TIME100 Most Influential Companies 2025: Lime
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Yahoo
13 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Comcast debuts soccer-focused video package ahead of World Cup
(Reuters) -Internet and media giant Comcast launched a soccer-focused video package exclusively for its Xfinity customers on Wednesday, as it looks to attract sports fans ahead of major events, including the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Comcast has priced the offering, called "World Soccer Ticket", at $85 a month. The bundle includes nearly 60 broadcast, cable news, and sports channels, along with a premium subscription of NBCUniversal's Peacock streaming service. As cord cutting continues to hit traditional TV revenue, live sports content has emerged as one of the few formats that still draw millions of eyeballs and boost advertising demand. The package comes ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which will be jointly hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico. Every match of the quadrennial tournament will be available in English on Fox and in Spanish across Telemundo, Universo, and Peacock, Comcast said on Wednesday. The plan will also offer live coverage of major international leagues and competitions, including Premier League, UEFA Champions League, LaLiga, Liga MX and CONCACAF Champions Cup. Besides, the package will include live coverage of other major sports and leagues like the NFL and NBA on the package's networks and Peacock. Customers can access the package through X1 set-top box and Xfinity Stream TV app on supported platforms like Apple TV and Fire TV. Comcast's new offering is expected to drive demand for its networks like NBC and boost subscriber growth for its flagship streaming platform, Peacock, which had 41 million paid subscribers at the end of June, far fewer than rival platforms. Media companies are aggressively pursuing major sports deals to strengthen their streaming platforms. The newly merged Paramount secured exclusive U.S. broadcast rights to the Ultimate Fighting Championship for seven years in a $7.7 billion deal on Monday. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Fast Company
an hour ago
- Fast Company
Agentic AI in three moves: Connect, co-operate, concierge
A spring storm wipes out the last Thursday flight from Dallas. One in-app request later, an invisible digital assistant secures a nearby hotel, drops a meal voucher into your wallet, reroutes your suitcase, updates tomorrow's Teams meeting, and (because it senses weariness in your voice) orders an Uber Black. The experience feels less like self-service and more like having a well-briefed assistant orchestrating every detail. The result is not merely a rescued itinerary, but a deeper affinity with the very airline that just disrupted your plans. That feeling is the promise of agentic AI: software that breaks a goal into tasks, taps outside systems, remembers context across channels, and hands control back to a person whenever judgment matters. The timing is right. IBM research shows 76% of executives are piloting autonomous agents and 86% expect them to reshape workflows by 2027. Customers are more impatient than ever; 17% quit after one bad interaction, 59% after a few, and 70% expect the next employee or interface to know their context without being told. Agentic AI can meet that bar, but only if we build in the right order. Think of it as a three-stage path that begins with connecting, moves into the cooperate stage, and ends with the promise land of concierge. Here's how it can work: 1. CONNECT: GIVE EVERY CHANNEL THE SAME MEMORY First comes plumbing. Funnel every click, order, chat, and loyalty swipe into a lightweight feature store, a living memory capsule any touchpoint can open. This capsule powers an AI copilot beside frontline staff. The copilot drafts answers, suggests next moves, and flags land mines such as a refund that would void a bundle discount before a rep hits send. Customer Benefit: Instant, consistent replies in one brand voice, regardless of whether the message arrives by SMS, email, or IVR. Business Benefit: Average handle time drops an estimated 25% and brittle integrations surface early, long before full autonomy. Design work changes focus. Instead of polishing pixels, teams choreograph conversations: tone curves, escalation triggers, and data contracts replace static mock-ups. Brand language is encoded once, then reused everywhere. 2. CO-OPERATE: LET A SUPERVISED AGENT OWN HIGH-VOLUME TASKS With the pipes proven, elevate one high-volume journey—where is my order, a password reset, an in-store return—to a supervised agent that still knows when to wave in a human. Because it reads from the same memory capsule, the agent can finish a sizing chat that began on TikTok and push a shipping update straight to Apple Wallet without losing context. If confidence drops, the full thread with rationale lands on an agent's screen. Customer Benefit: Friction disappears. When a shoe size is gone online, the system checks nearby stores and offers same-day pickup. At the airport, kiosks spot a risky connection and print a later boarding pass before panic sets in. Business Benefit: Problems are solved on first contact and revenue pops fast; one fashion pilot lifted buy-online-pick-up-in-store conversions by 22% when agents brokered inventory in real time. Designers double down on micro interactions, surfacing one-tap options and keeping language tight. Strategy teams track completion and sentiment, not cost alone, to keep the experience human. 