Electricity. The Internet. Now it’s time for another major technology, AI, to sweep the globe. NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang took the stage at a packed Taipei Music Center Monday to kick off COMPUTEX 2025, captivating the audience of more than 4,000 with a vision for a technology revolution that will sweep every country, every industry and every company. “AI is now infrastructure, and this infrastructure, just like the internet, just like electricity, needs factories,” Huang said. “These factories are essentially what we build today.” “They’re not data centers of the past,” Huang added. “These AI data centers, if you will, are improperly described. They are, in fact, AI factories. You apply energy to it, and it produces something incredibly valuable, and these things are called tokens.” NVIDIA CUDA-X Everywhere: After showing a towering wall of partner logos, Huang described how companies are using NVIDIA’s CUDA-X platform for a dizzying array of applications, how NVIDIA and its partners are building 6G using AI, and revealed NVIDIA’s latest work to accelerate quantum supercomputing. “The larger the install base, the more developers want to create libraries, the more libraries, the more amazing things are done,” Huang said, describing CUDA-X’s growing popularity and power. “Better applications, more benefits to users.” More’s coming, Huang said, describing the growing power of AI to reason and perceive. That leads us to agentic AI — AI able to understand, think and act. Beyond that is physical AI — AI that understands the world. The phase after that, he said, is general robotics. All of this has created demand for much more computing power. To meet those needs, Huang detailed the latest NVIDIA innovations from Grace Blackwell NVL72 systems to advanced networking technology, and detailed huge new AI installations from CoreWeave, Oracle, Microsoft, xAI and others across the globe. “These are gigantic factory investments, and the reason why people build factories is because you know, you know the answer,” Huang said with a grin. “The more you buy, the more you make.” Building AI for Taiwan: It all starts in Taiwan, Huang said, highlighting the key role Taiwan plays in the global technology ecosystem. But Taiwan isn’t just building AI for the world; NVIDIA is helping build AI for Taiwan. Huang announced that NVIDIA and Foxconn Hon Hai Technology Group are deepening their longstanding partnership and are working with the Taiwan government to build an AI factory supercomputer that will deliver state-of-the-art NVIDIA Blackwell infrastructure to researchers, startups and industries – including TSMC. “Having a world-class AI infrastructure here in Taiwan is really important,” Huang said. NVIDIA NVLink Fusion: And moving to help its partners scale up their systems however they choose, Huang announced NVLink Fusion, a new architecture that enables hyperscalers to create semi-custom compute solutions with NVIDIA’s NVLink interconnect. This technology aims to break down traditional data center bottlenecks, enabling a new level of AI scale and more flexible, optimized system designs tailored to specific AI workloads. “This incredible body of work now becomes flexible and open for anybody to integrate into,” Huang said. Blackwell Everywhere: And the engine now powering this entire AI ecosystem is NVIDIA Blackwell, with Huang showing a slide explaining how NVIDIA offers “one architecture,” from cloud AI to enterprise AI, from personal AI to edge AI. DGX Spark: Now in full production, this personal AI supercomputer for developers will be available in a “few weeks.” DGX Spark partners include ASUS, Dell, Gigabyte, Lenovo and MSI. DGX Station: DGX Station is a powerful system with up to 20 petaflops of performance powered from a wall socket. Huang said it has the capacity to run a 1 trillion parameter model, which is like having your “own personal DGX supercomputer.” NVIDIA RTX PRO Servers: Huang also announced a new line of enterprise servers for agentic AI. NVIDIA RTX PRO Servers, part of a new NVIDIA Enterprise AI Factory validated design, are now in volume production. Delivering universal acceleration for AI, design, engineering and business, RTX PRO Servers provide a foundation for NVIDIA partners to build and operate on-premises AI factories. NVIDIA AI Data Platform: The compute platform is different, so the storage platform for modern AI is different. To that end, Huang showcased the latest NVIDIA partners building intelligent storage infrastructure with NVIDIA RTX 6000 PRO Blackwell Server Edition GPUs and the NVIDIA AI Data Platform reference design. Physical AI: Agents are “essentially digital robots,” Huang said, able to “perceive, understand and plan.” To speed up the development of physical robots, the industry needs to train robots in a simulated environment. Huang said that NVIDIA partnered with DeepMind and Disney to build Newton, the world’s most advanced physics training engine for robotics. Huang introduced new tools to speed the development of humanoid robots: The Isaac GR00T-Dreams blueprint will help generate synthetic training data. And the Isaac GR00T N1.5 Humanoid Robot Foundation Model will power robotic intelligence. Industrial Physical AI: Huang said that companies are in the process of building $5 trillion worth of factories worldwide. Optimizing the design of those factories is critical to boosting their output. Taiwan’s leading manufacturers — TSMC, Foxconn, Wistron, Pegatron, Delta Electronics, Quanta, GIGABYTE and others — are harnessing NVIDIA Omniverse to build digital twins to drive the next wave of industrial physical AI for semiconductor and electronics manufacturing. NVIDIA Constellation: Lastly, building anticipation, Huang introduced a dramatic video showing NVIDIA’s Santa Clara office launching into space and landing in Taiwan. The big reveal: NVIDIA Constellation, a brand new Taiwan office for NVIDIA’s growing Taiwan workforce. In closing, Huang emphasized that the work Taiwanese companies are doing has changed the world. He thanked NVIDIA’s ecosystem partners and described the industry’s opportunity as “extraordinary” and “once in a lifetime.” “We are in fact creating a whole new industry to support AI factories, AI agents, and robotics, with one architecture,” Huang said.

