It’s a wrap: News this week (June 1 - June 7)

There have been multiple developments this week on the tech front. From TCS’ WisdomNext to Computex 2024, this is the list of the most important developments for a quick catch-up:

WhatsApp in India tests AI for businesses

Meta-owned messaging app WhatsApp is testing new artificial intelligence (AI) tools for small businesses to better assist consumers in India and Singapore. The move aims at amplifying the company’s efforts to turn messaging apps into viable business units, said analysts.

Meta said that AI tools help businesses on WhatsApp better assist their customers and help them discover new products they may be interested in. The company is training AI to respond to the most popular questions businesses receive on WhatsApp, so they can quickly help customers find the answers they’re seeking.

Wipro bags $500 mn deal

IT services firm Wipro has won a $500 million deal from a leading US Communication Service Provider. Under the five-year long contract, Wipro will be offering managed services for some products and industry-specific solutions, the company said in an exchange filing on June 6. This is touted as the first big deal bagged by the company after new chief executive officer Srinivas Pallia took office on April 6 after Thierry Delaporte stepped down. 

In April, Wipro signed a multi-million-dollar agreement with telecommunications major Nokia to overhaul the latter's employee service desk and offer real-time IT support to a global network of employees, in a multi-million dollar deal.

TCS’ WisdomNext

TCS launched an aggregated generative AI (GenAI) platform called WisdomNext. The platform is a single interface to multiple GenAI services aimed at helping enterprises to adopt next-gen solutions at scale and lower cost. This platform is being launched under the AI. Cloud business unit that was introduced last year for a focused approach to these emerging technologies.

The company said that the platform is designed to remove barriers for customers in developing and launching business solutions allowing for real-time experimentation across vendor, internal, and open-source LLM models. TCS spokesperson said during media briefing that over a 100 customers across domains such as BFSI, retail, consumer goods, and travel, among others are already leveraging it. 

Computex 2024 highlights

The tech world turned its eyes to Taipei, Taiwan for Computex 2024, the biggest computing event of the year, where the latest in AI and semiconductor technology took centre stage. Some of the highlights of the event include – Nvidia’s NIM, a set of microservices for running generative AI models; AMD’s Ryzen AI 300 Series and fifth-generation EPYC server processors; Intel’s next-generation Lunar Lake processors, among others.

Zoho’s semiconductor foray

Zoho top boss Sridhar Vembu has announced that the company has applied for a license to build a compound semiconductor fab unit. Zoho will be investing $200 million for this project. Vembu said that the company has applied for a license and waiting government clearance during the company’s annual event in the US this week. The company also anticipates the project to be financed under government’s compound semiconductor manufacturing scheme.