Kodiak AI Goes Public on Nasdaq, Fueling Autonomous Trucking Race
Autonomous trucking company Kodiak AI (formerly Kodiak Robotics) has officially gone public on the Nasdaq exchange under the ticker ‘KDK’. The public listing follows a completed merger with special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Ares Acquisition Corporation II. The deal, which values Kodiak AI at approximately $2.5 billion, is set to inject over $212.5 million in capital into the company. Kodiak AI will leverage these funds to accelerate the commercialization of its self-driving system, the Kodiak Driver, and expand its fleet of driverless trucks. Having already logged millions of autonomous miles, the company continues to build on its partnerships with major logistics and freight operators.
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Lyft and Waymo Announce Nashville Robotaxi Service for 2026
Lyft and Waymo are expanding their partnership to launch a fully autonomous ride-hailing service in Nashville, Tennessee, with operations scheduled to begin in 2026. Initially, customers will book Waymo robotaxis through the Waymo app, with a full integration into the Lyft app planned for a later phase. Lyft’s fleet management subsidiary, Flexdrive, will oversee the management, maintenance, and depot operations for the Waymo vehicle fleet. This collaboration signifies a major expansion for Waymo’s autonomous services and deepens Lyft’s integration of self-driving technology into its ride-sharing platform.
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Pony.ai to Launch Autonomous Driving Trials in Dubai
Autonomous driving technology firm Pony.ai has received a permit to begin self-driving vehicle trials on public roads in Dubai. This move is part of a strategic partnership with Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) and represents a significant step toward commercial deployment in the Middle East. Pony.ai has already initiated pilot tests in select areas and aims to launch a commercial driverless robotaxi service by 2026. This initiative aligns with Dubai’s ambitious goal to make 25% of all urban transportation autonomous by 2030.
Google DeepMind Unveils Gemini AI Models for Advanced Robotics
Google DeepMind has introduced two new AI models, Gemini Robotics 1.5 and Gemini Robotics-ER 1.5, engineered to significantly enhance the capabilities of general-purpose robots. These models empower robots with a deeper understanding of their environment, enabling them to execute complex, multi-step tasks and even leverage digital tools like web search to find solutions. The Gemini Robotics-ER 1.5 model functions as a reasoning engine to create detailed plans, which the Gemini Robotics 1.5 model then translates into physical actions. This breakthrough marks a critical step toward creating more intelligent and versatile robots capable of reasoning and problem-solving in the real world.
KPMG Launches AI Assurance Services for Responsible AI Adoption
KPMG has expanded its AI Trust suite with new AI assurance capabilities aimed at helping organizations implement and scale generative AI and AI agents responsibly and ethically. The new services provide robust assurance frameworks to assess and monitor AI agent behavior, ensuring they operate within predefined ethical guardrails. These offerings are designed to mitigate emerging AI-related risks, including security vulnerabilities, data privacy, and the accuracy of AI-generated content. The announced services include AI model risk assessments, control testing, quantitative assessments, and AI model validation to ensure accuracy and regulatory compliance.
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GitLab and Atlassian Dominate 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for DevOps
For the third consecutive year, both GitLab and Atlassian have been named Leaders in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for DevOps Platforms. GitLab’s recognition follows its recent placement as a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for AI Code Assistants. Atlassian was also named a Leader for the third year running, positioned highest for its “Ability to Execute” and furthest for “Completeness of Vision.” The Gartner report emphasizes the critical role of DevOps platforms in simplifying software delivery. In the companion 2025 Gartner Critical Capabilities report, GitLab ranked first in four of the six evaluated use cases.
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HashiCorp Introduces Project Infragraph for Agentic Infrastructure Automation
At HashiConf 2025, HashiCorp, now part of IBM, unveiled Project Infragraph, a new initiative for the HashiCorp Cloud Platform (HCP) designed to enable agentic infrastructure. Project Infragraph will create a real-time infrastructure graph, offering a unified view of infrastructure, applications, services, and ownership to solve common challenges in visibility and data governance within complex cloud environments. HashiCorp plans to extend Project Infragraph to integrate with a wide range of IBM’s software portfolio, including Red Hat Ansible, OpenShift, IBM watsonx Orchestrate, and Turbonomic. This integration aims to help customers unify their infrastructure, security, and applications under a consistent data and policy model.
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Equinix Debuts Distributed AI Infrastructure for Edge and Multicloud
Equinix has launched its Distributed AI infrastructure, a new architecture designed to support the next wave of AI, including agentic AI. Announced at the company’s inaugural AI Summit, the offering includes a new AI-ready backbone for distributed deployments, a global AI Solutions Lab for solution testing, and Fabric Intelligence to support next-gen workloads. Fabric Intelligence is a software layer that enhances Equinix Fabric with real-time awareness and automation for AI and multicloud environments. This new infrastructure is engineered to handle the scale and complexity of modern intelligent systems, enabling enterprises to run compliant, low-latency AI workloads at the edge for use cases like predictive maintenance and real-time fraud detection. The new products are slated for availability in Q1 2026.
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Silicon Quantum Chips Overcome Key Manufacturing Hurdle for Scalability
In a major breakthrough for scalable quantum computing, UNSW Sydney startup Diraq, in partnership with imec, has demonstrated that silicon-based quantum chips can be manufactured using standard CMOS processes while maintaining high fidelity. A paper published in Nature details how the teams achieved over 99% fidelity in two-qubit operations on devices fabricated at a commercial semiconductor foundry. This result overcomes a critical bottleneck for building utility-scale quantum computers, which will require millions of qubits. Manufacturing high-performance qubits with the same technology as conventional computer chips provides a cost-effective path to scaling quantum processors.
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IBM and HSBC Prove Quantum Advantage in Algorithmic Bond Trading
IBM and HSBC have announced a significant breakthrough demonstrating the practical application of quantum computing in the financial sector. In a trial, HSBC used an IBM Heron quantum processor with classical machine learning to enhance a key process in algorithmic bond trading. This hybrid quantum-classical approach improved the estimation of a trade’s fill probability by up to 34% compared to classical methods alone. This real-world application shows the potential for current quantum computers to offer a competitive edge in solving complex business problems and serves as a key proof point for IBM’s quantum-centric supercomputing strategy.
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Software Engineering & Open-Source News Roundup
This feed provides the latest news in software engineering and open-source, including a call for verifiable technology from Ethereum’s co-founder, the release of an open-source meteor detection tool, and a new open-source server for securing AI agents.
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