MSI EdgeXpert MS-C931 boasts super specs and DGX Spark tech, but doubts remain over its claim of being a true desktop AI supercomputer.

China has launched the first 12 satellites of a planned 2,800-strong orbital supercomputer satellite network, reports Space News. The satellites, created by the company ADA Space, Zhijiang Laboratory, and Neijang High-Tech Zone, will be able to process the data they collect themselves, rather than relying on terrestrial stations to do it for them, according to ADA Space’s announcement (machine-translated).The satellites are part of ADA Space’s “Star Compute” program and the first of what it calls the “Three-Body Computing Constellation,” the company writes. Each of the 12 satellites has an onboard 8-billion parameter AI model and is capable of 744 tera operations per second (TOPS) — a measure of their AI processing grunt — and, collectively, ADA Space says they can manage 5 peta operations per second, or POPS. That’s quite a bit more than, say, the 40 TOPS required for a Microsoft Copilot PC. The eventual goal is to have a network of thousands of satellites that achieve 1,000 POPs, according to the Chinese government.The satellites communicate with each other at up-to-100Gbps using lasers, and share 30 terabytes of storage between them, according to Space News. The 12 launched last week carry scientific payloads, including an X-ray polarization detector for picking up brief cosmic phenomena such as gamma-ray bursts. The satellites also have the capability to create 3D digital twin data that can be used for purposes like emergency response, gaming, and tourism, ADA Space says in its announcement.The benefits of having a space-based supercomputer go beyond saving communications time, according to South China Morning Post. The outlet notes that traditional satellite transmissions are slow, and that “less than 10 per cent” of satellite data makes it to Earth, due to things like limited bandwidth and ground station availability. And Jonathan McDowell, a space historian and astronomer at Harvard University, told the outlet, “Orbital data centres can use solar power and radiate their heat to space, reducing the energy needs and carbon footprint.” He said both the US and Europe could carry out similar projects in the future, writes SCMP.See More:

China has launched the first 12 satellites of a planned 2,800-strong orbital supercomputer satellite network, reports Space News. The satellites, created by the company ADA Space, Zhijiang Laboratory, and Neijang High-Tech Zone, will be able to process the data they collect themselves, rather than relying on terrestrial stations to do it for them, according to ADA Space’s announcement (machine-translated).The satellites are part of ADA Space’s “Star Compute” program and the first of what it calls the “Three-Body Computing Constellation,” the company writes. Each of the 12 satellites has an onboard 8-billion parameter AI model and is capable of 744 tera operations per second (TOPS) — a measure of their AI processing grunt — and, collectively, ADA Space says they can manage 5 peta operations per second, or POPS. That’s quite a bit more than, say, the 40 TOPS required for a Microsoft Copilot PC. The eventual goal is to have a network of thousands of satellites that achieve 1,000 POPs, according to the Chinese government.The satellites communicate with each other at up-to-100Gbps using lasers, and share 30 terabytes of storage between them, according to Space News. The 12 launched last week carry scientific payloads, including an X-ray polarization detector for picking up brief cosmic phenomena such as gamma-ray bursts. The satellites also have the capability to create 3D digital twin data that can be used for purposes like emergency response, gaming, and tourism, ADA Space says in its announcement.The benefits of having a space-based supercomputer go beyond saving communications time, according to South China Morning Post. The outlet notes that traditional satellite transmissions are slow, and that “less than 10 per cent” of satellite data makes it to Earth, due to things like limited bandwidth and ground station availability. And Jonathan McDowell, a space historian and astronomer at Harvard University, told the outlet, “Orbital data centres can use solar power and radiate their heat to space, reducing the energy needs and carbon footprint.” He said both the US and Europe could carry out similar projects in the future, writes SCMP.See More:

Sergey Nivens - Stock.Adobe.com News The Security Interviews: David Faugno, 1Password David Faugno, co-CEO of 1Password, discusses how his background led to him joining the company and why maintaining profitability is a key factor in overcoming the challenges of switching markets. By Peter Ray Allison Published: 16 May 2025 12:15 Although companies may embrace emerging technologies to remain competitive, they can be risk averse, especially when it comes to changing their customer base. However, this shift in focus is what 1Password did when it moved from being consumer focused to providing enterprise grade security solutions. In 2006, the company 1Password developed a password manager of the same name for the Windows, Android, iOS and Linux platforms. Since then, it has earned a reputation for being a secure method for protecting sensitive user information. Software licenses and other sensitive information can also be securely stored in a virtual vault on their servers, which is locked with a password-based key derivation function (PBKDF2) guarded master password (a password storage algorithm that is designed for deterring brute force attacks by making them computationally expensive). David Faugno had previously been enjoying a semi-retirement, working as a board member and adviser for various companies, including 1Password. As his interest in the company grew, he soon became increasingly impressed with its collaborative approach and transparency. He was invited to join the company as its president and chief operating officer in September 2023, before becoming co-CEO just over a year later. Faugno had previously spent more than 10 years with security and storage provider Barracuda Networks as its chief finance officer. Faugno’s experience with Barracuda Networks gave him a broad understanding of the security landscape, as well as a unique perspective for solving security problems facing organisations of all sizes. When Faugno joined 