Connect with us

Published

on

Dado Ruvic | Reuters

A slew of major tech companies including Microsoft, Amazon, and OpenAI, on Tuesday agreed to a landmark international agreement on artificial intelligence safety at the Seoul AI Safety Summit.

The agreement will see companies from countries including the U.S., China, Canada, the U.K., France, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates, make voluntary commitments to ensure the safe development of their most advanced AI models.

Where they have not done so already, AI model makers will each publish safety frameworks laying out how they’ll measure risks of their frontier models, such as examining the risk of misuse of the technology by bad actors.

These frameworks will include “red lines” for the tech firms that define the kinds of risks associated with frontier AI systems which would be considered “intolerable” — these risks include but aren’t limited to automated cyberattacks and the threat of bioweapons.

In those sorts of extreme circumstances, companies say they will implement a “kill switch” that would see them cease development of their AI models if they can’t guarantee mitigation of these risks.

“It’s a world first to have so many leading AI companies from so many different parts of the globe all agreeing to the same commitments on AI safety,” Rishi Sunak, the U.K.’s prime minister, said in a statement Tuesday.

“These commitments ensure the world’s leading AI companies will provide transparency and accountability on their plans to develop safe AI,” he added.

The pact agreed Tuesday expands on a previous set of commitments made by companies involved in the development of generative AI software the U.K.’s AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park, England, last November.

The companies have agreed to take input on these thresholds from “trusted actors,” including their home governments as appropriate, before releasing them ahead of the next planned AI summit — the AI Action Summit in France — in early 2025.

The commitments agreed Tuesday only apply to so-called “frontier” models. This term refers to the technology behind generative AI systems like OpenAI’s GPT family of large language models, which powers the popular ChatGPT AI chatbot.

Ever since ChatGPT was first introduced to the world in November 2022, regulators and tech leaders have become increasingly worried about the risks surrounding advanced AI systems capable of generating text and visual content on par with, or better than, humans.

Microsoft's new PCs with AI is a 'thumbs up,' says WSJ's Joanna Stern

The European Union has sought to clamp down on unfettered AI development with the creation of its AI Act, which was approved by the EU Council on Tuesday.

The U.K. hasn’t proposed formal laws for AI, however, instead opting for a “light-touch” approach to AI regulation that entails regulators applying existing laws to the technology.

The government recently said it will consider legislating for frontier models at a point in future, but has not committed to a timeline for introducing formal laws.

Continue Reading

Technology

Microsoft enters portable gaming with new ROG Xbox Ally devices

Published

on

By

Microsoft enters portable gaming with new ROG Xbox Ally devices

Microsoft ROG Xbox Ally and Ally X Handheld devices

Source: Xbox

Microsoft Xbox players will soon be able to take their favorite games anywhere with the launch of the new ROG Xbox Ally handhelds.

This is a first for Xbox, which has never released a handheld before.

The devices, developed in collaboration with ASUS, offer a full-screen Xbox experience meant for portable play.

Players will be able to access Xbox games, stream content, and play on the go with built-in support for cloud gaming.

“Players can look forward to an approachable gaming experience that travels with you wherever you go, featuring several new and first-of-their kind features on both devices,” Microsoft said in a press release.

The announcement follows last week’s debut of Nintendo‘s flagship Switch 2 and sets the stage for a new chapter in portable gaming.

Continue Reading

Technology

Vantage raises $820 million in a first-of-its-kind cloud and AI data center deal in Europe

Published

on

By

Vantage raises 0 million in a first-of-its-kind cloud and AI data center deal in Europe

U.S. data center operator Vantage has raised 720 million euros ($821.4 million) — the first of its kind deal in Europe.

The asset-backed securitization (ABS) deal, the first ever euro-denominated with data center assets on the continent, involves four data centers in Germany.

The company said it will be paying on average a 4.3% coupon on the bonds issued through the process.

In an ABS, Vantage raises money by using its data center infrastructure and future revenues from the facilities as collateral.

Vantage said it will use the funds primarily to pay off existing construction loans previously secured for the facilities.

“We believe the ABS market in particular is kind of best suited for our type of asset, which is real estate centric, high credit quality tenants, long term leases, something that is almost perfect for the ABS investor,” Sharif Metwalli, chief financial officer of Vantage Data Centers, told CNBC.

Vantage added that despite the large sum borrowed, the demand from investors exceeded the amount raised.

“So this transaction was actually pretty highly levered, frankly,” Rich Cosgray, senior vice president of global capital markets at Vantage Data Centers told CNBC. “It was higher leverage than our prior transaction and we had some investors that just weren’t comfortable at that leverage level.”

“Yet, despite that, we were basically two and four times oversubscribed on the respective financings, and we were able to tighten pricing pretty meaningfully through the marketing process,” Cosgray added.

The four facilities — two in Berlin and two in Frankfurt — have access to around 55 megawatts of power and “are fully leased to hyperscale customers,” the company said in a statement. The four facilities were valued at more than $1 billion earlier this year.

Last year, Vantage also raised £600 million through the first-ever securitization of a data center in Europe, the Middle East and Asia (EMEA). The deal involved two units from the company’s Cardiff campus with 148 megawatts of electricity power. Across the region, the company has 2,500 megawatts of data center capacity either operational or under development.

The transaction was led by Barclays Bank and Deutsche Bank as joint lead managers and Vantage was represented by the British law firm Clifford Chance.

Continue Reading

Technology

IonQ buys UK quantum startup Oxford Ionics for more than $1 billion

Published

on

By

IonQ buys UK quantum startup Oxford Ionics for more than  billion

Cheng Xin | Getty Images

IonQ is buying United Kingdom-based quantum computing startup Oxford Ionics in a deal valued at nearly $1.1 billion.

Shares gained about 4%.

The companies said in a release that the deal will combine IonQ’s quantum computing hardware and software knowledge with Oxford Ionics’ semiconductor chip technologies. The company aims to deliver breakthroughs in the field and capitalize on growing revenue opportunities.

“We believe the advantages of our combined technologies will set a new standard within quantum computing and deliver superior value for our customers through market-leading enterprise applications,” said IonQ CEO Niccolo De Masi in a release.

The deal, which is expected to close this year, includes $1.065 billion worth of IonQ shares and about $10 million in cash. The merged company expects to build systems with 256 qubits by 2026, over 10,000 by 2027 and 2 million by 2030.

Interest in quantum computing has skyrocketed in recent months after technology giants Microsoft and Alphabet announced new chip breakthroughs. Experts tout the technology’s ability to solve intricate computing tasks unachievable by other computers.

Read more CNBC tech news

IonQ’s CEO previously told CNBC that he wants the company to become the “800-pound gorilla” in the quantum world.

Shares of Maryland-based company, which went public through a special purpose acquisition company in late 2021, are down about 6% year to date. The stock has soared more than 400% from a year ago.

WATCH: IonQ CEO on earnings: Leading the world in ‘the quantum internet’

IonQ CEO on earnings: Leading the world in 'the quantum internet'

Continue Reading

Trending