Artificial Intelligence

HERNDON, Va. – October 29, 2026 -- Four Akima subsidiaries have secured positions on the Missile Defense Agency's SHIELD indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract, which carries a ceiling of $151 billion.

Cloud Lake, Systems Intelligence, RiverTech and Akima Logistics Services join the vehicle

The awardees are Cloud Lake Technology, Systems Intelligence, RiverTech and Akima Logistics Services. Their parent, Akima, employs 11,000 people and ranked #31 on Washington Technology's 2025 Top 100 list of government contractors.

SHIELD gives MDA and other DoD organizations a vehicle to compete work rapidly

SHIELD stands for Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense. It serves MDA and other Department of Defense organizations as a flexible contract vehicle for rapidly competing and delivering advanced capabilities. Its work areas support accelerated development and fielding of mission-critical technologies.

United States – October 29, 2026 -- Only 14% of organizations using AI say it reduced their total workforce in the past year, down from the 32% that expected cuts a year earlier, according to McKinsey's State of AI 2026. Two-thirds report little or no AI-related change in employment.

Inside finance, Deloitte found that 84% of finance organizations have yet to redesign jobs or the nature of work around AI. AI is therefore landing on finance teams that look much like they did before.

US labor data projects 5% growth for accountants and auditors through 2035

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics projects employment of accountants and auditors to grow 5% from 2025 to 2035. It expects about 115,300 openings a year, many of them replacing experienced people who move on or retire.

Norwalk – October 29, 2026 -- Xerox has been named a Leader in Quocirca's 2026 Automation & AI, Cloud & Technology (ACT) assessment, which evaluates vendors across Automation & AI, Cloud and Technology Ecosystems.

Xerox applies AI across four operational areas

Xerox says it now uses AI as a foundational capability in predictive maintenance, workflow automation, intelligent document processing and production optimization. Cloud platforms and partner ecosystems support these offerings and let them scale securely across distributed environments.

The ACT assessment rewards vendors that show strategic vision, execution strength and the integration needed to move beyond standalone technologies toward enterprise-wide transformation.

Reno – October 29, 2026 -- Dragonfly Energy Holdings Corp. (Nasdaq: DFLI) has appointed Dr. Lukas Lutz, co-founder of Germany-based AI engineering firm Sphere Energy, to its Board of Directors. The move adds battery-simulation and machine-learning expertise as the company works to use data from its installed base of Battle Born Batteries.

Sphere Energy models simulate battery aging from a handful of tests

Lutz co-founded Sphere with Luca Scherrer and Dr. Daniel Alves Dalla Corte. The company built an AI Operating System that lets large corporations scale AI applications across their organizations. Its proprietary transformer-based models generate CAD parts from a single requirement, optimize complex crash scenarios, and simulate battery aging and performance from just a handful of tests.

Africa – October 29, 2026 -- Hyperproof and Platview are offering an on-demand session on how tightening data-security and AI regulation affects organisations operating in and with Africa.

EU rules reach beyond Europe as African regulators build their own frameworks

New EU rules on data security and AI apply well beyond Europe's borders, according to the organisers. African regulators are building their own frameworks at pace, adding a second layer of obligations for companies active on the continent.

IRVINE – October 29, 2026 -- SBC Medical Group Holdings (Nasdaq: SBC) will put its AI-driven longevity strategy in front of Asian investors this month, with CFO and COO Yuya Yoshida presenting at Cantor Fitzgerald Hong Kong's inaugural Asia Longevity Forum on October 26, followed by investor meetings on October 27 and a non-deal roadshow on October 28.

Yoshida takes keynote and panel slots at a forum with more than 40 companies

The two-day Cantor HK Asia Longevity Forum 2026 runs October 26-27 at The Murray Hotel in Central, Hong Kong. More than 40 public and private companies are expected to attend. Yoshida will speak in the keynote and panel sessions on day one. Forum themes include the longevity economy, AI and digital health adoption, and building Asia's next-generation healthcare system.

Teaneck – October 29, 2026 -- Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) and Travelport have launched the next phase of their 20-year partnership, with the stated goal of making Travelport the first AI-native platform in global travel retailing. Cognizant teams will work with Travelport across 18 countries.

Cognizant and Travelport complete first modernization phase begun in May 2026

The two companies announced their AI transformation in May 2026 alongside Anthropic. They have since built the platforms, architecture and engineering practices needed for AI-enabled delivery. AI tooling is now entering the software development lifecycle, covering code generation, test creation and pull-request review. Further workflow automation opportunities have been identified.

ARLINGTON, Va. – October 29, 2026 -- The American Institutes for Research (AIR), a Gold Conference Sponsor, will present in 10 panels, roundtables and paper sessions, plus two poster events, at the Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management (APPAM) Fall Research Conference, November 5-7, 2026, at the Marriott Copley Place in Boston.

The conference theme is "Fifty States, Fifty Systems: State Policy Variations and Impacts." AIR will also staff a booth in the Exhibitor Hall and a table at the APPAM Career & PhD Program Fair on Friday, November 6, from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM ET in the Gloucester Meeting Room.

Vienna – October 29, 2026 -- Vienna-based WAVE Trockensysteme GmbH has put its best-selling FD440 freeze dryer under AI control, replacing a conventional industrial controller with the Interkey Brain system. On its first run on October 23, the AI rewrote its own program mid-process without stopping the machine. To WAVE's knowledge, this is the first industrial machine on the market guided by an AI rather than a fixed-program controller.

AI rewrites its own code during a live drying cycle

During the first batch, the team asked the AI to look for improvements while drying was under way. The system analyzed live measurement data, rewrote its program and installed the new version. The drying process did not have to be interrupted.

NEW YORK – October 29, 2026 -- Bloomberg launched BQuant Assistant, a conversational AI coding assistant that lets Bloomberg Terminal subscribers write Python code and query financial data across more than 22,000 fields using natural-language prompts. The tool is built into both BQuant Desktop and BQuant Enterprise.

BQuant Assistant generates BQL and PyBQL queries across all major asset classes

The assistant produces Bloomberg Query Language (BQL) and PyBQL queries covering equities, funds, fixed income, FX, commodities, indices and derivatives. The fields span reference, pricing, returns, derived analytics, fundamentals, valuations, sustainable finance data, risk metrics, estimates and economic data. It also writes code for screens and universes, and for visualizations using open source libraries such as Plotly and Jupyter Widgets.