1Password, the world was emerging from the Covid-19 pandemic. Covid transformed the way companies operate by accelerating remote working technologies and encouraging people to work from home and, since then, hybrid working has become the norm in many sectors. “The world was fundamentally changing. The way people worked and the tools that businesses had provided to their employees to stay safe and secure, and create a secure perimeter, no longer really existed,” says Faugno. “This got accelerated pretty dramatically during the pandemic, which is right at the point in the time when we first invested and got involved.” As a consequence of the proliferation of remote working, the security perimeter for an organisation also expanded. Previously, the security perimeter had been at the endpoints of the corporate network, but now it has extended into homes of employees. Most cyber security incidents are due to compromised credentials, such as stolen, weak or reused passwords. Consequently, employees who use weak identification systems at home may inadvertently expose corporate networks to attack. It is therefore essential for maintaining security of a corporate network security that the cyber security of devices in the employees’ home is also protected. One method for achieving this is to provide each employee with a free family license for a cyber security package. Balancing security and data privacy against accessibility and usability can be challenging as these aspects can often be at odds with each other. Faugno acknowledges that uncompromised security may cause friction with setup and account recovery, however, 1Password took a decision early in the product development cycle to focus on ensuring that the most secure way was also the easiest. This led to a rapid uptake of its password manager, which resulted in it being adopted into thousands of businesses. Faugno soon noted that although 1Password was primarily a consumer-focused product at the time, it was becoming increasingly used in the enterprise sector. “When the work environment started to change and people started to get access to resources that were not being necessarily centrally controlled through their SSO, or through the tools that the company had put behind the firewall, these security-centric folks in business thought, ‘Oh, I can use 1Password for this’,” says Faugno. “We got pulled into thousands of business environments by these people. That’s when our awakening happened – the battlefield had moved from the building walls to where the end user was, wherever they were, with whatever tools they were using.” One of the first things Faugno did when he joined 1Password was to hire a finance leader. By having a sales team engage with enterprise clients to understand their needs, such as administrative controls or additional reporting functionality, 1Password was able to develop its existing platform and market an enterprise service to the business community. “When we first made the investment in 1Password in 2019, the company had zero salespeople and pretty much zero accountants,” says Faugno. “It was nothing but developers, building a great product, and support people. Those use cases would organically come, but what we weren’t doing is interfacing with the chief information security officers at large enterprises to share how our platform fits into their overall security architecture.” 1Password started building infrastructure around enterprise level support and billing capabilities, as well as sales and post-sales implementation capabilities, to allow it to engage with the business sector. Any change to a company carries with it a certain level of risk and expense, especially when it involves adapting to a changing market. It has taken four years, but 1Password’s core business model has created solid foundation for the company to build on. Despite the absence of salespeople and accountants, 1Password’s cash flow had remained profitable. This strong position allowed 1Password the opportunity for forward investment (investing in a company to improve a return on investment) without sacrificing profitability. Although maintaining durability of growth is essential for financial sustainability, it can be challenging. Unless an organisation has a financially stable core product, significant resources can be spent promoting a product that causes a sudden growth curve, but the growth will stop as soon as the money is used up if it was not sustainable. 1Password had the opportunity to invest in itself while remaining profitable in the different sectors, ensuring a durable growth. Instead of optimising for profitability, 1Password is forward investing across several areas without the need to pay off debt from a private equity transaction. “Over 75% of our sales are to companies, but so many people think of us as a consumer business, because either they know us personally or they’ve seen the legacy of us over the 20 years,” says Faugno.  The cyber security sector is a constantly evolving market, with an ongoing war of attrition between hackers and security teams: what is cutting edge now could be obsolete in six months’ time. Not only must security companies have a solid product, but they must also constantly update it in response to emerging threats. Soon, one of the key challenges that cyber security teams will need robust solutions for is protecting their communications in a post-quantum world. Quantum computers can process vast amounts of information in a fraction of the time that classical computers would take, including today’s supercomputers. This will have massive implications for cyber security as quantum computers will be able quickly break current encryption systems. There are various technologies already being developed that are described as quantum resistant, but testing of these is still ongoing. Rather than focusing on a specific technology, 1Password has teams researching emerging challenges. The future security challenge presented by quantum computing necessitate a multifaceted security strategy – 2FA/MFA, passkeys and federation (authentication across networked systems). “We have teams that are engaged deeply in thinking about what’s not only the next step, but two steps ahead,” says Faugno. “The world is changing across a number of dimensions, and quantum computing represents one. Passkeys are going to help, but the pathway to passwordlesss is a journey that’s going to take decades.   “Our view is that you have to start with the visibility of everything that exists and move everything on the continuum to passwordlesss. Today, that is having strong and unique passwords and encrypted vaults, adding multi-factor authentication, using passkeys where they’re available, and ultimately moving to federation.” Reputation is essential, especially in security. If a tool has proven itself to be viable and effective protection against attacks in the wild, then that will over carry into the business sector and naturally generate interest from organisations. “If you can build that level of endearment to the end user at the individual level, then what you can do for the business user is very similar,” concludes Faugno. “You can satisfy the most robust and hard-to-crack use case for making someone feel like this tool is helping them be secure and productive.”  Read more from the Security Interviews Series Armis CEO Yevgeny Dibrov talks about how his military service and intelligence work opened the door into the world of cyber security entrepreneurship. Okta regional chief security officer for EMEA sits down with Dan Raywood to talk about how Okta is pivoting to a secure-by-design champion. Threat intel expert and author Martin Lee, EMEA technical lead for security research at Cisco Talos, joins Computer Weekly to mark the 35th anniversary of the first ever ransomware attack. In The Current Issue: UK MoJ crime prediction algorithms raise serious concerns Interview: Markus Schümmelfeder, CIO, Boehringer Ingelheim Download Current Issue GraphQL as an ‘essential protocol’ for AI-API orchestration – CW Developer Network Mind the insight-to-impact gap, Qlik captures analytics ‘in the moment’ – CW Developer Network View All Blogs

This is today's edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what's going on in the world of technology. This baby boy was treated with the first personalized gene-editing drug Doctors say they constructed a bespoke gene-editing treatment in less than seven months and used it to treat a baby with a deadly metabolic condition. The rapid-fire attempt to rewrite the child’s DNA marks the first time gene editing has been tailored to treat a single individual. The baby who was treated, Kyle “KJ” Muldoon Jr., suffers from a rare metabolic condition caused by a particularly unusual gene misspelling. Researchers say their attempt to correct the error demonstrates the high level of precision new types of gene editors offer.The project also highlights what some experts are calling a growing crisis in gene-editing technology. That’s because even though the technology could cure thousands of genetic conditions, most are so rare that companies could never recoup the costs of developing a treatment for them. Read the full story.—Antonio Regalado Access to experimental medical treatments is expanding across the US —Jessica Hamzelou A couple of weeks ago I was in Washington, DC, for a gathering of scientists, policymakers, and longevity enthusiasts. They had come together to discuss ways to speed along the development of drugs and other treatments that might extend the human lifespan. One approach that came up was to simply make experimental drugs more easily accessible. Now, the state of Montana has passed a new bill that sets out exactly how clinics can sell experimental, unproven treatments in the state to anyone who wants them. The passing of the bill could make Montana something of a US hub for experimental treatments. But it represents a wider trend: the creep of Right to Try across the US. And a potentially dangerous departure from evidence-based medicine. Read the full story. This article first appeared in The Checkup, MIT Technology Review’s weekly biotech newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Thursday, and read articles like this first, sign up here. Take a new look at AI’s energy use Big Tech's appetite for energy is growing rapidly as adoption of AI accelerates. But just how much energy does even a single AI query use? And what does it mean for the climate? Join editor in chief Mat Honan, senior climate reporter Casey Crownhart, and AI reporter James O'Donnell at 1.30pm ET on Wednesday May 21 for a subscriber-only Roundtables conversation exploring AI's energy demands now and in the future. Register here. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 xAI has blamed Grok’s white genocide fixation on an ‘unauthorized modification’ Made by an unnamed employee at 3.15am. (TechCrunch)+ The topic is one the far-right comes back to again and again. (The Atlantic $)+ Memphis residents are struggling to live alongside xAI’s supercomputer. (CNBC) 2 Meta has delayed the launch of its next flagship AI model Its engineers are struggling to improve its Behemoth LLM enough. (WSJ $)3 Elon Musk is tapping up friends and allies for federal jobs It’s creating an unprecedented web of potential conflicts of interests. (WSJ $)+ Musk is posting on X less than he used to. (Semafor)4 The US is slashing funding for scientific research Such projects produced GPS, LASIK eye surgery, and CAPTCHAs. (NYT $)+ US tech visa applicants are under seriously heavy scrutiny. (Wired $)+ The foundations of America’s prosperity are being dismantled. (MIT Technology Review)They’re focusing on improving chatbots’ memory—but critics are worried. (5 Big Tech wants its AI agents to remember everything about you 🧠FT $)+ AI agents can spontaneously develop human-like behavior. (The Guardian)+ Generative AI can turn your most precious memories into photos that never existed. (MIT Technology Review)6 People keep making anti-DEI modifications for The Sims 4 And the gamemaker EA’s attempts to stamp them out aren’t working. (Wired $) 7 This chatbot promises to help you get over your ex  Closure creates an AI version of ex-partners for users to vent their frustrations at. (404 Media)+ The AI relationship revolution is already here. (MIT Technology Review)8 How this AI song became a viral megahit in JapanYAJU&U is completely inescapable, and totally nonsensical. (Pitchfork) + AI is coming for music, too. (MIT Technology Review) 9 Your future overseas trip could be by zeppelin If these startups get their way. (WP $)+ Welcome to the big blimp boom. (MIT Technology Review)10 Are you a ‘dry texter’? 