY STARTUP ISLAND RAISES $400M AT $6.4B VALUATION ↗
02 / The wider picture
Latest signals
Wall Street expects Meta’s AI agent Muse to shape into a new revenue engine ↗
Palo Alto Networks launches AI-agent service to fight cyberattacks ↗
Using AI to help local governments connect with constituents ↗
A primary-source Google.org/Jigsaw account of AI-assisted public participation and local-government planning.
AI could boost LatAm, Caribbean economy 5.1% but wages may fall, IDB says ↗
Enveda raises $311M as AI-discovered drugs enter clinical trials ↗
Mercedes-Benz picks Wayve AI driver for future production cars ↗
Ema raises $77M to expand AI agents across office workflows ↗
ChatGPT mobile adds voice commands for multi-step work ↗
AI infrastructure spending could dwarf past U.S. build-outs, WSJ reports ↗
BlackRock-backed group in talks for up to $25B Stack data-center deal ↗
Wildfire technology spotted fires in minutes, but could not stop them ↗
AI stocks lift Wall Street as oil falls, Treasury yields decline ↗
Chinese ‘robot brain’ startup sees ChatGPT-style breakthrough as soon as next year ↗
AI startup Mantic raises $25 million for superhuman forecasting ↗
↗Anthropic quietly sets up biology lab as it ramps AI drug program ↗
Novo partners with Anthropic to speed up drug development with Claude ↗
AI coding agent startup Factory triples valuation to $5 billion ↗
↗