• BMW M5 V8 power cut to meet new emissions regulations

    January 29, 2026

    BMW has pared back the power of the 4.4-litre twin-turbo V8 petrol engine found in the latest M5 performance sedan and wagon, as well as the XM SUV, in order to meet incoming emissions laws in Europe. The German automaker said the latest Euro 7 emissions regulations, due to come into effect in Europe in November 2026, will see the M5’s V8 drop from 430kW to 400kW – with the hybrid system making up the shortfall to keep total system output unchanged at 535kW. The changes stem from the introduction of the Miller Cycle internal combustion process, which the automaker…

  • Elon Musk’s SpaceX and xAI are reportedly holding merger talks

    January 29, 2026

    Two Elon Musk companies are reportedly planning to merge. On Thursday, Reuters reported that SpaceX and xAI are holding merger talks ahead of a planned IPO. Part of their plan is to launch AI data centers into space (but unfortunately, only as far as Earth’s orbit). Last week, it was reported that Musk planned to take SpaceX public despite having once said it wouldn’t happen until the company had a presence on Mars. Now, the IPO could happen as early as this year. Shares of xAI would reportedly be exchanged for shares in SpaceX under the merger. Reuters reports that…

  • Fintech firm Marquis blames hack at firewall provider SonicWall for its data breach

    January 29, 2026

    Fintech firm Marquis told customers that it plans to seek compensation from its firewall provider after blaming the company for a breach that allowed hackers to steal its customers’ personal and financial data. In a memo shared with customers this week and seen by TechCrunch, Marquis said it believes that its August 2025 ransomware attack happened because the company’s firewall service provider SonicWall had its own data breach that exposed critical security information about its customers’ firewalls. That earlier breach of SonicWall allowed hackers to obtain credentials needed to launch a ransomware attack against Marquis, the memo said. Marquis said…

  • Waymo begins service at San Francisco International Airport

    January 29, 2026

    As fans and media prepare to descend on the Bay Area for Super Bowl LX, what does a high-tech city like San Francisco do? Why, call in the robotaxis, of course. On Thursday, Alphabet’s Waymo began offering fully autonomous rides at San Francisco International Airport (SFO). There are some limits. For now, SFO access is restricted to “a select number of riders.” However, access will gradually expand over the coming months. The service is also limited to the SFO Rental Car Center (pickups and drop-offs) at launch. Waymo says it will expand to other airport locations, including terminals, “in the…

  • Satya Nadella insists people are using Microsoft’s Copilot AI a lot  

    January 29, 2026

    Microsoft delivered a solid earnings report on Wednesday with $81.3 billion in revenue for the quarter (up 17%), net income profits of $38.3 billion (up 21%) and a record breaking Microsoft cloud revenue of over $50 billion.  But the stock was getting pounded on Thursday as investors worried about how much the tech giant was spending to build out its cloud and questioned whether that investment would pay off. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says, yes  — and spent considerable time on the earnings call trying to make that point Microsoft has spent almost as much on capital expenditures in the…

  • Jaguar Land Rover could produce Chery cars in the UK – report

    January 29, 2026

    JLR (Jaguar Land Rover) is in discussions with Chery centred around producing the Chinese automaker’s vehicles at one of its plants in the UK. According to the Financial Times, the two firms are in the early discussions, which are being facilitated by the British government. Members of the government, including Prime Minister Keir Starmer, are currently in China for a series of wide-ranging trade negotiations. The UK government has a set a target for the local auto industry to produce 1.3 million cars per year by 2035. The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders estimates manufacturers in the UK made…

  • Music publishers sue Anthropic for $3 billion over ‘flagrant piracy’

    January 29, 2026

    A group of music publishers led by Concord Music Group and Universal Music Group Anthropic, . The suit accuses the AI company of illegally downloading more than 20,000 copyrighted songs, including sheet music, lyrics and compositions. These songs were then allegedly fed into the chatbot Claude for training purposes. There are some iconic tunes named by Universal in the suit, including tracks by The Rolling Stones, Neil Diamond and Elton John, among many others. Concord is an independent publisher that handles artists like Common, Killer Mike and Korn. The publishers issued a statement saying that the damages could amount to…

  • Waymo robotaxis are now giving rides to and from San Francisco International Airport

    January 29, 2026

    After years of negotiations and false starts, Waymo is now allowed to operate a robotaxi service to and from the San Francisco International Airport (SFO). The Alphabet-owned company said in a blog post Thursday it will begin offering access to SFO to a select number of riders before offering it to all customers in the coming months. Pickups and drop-offs will occur at the SFO Rental Car Center, which is accessible via AirTrain. Waymo said it plans to serve additional airport locations in the future. Waymo’s SFO win comes as the company faces criticism and concerns about safety in some…

  • Beyond the Chatbox: Generative UI, AG-UI, and the Stack Behind Agent-Driven Interfaces

    January 29, 2026

    Most AI applications still showcase the model as a chat box. That interface is simple, but it hides what agents are actually doing, such as planning steps, calling tools, and updating state. Generative UI is about letting the agent drive real interface elements, for example tables, charts, forms, and progress indicators, so the experience feels like a product, not a log of tokens. https://www.copilotkit.ai/blog/the-state-of-agentic-ui-comparing-ag-ui-mcp-ui-and-a2ui-protocols What is Generative UI? The CopilotKit team explains Generative UI as to any user interface that is partially or fully produced by an AI agent. Instead of only returning text, the agent can drive: stateful components…

  • 2026 Mercedes-Benz S-Class revealed with stars in its eyes

    January 29, 2026

    The heavily upgraded Mercedes-Benz S-Class has made its world debut, five years after the German automaker’s current W223-series flagship sedan debuted in 2020. Mercedes-Benz says the 2026 S-Class represents the most comprehensive mid-cycle update in the model’s history, with more than 50 per cent of the extra-large luxury limousine (around 2700 components) being newly developed, updated or refined to better compete with rivals including the BMW 7 Series and Porsche Panamera. Key highlights of the latest S-Class, which arrives in Australia in the fourth quarter of this year, include an optionally illuminated three-pointed star emblem on the bonnet, a 20…