3. CONCIERGE: ORCHESTRATE SPECIALISTS EVERYWHERE The final move adds an orchestrator that spawns specialist sub-agents for billing, loyalty, inventory, payments, and more, all sharing state. Open-source stacks such as LangGraph give engineers fine-grained control without vendor lock-in. In ecommerce, the effect is dramatic: A shopping companion can search, compare, and check out inside the brand app, while new payment rails let AI complete a purchase securely on any site. Customer Benefit: The brand seems to anticipate needs. Wish lists refresh when sizes restock, pantry staples reorder themselves within a spending cap, and a smart mirror recalls everything tried at home. An edit log and a one-tap undo keep the human in charge. Business Benefit: Service savings persist, but growth becomes the headline. Cart abandonment falls as agents juggle price, stock, and rewards in milliseconds. Every interaction pushes live insight back into product, pricing, and media models. Design, tech, and strategy converge around explainability and seamless human hand-offs; a live expert can join the chat without forcing the shopper to start over. GUARDRAILS THAT MAKE IT SAFE AND CREDIBLE Autonomy delights only when it is accountable. Validate with pre-launch testing of generated copy against brand-voice guidelines. Keep a visible skills registry so compliance teams know which agent touches which data. Run security and privacy drills at least quarterly. These checkpoints matter as much to experience quality as typography or color. THE PAYOFF: LESS FRICTION, MORE GROWTH Execute connect, co-operate, and concierge in sequence, and customers notice what is missing: repeated forms, channel seams, surprise fees, awkward transfers. A purchase becomes a sentence such as, 'Find me a vegan gift under fifty dollars, deliver Tuesday, use points first,' and service stays invisible until empathy is needed, at which point a person appears fully briefed. For the organization, efficiency shows up first, growth second. Support costs drop, conversion climbs, and the feature store becomes a feedback loop that sharpens product road maps and media buys. Strategists rank journeys by value and complexity, technologists instrument every agent step, and designers craft feelings of continuity, anticipation, and control. Brands that master connect, co-operate, concierge will own both the moments that suit automation and the critical times when a human must lead. Those that wait may find their next customer already served instantly by someone else's digital assistant.
Yahoo
5 hours ago
- Yahoo
BofA Maintains ‘Buy' Rating on Uber Technologies, Inc. (UBER) with $115 PT
With a significant presence in Bill Ackman's stock portfolio, Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER) secures a spot on our list of the Bill Ackman Stock Portfolio: Top 10 Stock Picks. A close up view of a hand holding a smartphone, using a ride sharing app. On August 4, 2025, BofA Securities kept a 'Buy' rating on Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER) with a $115 price target. This comes ahead of the company's Q2 earnings, scheduled for release on August 6. BofA raised its estimates amid strong spending data and improving industry trends. The analyst increased its bookings, revenue, and EBITDA forecasts to $47.10 billion, $12.56 billion, and $2.12 billion, respectively, all above consensus estimates. This follows strong momentum for Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER), as it has gained 47% YTD. A strong financial performance, along with strategic partnerships with Waymo and Lucid, has remained a key growth driver. Wall Street expects UBER to report earnings of $0.63 per share and a 16.5% revenue jump to $12.5 billion. Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER) boasts a strong historical track record of beating estimates. Operating across the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia-Pacific, Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER) develops proprietary technology applications within Mobility, Delivery, and Freight segments. Bill Ackman has bought 30.3 million shares of Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:UBER) as of Q1 2025. While we acknowledge the potential of UBER as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: 12 Cheap Value Stocks to Buy Now According to Warren Buffett and 7 Best Potash Stocks to Buy According to Analysts. Disclosure: None. Effettua l'accesso per consultare il tuo portafoglio