💬 It’s a conflict-averse teen’s worst nightmare. (Vox) Quote of the day “It’s OK to be Chinese overseas.” —Chris Pereira, the CEO of iMpact, a communications firm advising Chinese companies expanding abroad, tells Rest of World that DeepSeek has given Chinese startups the confidence not to hide their origins. One more thingWe’ve never understood how hunger works. That might be about to change. When you’re starving, hunger is like a demon. It awakens the most ancient and primitive parts of the brain, then commandeers other neural machinery to do its bidding until it gets what it wants. Although scientists have had some success in stimulating hunger in mice, we still don’t really understand how the impulse to eat works. Now, some experts are following known parts of the neural hunger circuits into uncharted parts of the brain to try and find out. Their work could shed new light on the factors that have caused the number of overweight adults worldwide to skyrocket in recent years. And it could also help solve the mysteries around how and why a new class of weight-loss drugs seems to work so well. Read the full story. —Adam Piore We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or skeet 'em at me.)+ Who knew—Harvard Law School’s Magna Carta may be the real deal after all.+ Early relatives of reptiles might have walked the Earth much earlier than we realised.+ New York University’s MFA Students are a talented bunch.+ The Raines sandwich sounds unspeakably awful 🥪

This is today's edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what's going on in the world of technology. This baby boy was treated with the first personalized gene-editing drug Doctors say they constructed a bespoke gene-editing treatment in less than seven months and used it to treat a baby with a deadly metabolic condition. The rapid-fire attempt to rewrite the child’s DNA marks the first time gene editing has been tailored to treat a single individual. The baby who was treated, Kyle “KJ” Muldoon Jr., suffers from a rare metabolic condition caused by a particularly unusual gene misspelling. Researchers say their attempt to correct the error demonstrates the high level of precision new types of gene editors offer.The project also highlights what some experts are calling a growing crisis in gene-editing technology. That’s because even though the technology could cure thousands of genetic conditions, most are so rare that companies could never recoup the costs of developing a treatment for them. Read the full story.—Antonio Regalado Access to experimental medical treatments is expanding across the US —Jessica Hamzelou A couple of weeks ago I was in Washington, DC, for a gathering of scientists, policymakers, and longevity enthusiasts. They had come together to discuss ways to speed along the development of drugs and other treatments that might extend the human lifespan. One approach that came up was to simply make experimental drugs more easily accessible. Now, the state of Montana has passed a new bill that sets out exactly how clinics can sell experimental, unproven treatments in the state to anyone who wants them. The passing of the bill could make Montana something of a US hub for experimental treatments. But it represents a wider trend: the creep of Right to Try across the US. And a potentially dangerous departure from evidence-based medicine. Read the full story. This article first appeared in The Checkup, MIT Technology Review’s weekly biotech newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Thursday, and read articles like this first, sign up here. Take a new look at AI’s energy use Big Tech's appetite for energy is growing rapidly as adoption of AI accelerates. But just how much energy does even a single AI query use? And what does it mean for the climate? Join editor in chief Mat Honan, senior climate reporter Casey Crownhart, and AI reporter James O'Donnell at 1.30pm ET on Wednesday May 21 for a subscriber-only Roundtables conversation exploring AI's energy demands now and in the future. Register here. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 xAI has blamed Grok’s white genocide fixation on an ‘unauthorized modification’ Made by an unnamed employee at 3.15am. (TechCrunch)+ The topic is one the far-right comes back to again and again. (The Atlantic $)+ Memphis residents are struggling to live alongside xAI’s supercomputer. (CNBC) 2 Meta has delayed the launch of its next flagship AI model Its engineers are struggling to improve its Behemoth LLM enough. (WSJ $)3 Elon Musk is tapping up friends and allies for federal jobs It’s creating an unprecedented web of potential conflicts of interests. (WSJ $)+ Musk is posting on X less than he used to. (Semafor)4 The US is slashing funding for scientific research Such projects produced GPS, LASIK eye surgery, and CAPTCHAs. (NYT $)+ US tech visa applicants are under seriously heavy scrutiny. (Wired $)+ The foundations of America’s prosperity are being dismantled. (MIT Technology Review)They’re focusing on improving chatbots’ memory—but critics are worried. (5 Big Tech wants its AI agents to remember everything about you 🧠FT $)+ AI agents can spontaneously develop human-like behavior. (The Guardian)+ Generative AI can turn your most precious memories into photos that never existed. (MIT Technology Review)6 People keep making anti-DEI modifications for The Sims 4 And the gamemaker EA’s attempts to stamp them out aren’t working. (Wired $) 7 This chatbot promises to help you get over your ex  Closure creates an AI version of ex-partners for users to vent their frustrations at. (404 Media)+ The AI relationship revolution is already here. (MIT Technology Review)8 How this AI song became a viral megahit in JapanYAJU&U is completely inescapable, and totally nonsensical. (Pitchfork) + AI is coming for music, too. (MIT Technology Review) 9 Your future overseas trip could be by zeppelin If these startups get their way. (WP $)+ Welcome to the big blimp boom. (MIT Technology Review)10 Are you a ‘dry texter’? 💬 It’s a conflict-averse teen’s worst nightmare. (Vox) Quote of the day “It’s OK to be Chinese overseas.” —Chris Pereira, the CEO of iMpact, a communications firm advising Chinese companies expanding abroad, tells Rest of World that DeepSeek has given Chinese startups the confidence not to hide their origins. One more thingWe’ve never understood how hunger works. That might be about to change. When you’re starving, hunger is like a demon. It awakens the most ancient and primitive parts of the brain, then commandeers other neural machinery to do its bidding until it gets what it wants. Although scientists have had some success in stimulating hunger in mice, we still don’t really understand how the impulse to eat works. Now, some experts are following known parts of the neural hunger circuits into uncharted parts of the brain to try and find out. Their work could shed new light on the factors that have caused the number of overweight adults worldwide to skyrocket in recent years. And it could also help solve the mysteries around how and why a new class of weight-loss drugs seems to work so well. Read the full story. —Adam Piore We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or skeet 'em at me.)+ Who knew—Harvard Law School’s Magna Carta may be the real deal after all.+ Early relatives of reptiles might have walked the Earth much earlier than we realised.+ New York University’s MFA Students are a talented bunch.+ The Raines sandwich sounds unspeakably awful 🥪

