Medtronic has announced that it will acquire long-time partner Nutrino, an AI powered personalized nutrition platform for an undisclosed sum. As part of the deal Medtronic will be integrating Nutrino's AI-driven personalized insights and food database. The acquisition is set to specifically boost Medtronic's offerings for people living with diabetes and offer the company's predictive glycemic response algorithm, which will be integrated with Medtronic's CGM system. "Bringing Nutrino and their nutrition-related expertise into our organization will give us a substantial differentiator in the diabetes industry and accelerate our progress to help people with diabetes live with greater freedom and better health," Hooman Hakami, executive vice president and president of the Diabetes Group at Medtronic, said in a statement. "The Nutrino team has been an outstanding partner over the past few years. We are excited to welcome them to our team, and I have no doubt that, together, we will make a profound impact on the lives of people with diabetes."

Our customers are living in a data-driven world and the volume of information they generate is growing exponentially. As a result, companies are increasingly investing in the hardware, software, and services needed to gain actionable insights from their data. By 2022, the total addressable market for artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML) and big data is expected to grow to approximately $160 billion.[1] However, according to Gartner, by 2020 half of organizations will lack sufficient AI and data literacy skills needed to extract business value from their data, and they are already demanding easier-to-implement, faster-to-deploy, and more cost-effective solutions for AI/ML and big data analytics.[2] Today, HPE announced that we are acquiring BlueData, a leading provider of AI/ML and big data analytics infrastructure software, which will significantly expand our footprint in the rapidly growing artificial intelligence and big data analytics space.

Ltd. said Friday it has agreed to acquire cybersecurity company Cylance Inc. for $1.4 billion in cash. Cylance, based in Irvine, Calif., is among a group of cybersecurity companies that have been highly valued by venture investors over the past few years. Cylance uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to identify computer viruses.

Microsoft has been all in on AI this year, and in the build versus buy equation, the company has been leaning heavily toward buying. This morning, the company announced its intent to acquire Xoxco, an Austin-based software developer with a focus on bot design, making it the fourth AI-related company Microsoft has purchased this year. "Today, we are announcing we have signed an agreement to acquire Xoxco, a software product design and development studio known for its conversational AI and bot development capabilities," Lili Cheng, corporate VP for conversational AI at Microsoft wrote in a blog post announcing the acquisition. Xoxco, which was founded in 2009 -- long before most of us were thinking about conversational bots -- has raised $1.5 million. It began working on bots in 2013, and is credited with developing the first bot for Slack to help schedule meetings.

Microsoft seeks to bring artificial intelligence and chatbots as a mainstream part of the workplace and it's taking steps to make it easier for partners to deliver AI capabilities directly into its popular Power BI reporting tool. At an event in San Francisco Wednesday, company officials revealed new AI capabilities coming to its Power BI self-service analytics tool with its new Azure Cognitive Services containers for partners without deep data-science development skills to deliver intelligent apps. Also looking to make it easier for partners to develop bots, Microsoft announced it has agreed to acquire XOXCO, a startup with expertise in conversational AI. Founded in 2013, XOXCO created the first commercial chatbot for Slack, a meeting scheduling app called Howdy. XOXCO is also known for its Botkit developer tool for building chatbot apps and providing native integration with messaging platforms.

Interest and activity around communications and networking solutions that leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable agility and greater efficiency continues to build. That's why TMC is launching three new AI-focused events under the banner of The New Intelligence. This table lays out the details of these events. And the below briefs highlight some recent industry AI developments. In its new IT Operations Readiness Index, Cisco looks at where the more than 1,500 senior IT leaders it surveyed are in their IT operational transformation journeys.

Tesla today released an earnings report that made shares soar -- and Wall Street analysts scratch their heads. Earnings came out to $2.90 a share versus expected losses of close to 20 cents per share. The company's net income, $311.5 million, is a far cry from its losses of $619.4 million this time last year. And quarterly revenue topped that of a year ago by more than 70 percent. This was Tesla's third-ever profitable quarter, as well as CEO Elon Musk's last full quarter, for the time being, as chairman of the company he founded 15 years ago.

Accenture has acquired a financial services firm that specializes in using artificial intelligence and robotic process automation in corporate and commercial lending, the company said Wednesday. TargetST8 Consulting, which was founded in 2013, focuses exclusively on the financial markets, serving banks and investment firms in the U.S. and Europe, Accenture said. TargetST8 provides customers with digital lending solutions that include deploying artificial intelligence and robotic process automation, according to Accenture. "TargetST8 consultants are known for their deep expertise, innovative digital solutions and outstanding project delivery--particularly in their implementation of Finastra's Loan IQ solution," said Alan McIntyre, who leads Accenture's banking practice globally. "The addition of TargetST8 will enhance our ability to help our commercial and corporate lending clients improve their processes and transform their businesses."

The semiconductor industry is one of the fastest growing sectors in technology. Information provided by the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) reveals that global sales of semiconductors reached $40.16 billion for the month of August 2018, which was a 14.9% year-on-year increase compared to August 2017. Market research consultant Stratistics MRC has also stated that many semiconductor companies have started to adopt IoT to drive new revenue and growth models. A report from Accenture too supports the fact that the semiconductor industry is the most bullish one when it comes to integrate blockchain within their industry and the impact of AI. Syed Alam, who leads Accenture's semiconductor practice, says: "Throughout the industry's complex supply chain, blockchain simplifies business operations leveraging semiconductor chips and related technologies. "This faster traceability will improve companies' business operations and accelerate delivery of their products to market - while enabling them to do so at lower costs.

As robotics technologies have advanced significantly in the past few years, robots for enterprise markets are becoming more affordable, productive, and smarter than ever before. According to a new report from Tractica, this trend is resulting in a significant increase in the number of enterprises within the agriculture, construction, warehousing and logistics, telepresence, customer service, and other sectors willing to invest in robots to cut costs and increase profits, while trusting robots to solve business challenges and productivity gaps. Tractica forecasts that worldwide shipments of enterprise robots will grow from approximately 83,000 units in 2016 to 1.2 million units annually by 2022, increasing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 57% during that period. Global revenue for the enterprise robotics market will increase from $5.9 billion in 2016 to $67.9 billion in 2022. "Just as robotics has transformed manufacturing and heavy industry in recent years, robots are beginning to impact enterprise work processes, with innovative and effective solutions being introduced with increased frequency," says research analyst Manoj Sahi.