Google just unveiled AI co-scientist, a multi-agent system built on Gemini 2.0 designed to serve as a virtual scientific collaborator. Instead of just summarizing papers, it uses specialized agents to generate novel hypotheses, draft proposals, and refine ideas through test-time compute scaling. Early lab tests in drug repurposing for leukemia have already shown real-world promise.
Rabbit just unveiled a research preview of its Android agent, showcasing an AI system that directly operates phone apps and controls device settings. The agent demonstrated multi-step tasks like coordinating between WhatsApp, YouTube, and Google Docs, though Rabbit notes speed and accuracy optimizations are still in progress.
Microsoft researchers just introduced Magma, a multimodal foundation model designed to act in both digital and physical spaces. Using visual marking for action grounding and trajectory planning, it can navigate mobile UIs and steer robotic arms to grab objects. Why it matters: it moves AI beyond isolated chat interfaces into a single unified agent that handles software and hardware alike.
Google just rolled out its Deep Research AI assistant to the Gemini mobile app for all Gemini Advanced subscribers across Android and iOS. The tool lets users generate comprehensive, readable research reports directly from their phones, turning heavy-duty investigation into an on-the-go workflow.
Meta just announced LlamaCon, its first developer conference dedicated entirely to generative AI, set for April 29. The event will showcase the latest in its open-source AI roadmap as Mark Zuckerberg prepares to launch reasoning and multimodal Llama models to fend off rising open-weight competition like DeepSeek.
OpenAI just launched SWE-Lancer, a benchmark testing whether frontier LLMs can tackle real freelance engineering work. Built from over 1,400 Upwork tasks valued at $1 million in payouts—spanning $50 bug fixes to $32,000 feature builds—it found that today's top models still fail at most tasks.
Perplexity just launched Deep Research, an autonomous agent that browses hundreds of web sources and synthesizes in-depth reports in two to four minutes. It scored a chart-topping 21.1% on Humanity's Last Exam, and unlike rivals, it is free for all users with daily query caps.
OpenAI just shared three key economic observations on the road to AGI, noting that intelligence costs drop 10x every 12 months while socioeconomic value grows super-exponentially. The post also highlights that AI agents will soon act as junior virtual coworkers, making human agency more vital than ever.
GitHub just introduced agent mode for Copilot in VS Code alongside the general availability of Copilot Edits. The agent can infer missing subtasks, propose terminal commands, and fix runtime errors on its own without manual copy-pasting. GitHub also added Gemini 2.0 Flash to the model picker and previewed Project Padawan, an autonomous agent built to resolve issues and open pull requests directly.
AI researcher Steven Hoi just joined Alibaba to lead its AI-to-Consumer business group. He plans to focus on building foundation models and AI agent applications for consumer markets over the coming decade. It shows Alibaba is getting serious about turning frontier model tech into everyday consumer software.
OpenAI just completed the rollout of its Deep Research feature to all Pro subscribers across Europe. The tool turns the web into a personal research assistant, leveraging autonomous agent capabilities to tackle complex research tasks. European Pro users can now run in-depth reports directly in ChatGPT.
Amazon is set to preview a major generative AI overhaul of Alexa at a February 26 event in New York. The revamped assistant can handle multi-turn conversations and act as an autonomous agent, partly powered by Anthropic's models. Why it matters: Turning Alexa from a glorified kitchen timer into an active assistant is Amazon's best shot at monetizing half a billion connected devices.
OpenAI just rolled out Deep Research to all ChatGPT Pro subscribers across iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows apps. The tool autonomously browses the web and synthesizes deep findings into structured reports, now accessible straight from your pocket or desktop.
Perplexity just rolled out Perplexity Assistant for Android users, turning its search engine into an action-taking agent. It can hail rides, reserve tables, and read your screen or camera feed across apps in 15 languages. While completely free to use right now, CEO Aravind Srinivas admitted some complex multi-app actions might still be hit-or-miss.
OpenAI just unveiled Operator, a research preview of an AI agent that controls a web browser to complete real-world tasks like filling out forms and ordering groceries. Powered by a new Computer-Using Agent (CUA) model, it navigates interfaces like a human while asking users to take over during logins and payments. It is currently rolling out to Pro users in the U.S.
OpenAI just launched a research preview of Operator, a general-purpose AI agent that takes control of a browser to handle travel booking, reservations, and online shopping. Powered by a Computer-Using Agent model, it clicks and fills out forms just like a human, though sensitive actions like payments still require manual user approval.
Google has reportedly invested another $1 billion into Anthropic, pushing the tech giant's total stake to roughly $3 billion. The fresh cash arrives as Anthropic eyes a massive $60 billion valuation and preps an ambitious 2025 roadmap, which includes voice chat for Claude and a PC-controlling "Virtual Collaborator" agent.
Samsung just unveiled the Galaxy S25 lineup at Unpacked 2025, turning the hardware into a vehicle for a new integrated AI platform powered by Gemini. A long-press of the power button lets the assistant run tasks across Samsung and Google apps, while adding features like video audio erasing. Why it matters: Phone AI is finally moving past chatbots to actually doing multi-step chores across your phone.
Enterprise venture capitalists are moving their checkbooks past foundation models and into specialized applications. A TechCrunch survey of 20 enterprise investors reveals that the smart money in 2025 is hunting for task-specific agentic workflows, resilience tools, and AI infrastructure, while steering clear of single-feature startups.
OpenAI and other leading AI labs are preparing to unveil Ph.D.-level "super-agents" capable of independently tackling messy, multilayered human jobs, according to Axios. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has even scheduled a closed-door briefing with U.S. government officials on Jan. 30. Why it matters: If these autonomous agents can overcome nagging hallucination issues, generative AI moves from an assistant to a real replacement for mid-level knowledge workers.