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. This baby boy was treated with the first personalized gene-editing drug Doctors say they constructed a bespoke gene-editing treatment in less than seven months and used it to treat a baby with a deadly metabolic condition. The rapid-fire attempt to rewrite the child’s DNA marks the first time gene editing has been tailored to treat a single individual.The baby who was treated, Kyle “KJ” Muldoon Jr., suffers from a rare metabolic condition caused by a particularly unusual gene misspelling. Researchers say their attempt to correct the error demonstrates the high level of precision new types of gene editors offer. The project also highlights what some experts are calling a growing crisis in gene-editing technology. That’s because even though the technology could cure thousands of genetic conditions, most are so rare that companies could never recoup the costs of developing a treatment for them. Read the full story.—Antonio Regalado Access to experimental medical treatments is expanding across the US —Jessica Hamzelou A couple of weeks ago I was in Washington, DC, for a gathering of scientists, policymakers, and longevity enthusiasts. They had come together to discuss ways to speed along the development of drugs and other treatments that might extend the human lifespan. One approach that came up was to simply make experimental drugs more easily accessible. Now, the state of Montana has passed a new bill that sets out exactly how clinics can sell experimental, unproven treatments in the state to anyone who wants them. The passing of the bill could make Montana something of a US hub for experimental treatments. But it represents a wider trend: the creep of Right to Try across the US. And a potentially dangerous departure from evidence-based medicine. Read the full story. This article first appeared in The Checkup, MIT Technology Review’s weekly biotech newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Thursday, and read articles like this first, sign up here. Take a new look at AI’s energy use Big Tech’s appetite for energy is growing rapidly as adoption of AI accelerates. But just how much energy does even a single AI query use? And what does it mean for the climate?Join editor in chief Mat Honan, senior climate reporter Casey Crownhart, and AI reporter James O’Donnell at 1.30pm ET on Wednesday May 21 for a subscriber-only Roundtables conversation exploring AI’s energy demands now and in the future. Register here. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 xAI has blamed Grok’s white genocide fixation on an ‘unauthorized modification’Made by an unnamed employee at 3.15am. (TechCrunch)+ The topic is one the far-right comes back to again and again. (The Atlantic $)+ Memphis residents are struggling to live alongside xAI’s supercomputer. (CNBC) 2 Meta has delayed the launch of its next flagship AI modelIts engineers are struggling to improve its Behemoth LLM enough. (WSJ $)  3 Elon Musk is tapping up friends and allies for federal jobsIt’s creating an unprecedented web of potential conflicts of interests. (WSJ $)+ Musk is posting on X less than he used to. (Semafor) 4 The US is slashing funding for scientific researchSuch projects produced GPS, LASIK eye surgery, and CAPTCHAs. (NYT $)+ US tech visa applicants are under seriously heavy scrutiny. (Wired $)+ The foundations of America’s prosperity are being dismantled. (MIT Technology Review)5 Big Tech wants its AI agents to remember everything about you They’re focusing on improving chatbots’ memory—but critics are worried. (FT $)+ AI agents can spontaneously develop human-like behavior. (The Guardian)+ Generative AI can turn your most precious memories into photos that never existed. (MIT Technology Review) 6 People keep making anti-DEI modifications for The Sims 4And the gamemaker EA’s attempts to stamp them out aren’t working. (Wired $) 7 This chatbot promises to help you get over your ex Closure creates an AI version of ex-partners for users to vent their frustrations at. (404 Media)+ The AI relationship revolution is already here. (MIT Technology Review) 8 How this AI song became a viral megahit in JapanYAJU&U is completely inescapable, and totally nonsensical. (Pitchfork)+ AI is coming for music, too. (MIT Technology Review) 9 Your future overseas trip could be by zeppelinIf these startups get their way. (WP $)+ Welcome to the big blimp boom. (MIT Technology Review) 10 Are you a ‘dry texter’? It’s a conflict-averse teen’s worst nightmare. (Vox) Quote of the day “It’s OK to be Chinese overseas.” —Chris Pereira, the CEO of iMpact, a communications firm advising Chinese companies expanding abroad, tells Rest of World that DeepSeek has given Chinese startups the confidence not to hide their origins. One more thingWe’ve never understood how hunger works. That might be about to change. When you’re starving, hunger is like a demon. It awakens the most ancient and primitive parts of the brain, then commandeers other neural machinery to do its bidding until it gets what it wants. Although scientists have had some success in stimulating hunger in mice, we still don’t really understand how the impulse to eat works. Now, some experts are following known parts of the neural hunger circuits into uncharted parts of the brain to try and find out. Their work could shed new light on the factors that have caused the number of overweight adults worldwide to skyrocket in recent years. And it could also help solve the mysteries around how and why a new class of weight-loss drugs seems to work so well. Read the full story. —Adam Piore We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or skeet ’em at me.)+ Who knew—Harvard Law School’s Magna Carta may be the real deal after all.+ Early relatives of reptiles might have walked the Earth much earlier than we realised.+ New York University’s MFA Students are a talented bunch.+ The Raines sandwich sounds unspeakably awful

