Databricks launches Lakebase, a fully managed serverless Postgres database integrated with its lakehouse platform, offering one-click data sync, autoscaling, and instant branching to power AI agents and real-time applications without complex ETL pipelines.
Databricks, a data analytics software company, is reportedly in advanced negotiations to acquire Neon, an open-source database startup, for a staggering $1 billion, though the deal has not yet been finalized and could potentially fall through.
Alibaba's groundbreaking 'ZeroSearch' technique slashes AI training costs by a staggering 88% by simulating search results with language models, eliminating expensive API calls and reducing reliance on big tech platforms, potentially reshaping the economics of AI development.
Postgres 18 introduces asynchronous I/O (AIO) for read operations, offering potential performance gains of up to 3x, especially in cloud environments with high storage latency, through options like dedicated I/O worker processes or the Linux io_uring interface.
BreezoMeter leverages Google Cloud's scalable and sustainable infrastructure to analyze vast environmental data, delivering precise, hyperlocal insights on air pollution, pollen, wildfires, and weather for over 100 countries, processing 1.8 TB of data and calculating 10 billion pollutant concentrations hourly.
OpenAI spent $3B on coding startup Windsurf, Google fortified its AI lead via benchmarks and talent retention, while Apple lagged due to privacy restrictions limiting training data access, intensifying the AI arms race.
Major Chinese tech giants like ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent hoarded billions of dollars' worth of Nvidia's H20 AI chips, designed for sale in China, in anticipation of U.S. export restrictions, aiming to stockpile around 1 million chips before the curbs were imposed in April.
Global venture funding skyrockets to a staggering $113 billion in Q1 2025, fueled by OpenAI's record-breaking $40 billion raise and Google's planned $32 billion Wiz acquisition, signaling a resurgence in startup exits.
Major tech giants like Amazon and Microsoft are strategically pausing or slowing down their data center expansion plans, signaling a shift in spending priorities amidst economic headwinds and potential cost-cutting measures within the industry.
Elon Musk's AI venture xAI enters the market with the launch of Grok 3 API, offering a large language model and a smaller version at competitive pricing, though with a reduced context window.