Today's Daily AI Roundup covers the latest Artificial Intelligence announcements on AI capabilities, AI mobility products, Robotic Service, Technology from Samya.AI, Trend Micro, Tata Consultancy Services, Moody's Analytics, and Machine Zone. Samya.AI, an enterprise Revenue Growth AI SaaS company, announced today that it has raised $6 million in seed round funding led by Sequoia India. Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cybersecurity solutions, announced it has joined non-profit community LOT Network in a bid to combat the growing threat posed to its business and its customers by patent assertion entities (PAEs). Tata Consultancy Services, the leading global IT services, consulting and business solutions organization, reported its consolidated financial results according to Ind AS and IFRS, for the quarter ending December 31, 2019. Moody's Analytics, a global provider of financial intelligence, has won the Best Financial Services AI Solution category at the 2019 Artificial Intelligence Awards.

Today's Daily AI Roundup covers the latest Artificial Intelligence announcements on AI capabilities, AI mobility products, Robotic Service, Technology from Samya.AI, Trend Micro, Tata Consultancy Services, Moody's Analytics, and Machine Zone. Samya.AI, an enterprise Revenue Growth AI SaaS company, announced today that it has raised $6 million in seed round funding led by Sequoia India. Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cybersecurity solutions, announced it has joined non-profit community LOT Network in a bid to combat the growing threat posed to its business and its customers by patent assertion entities (PAEs). Tata Consultancy Services, the leading global IT services, consulting and business solutions organization, reported its consolidated financial results according to Ind AS and IFRS, for the quarter ending December 31, 2019. Moody's Analytics, a global provider of financial intelligence, has won the Best Financial Services AI Solution category at the 2019 Artificial Intelligence Awards.

Soft Robotics Inc., a pioneer in robotic grasping, announced today that it has raised $23 million in an oversubscribed Series B funding round. The round was co-led by Calibrate Ventures and Material Impact and included existing investors Honeywell, Hyperplane, Scale, Tekfen Ventures, and Yamaha. FANUC Corp., the world's largest industrial robot manufacturer, joined this round as a new investor in Soft Robotics. Soft Robotics previously announced a strategic partnership with FANUC to integrate Soft Robotics' mGrip adaptable gripper system with any FANUC robot through the deployment of a new controller. The combined product was introduced at IREX in Tokyo in December 2019.

"Ambarella is an artificial intelligence ("AI") company," says the first line in a recent Ambarella (AMBA) investor presentation to Morgan Stanley. More than four and a half years ago, we wrote about how Ambarella was seeing very strong revenue growth selling semiconductor processing solutions for video in four primary segments: camera-based advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), wearable cameras like GoPro, cameras for drones, and home automation cameras. Since that article, shares of Ambarella have fallen -50% compared to a NASDAQ return of 73% over the same time frame. Fortunately, the company is being forthcoming with investors as to why the company's stock has performed so poorly. We had previously remarked how a lack of transparency into the company's financials prevented investors from seeing which of these areas were contributing to all that strong revenue growth.

Finance and accounting professionals are under constant pressure from the C-suite to elevate the strategic relevance of their function. At the same time, they are under day-to-day pressure to help their organizations stay ahead of audit and compliance requirements, report on financial results, and manage ongoing accounting activities. These activities are all critical for business growth. As enterprise resource planning is meant to be both the primary source of truth and technology used to perform these tasks, it can play a critical role in improving the ease and accuracy with which they are completed. Having the right ERP technology can make or break a finance team's ability to focus on the strategic instead of the tactical.

Apple has acquired Xnor.ai, a Seattle startup specializing in low-power, edge-based artificial intelligence tools, sources with knowledge of the deal told GeekWire. Speaking on condition of anonymity, sources said Apple paid an amount similar to what was paid for Turi, in the range of $200 million. Xnor.ai didn't immediately respond to our inquiries, while Apple emailed us its standard response on questions about acquisitions: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans." When we visited Xnor.ai's office in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood this morning, a move was clearly in progress -- presumably to Apple's Seattle offices. The arrangement suggests that Xnor's AI-enabled image recognition tools could well become standard features in future iPhones and webcams.

Apple on Wednesday said it has acquired Xnor.ai, an artificial intelligence software start-up. The company has previously used acquisitions to expand its bench of AI talent, as have other technology companies like Alphabet, Facebook and Microsoft. These companies have all taken steps to enhance their own products with AI and offer tools to outside software developers. "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans," the company told CNBC in an email. GeekWire first reported the news earlier on Wednesday, saying that the deal was worth up about $200 million.

DWS Group (DWS) has acquired a minority stake of 24.9 percent in Arabesque AI Ltd. The UK-based company focuses on Artificial Intelligence (AI) to predict stock price developments via its proprietary AI engine, combining big data, machine learning, and high-performance computing. In addition, both companies have agreed on a strategic partnership to enhance the capabilities of the AI engine, and to develop sophisticated AI-based investment solutions. Both parties have agreed to maintain confidentiality on the price of the transaction and further financial details. Closing of the transaction has already taken place.

These are flush times for American private equity funds. Through November, they have raised more capital than any other fiscal year. But a good portion of that cash has not been put to use – yet. One reason is that many takeover targets have simply become too expensive, a dynamic reflected in the drop in deal activity for 2019. According to RSM Bloomberg, the median implied M&A transaction multiple from 2017 to 2019 was 12.2 times a firm's EBITDA, while from the preceding two-year period it was only 10.4.

A t the beginning of a new decade, these lines from the play Inherit the Wind seem as appropriate for the technology industry as they did for the debate over evolution taking place in the drama. The tech industry is faced with a tricky balancing act: continuing to drive innovative solutions while grappling with the side effects of those solutions in the global economy. The challenge itself is not unique--every industry deals with this tension as it becomes more mature--but the new variables here are the scale that tech is able to achieve and the evolutionary aspect of mixing digital and physical worlds. It's time for the industry to take the next step. There are tremendous benefits available through technology for both business and society, but there are major questions around safety, privacy, sustainability, and trust. The answers to these questions come from combining technical expertise with social awareness. By embracing responsibility for all the changes innovation can bring, the tech industry can be responsible for driving future progress. Learn how people are re-envisioning the functions, processes, and best practices for infrastructure, development, security, and data in their organizations. The IT channel is in flux. This report highlights where today's providers see opportunities and challenges, embrace new technologies, and react to new rivals. This research explores the relevance of technology to SMBs and the factors affecting perceptions, decisions, and investments in established and emerging technologies. Thanks to the vast influx of user-friendly technologies, it has become popular to say that every company is a tech company. But the ubiquity of technology does not necessarily change the underlying business model. While digital transformation is creating new avenues for growth, companies are finding that they cannot simply slap tech labels on their products and practices and automatically reap benefits. On one end of the spectrum, this takes the shape of larger companies going public and struggling with the realities of their industry.