Quantum computing may still be regarded by many IT leaders as a very niche technology, but broader business use cases may be just a few years away. While only a handful of companies have machines with logical qubits today, delegates at the Commercialising Quantum Computing conference in London were told that a machine with 100 logical qubits would offer quantum advantage in material science by 2028. This means that, by then, a sufficiently powerful and stable quantum computer would start delivering business value better than what would be possible using high performance computing. Mark Jackson, senior quantum evangelist at Quantinuum, said the company was already using generative quantum artificial intelligence (AI). In a fireside chat at the conference, Jackson spoke about the interaction between quantum computing and AI. It is largely acknowledged that a quantum computer is not good at providing a precise answer, such as if applied to big data analysis. But, according to Jackson, it shines when used for machine learning, which can be applied to identify a correct answer. Quantum-enhanced machine learning can process large datasets far quicker than conventional computers, especially when applied to detecting patterns. “Quantum computers can detect patterns that would be missed by other conventional computing methods,” said Jackson. This ability to detect patterns in massive datasets could revolutionise cyber security. Becky Pickard, managing director of global cyber operations at Barclays, pointed out during a panel discussion that a lot of progress has been made with machine learning and how to apply it on a day-to-day basis: “We’re working with massive volumes of data – 12Tbytes – on a daily basis.” She suggested that quantum machine learning could help. From an optimisation perspective, she is keen to see the development of quantum computing applied in a way that reshapes cyber defence.  HSBC is one of the organisations that has been working on quantum computing for several years. Discussing the return on investment opportunity, and how quantum computing can be used to build more optimised financial models, Phil Intallura, global head of quantum technologies at HSBC, said: “When you breakdown the opportunities, financial services is one of the biggest beneficiaries.” As Intallura points out, banks are always looking for a better financial model: “There’s one thing that catalyses commercial organisations more than anything else, and that’s confidence. If you can show a solution using quantum technology that can get a better output based than using a supercomputers, [business decision-makers] will give you much more runway than you need.” Another application area is the ability to generate a true random number, which can feed into financial model simulations. In March, a team of researchers from JPMorganChase, Quantinuum, Argonne National Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and the University of Texas at Austin published a paper in Nature discussing a technique known as Random Circuit Sampling (RCS). RCS is used to perform a certified-randomness-expansion protocol, which outputs more randomness than it takes as input. It is a task that is often used to demonstrate quantum supremacy since it cannot be achieved on a classical computer. Speaking of the usefulness of a quantum number generator at HSBC, Intallura said: “Using quantum random numbers as your entropy source to classical simulation does not change any of the underlying model practices in classical models. You’re just injecting a different source of entropy than what we would [normally] use.” For Intallura, regulatory pressure and the need to ensure financial transactions are secure is helping to inform quantum computing plans at financial institutions.  The US National Institute of Standards and Technology has ratified a number of post-quantum cryptography (PQC) standards. Banks face pressure from regulators to replace RSA-2048 encryption by 2035 and migrate fully over to quantum safe encryption standards to protect banking transactions.But, as Mark Carney, lead of quantum cyber security research at Santander Global, noted, post-quantum cryptography needs both software and hardware acceleration. “We want to be able to have PQC at speed in our devices and on our payment cards,” he said. “We want to give our customers the very best cryptography that we possibly can – not just for regulatory purposes, but also because it gives a sense of assurance.” Among the promises of quantum computing is that it can be applied to solve complex optimisation problems. As and when they become commercially viable, such systems will need to work alongside traditional enterprise IT. This is something that Gerard Mullery, interim CEO of Oxford Quantum Circuits, recognised during his presentation at the event. Mullery sees a need for quantum computing to be embedded in enterprise workflows.  “As AI agents autonomously orchestrate enterprise workflows, quantum compute platforms must be designed to integrate with them,” he added. What is clear from the experts who spoke at the Commercialising Quantum Computing conference is that a useful machine is perhaps only a few years away. This will have enough logical qubits to solve real-world problems. As such devices evolve, it is likely more organisations will draw on quantum computing for certain combinatorial optimisation problems, which will need to integrate with classical computing in the datacentre. As quantum computing becomes more accessible, there will also be a need to bolster cryptography with PQC. Read more about quantum developments Cisco lays out plans for networking in era of quantum computing: The network equipment provider has opened a new lab and developed a prototype chip as it fleshes out its quantum networking strategy. Quantum datacentre deployments: How they are supporting evolving compute projects: Quantum datacentre deployments are emerging worldwide, so what are they and where are the benefits?

Saudi Arabia’s new state subsidiary, HUMAIN, is collaborating with NVIDIA to build AI infrastructure, nurture talent, and launch large-scale digital systems.The effort includes plans to set up AI “factories” powered by up to 500 megawatts of energy. The sites will be filled with NVIDIA GPUs, including the Grace Blackwell GB300 supercomputers connected via NVIDIA’s InfiniBand network. The goal is to create a base for training models, running simulations, and managing complex AI deployments.A major part of the push is about control. Saudi Arabia wants to build sovereign AI – models trained using local data, language, and systems. By building its own infrastructure, it avoids relying on foreign cloud providers. The shift aligns with a broader trend, as governments around the world start to question how AI tools are built, where data goes, and who controls it.HUMAIN is meant to give Saudi Arabia more say in that process. While other countries have launched national AI strategies, HUMAIN stands out for its structure. It’s not just a policy office or research fund; instead, it operates across the full AI value chain – building data centres, managing data, training models, and deploying applications. Few countries have a single body doing likewise with such a broad remit.Singapore’s NAIS 2.0, for example, focuses on public sector use cases and talent development, and the UAE’s approach, which emphasises frameworks and governance. China has set up AI labs in several cities, but they tend to work in silos. HUMAIN brings elements together with a central goal: make Saudi Arabia a producer, not just a user, of AI.The ambition is clear, but it comes with trade-offs. Running GPU-heavy data centres on this scale will use a lot of power. The 500-megawatt figure is far beyond typical enterprise deployments. Globally, the environmental cost of AI has become a growing concern. Microsoft and Google have both reported rising emissions from AI-related infrastructure. Saudi Arabia will need to explain how its AI factories will be powered – especially if it wants to align with its own sustainability targets under Vision 2030.The partnership with NVIDIA isn’t just about machines, it also includes training for people. HUMAIN and NVIDIA say they will run large-scale education programmes to help thousands of Saudi developers gain skills in AI, robotics, simulation, and digital twins. Building local talent is a core part of the effort, and without it, infrastructure likely won’t get used to its full potential.“AI, like electricity and internet, is essential infrastructure for every nation,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA. “Together with HUMAIN, we are building AI infrastructure for the people and companies of Saudi Arabia to realise the bold vision of the Kingdom.”One of the tools HUMAIN plans to deploy is NVIDIA Omniverse, to be used as a multi-tenant platform for industries like logistics, manufacturing, and energy. These sectors could create digital twins – virtual versions of real systems – to test, monitor, and improve operations. The idea is simple: simulate before you build, or run stress tests in digital form to save time and money later.This type of simulation and optimisation supports Saudi Arabia’s broader push into automation and smart industry. It fits in a wider narrative of transitioning from oil to advanced tech as a core pillar of the economy.The deal fits into NVIDIA’s global strategy, and the company has similar partnerships in India, the UAE, and Europe. Saudi Arabia offers strong government support, deep funding, and the promise to become a new AI hub in the Middle East. In return, NVIDIA provides the technical backbone – GPUs, software platforms, and the know-how to run them.The partnership helps both sides. Saudi Arabia gets the tools to build AI from the ground up and build a new economic version of itself, while NVIDIA gains a long-term customer and a foothold in a growing market.There are still gaps to watch. How will HUMAIN govern the use of its models? Will they be open for researchers and startups, or tightly controlled by the state? What role will local universities or private companies play? And can workforce development keep pace with the rapid buildout of infrastructure?HUMAIN isn’t just building for now. The structure suggests a long-term bet – one that links compute power, national priorities, and a shift in how AI is developed and deployed. Saudi Arabia wants more than access. It wants influence. And HUMAIN, in partnership with NVIDIA, is the engine it’s building to get there.(Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva)See also: Huawei’s AI hardware breakthrough challenges Nvidia’s dominanceWant to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo taking place in Amsterdam, California, and London. The comprehensive event is co-located with other leading events including Intelligent Automation Conference, BlockX, Digital Transformation Week, and Cyber Security & Cloud Expo.Explore other upcoming enterprise technology events and webinars powered by TechForge here.