Latest news with #AIInvestment
Yahoo
06-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Upstart returns to profitability in second quarter
Online lending platform Upstart Holdings became profitable again due to higher loan origination volumes. At the same time, the company has been investing in AI and expanding its consumer credit products. Upstart, an online lending platform that serves over 3 million borrowers, reached $5.6 million in net income this quarter, a 110% improvement from the $54.5 million loss reported this time last year. It's the first time the company has reported positive income since 2022. The lender also reported $257.3 million in revenue, a 101.6% increase from the prior year. "In addition to achieving triple-digit revenue growth, we reached GAAP profitability a quarter sooner than expected," Upstart CEO Dave Girouard said in the company earnings call. Similarly, diluted earnings per share hit $0.05, a 108% increase from the -$0.62 EPS reported in the second quarter of 2024. Driving the strong earnings report was the $2.8 billion of loan originations Upstart brought in, the lender's highest origination volume for a single quarter in three years. Paul Gu, Upstart co-founder and chief technology officer, emphasized the online lender's investment in AI this year and championed it as a factor in the company's growth. "We made strong progress in Q2 generalizing our AI technology across product verticals," Gu said in the earnings call. "Even with accelerating growth in new products, our share of fully automated loans actually kept up this quarter." About 92% of the company's loans are currently fully automated with no human intervention, according to a company earnings presentation. In Upstart's first investor day held in May 2025, which it called "AI Day," the company emphasized to its investors various plans to incorporate AI into employee workflow and consumer products. "One of our key priorities in 2025 is to 10x our leadership in AI," Gu said in the earnings call. "We continue to have a robust pipeline of modeling wins, and I'm incredibly proud of the team and what we've been able to accomplish so far with that." A Jeffries analyst report said that the quarter "showed good patterns on volumes with a rising conversion rate driving $2.8 billion of loan volume, ahead of consensus but modestly short of the 'whisper #' of $3.1 billion." A "whisper number" is an unofficial earnings prediction that can circulate among Wall Street brokers and investors separately from official consensus estimates for a publicly traded company. Upstart increased its revenue outlook for the full fiscal year from $1.01 billion to $1.055 billion, and its net income guidance from a general "positive" prediction to a specific number outlook of $35 million. The lender is also taking a conservative stance on the impacts of macroeconomic conditions on the latter half of the year and "roughly expects the status quo," according to chief financial officer Sanjay Datta. Analysts on the call pushed against this stance with several questions about the lower-than-expected jobs report released last week and the potential of future interest rate cuts, even as Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell is currently holding interest rates steady. "We plan for no real cuts in interest rates in the market," Datta said in response to an analyst question. "There's a lot of speculation around what that might look like for the rest of the year, but we certainly don't bank on anything in that regard." Upstart is also expecting a resilient labor market, according to Datta. "Notwithstanding the noise of the last week or so, we think the labor market continues to be in relatively good shape in terms of how many open jobs there are out there versus how many people are seeking jobs," he said. "That's the totality of the macro assumptions that go into our planning." Jeffries analysts noted that Upstart's third-quarter outlook changes were set above what they had expected. "FY25 guidance was [also] adjusted moderately up, which we believe may fall short of expectations considering momentum," the Jeffries report said. Shares in Upstart fell by 19% in trading on Wednesday. A Citizens analyst report on Upstart's earnings said that the firm would "remain neutral on the stock, as we believe that the valuation already captures a significant degree of the expectations for recovering volumes and margins; the near-record-high conversion rate within a more competitive lending landscape raises the credit risk profile; and we would like greater visibility into stable and permanent funding sources for new products." Sign in to access your portfolio
Bloomberg
04-08-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
HelloFresh Is Investing $70 Million to Have AI Help Plan Dinner
Meal kit specialists HelloFresh SE is employing artificial intelligence to get more customers cooking. The Berlin-based company announced on Monday a $70 million investment in its menu subscriptions. The funds will more than double the number of meals on offer and increase the range of star proteins such as beef and seafood. It will also bolster the use of AI technology to streamline decision making during ordering, even as the choices for recipes increase.
New Straits Times
30-07-2025
- New Straits Times
Penang woman scammed of RM600,000 in fake AI investment scheme
BUKIT MERTAJAM: A 55-year-old woman lost RM600,000 to an online investment scam known as AI Investment, which promised high short-term returns. Acting Penang police chief Datuk Mohd Alwi Zainal Abidin said the victim, a retired clerk from a company in Bukit Minyak, was duped into joining the investment scheme after seeing an advertisement on Facebook in May. He said the victim had clicked on the ad and was subsequently contacted by a man via WhatsApp before being added to a group chat named "Jin Yi Shi Guan". "The victim was then instructed to download an app called 'AI INV', register as a member, and start investing. "Initial investigation revealed the woman made six bank transfers on July 11 to six separate company accounts, amounting to RM600,000. "She only realised she had been scammed when she attempted to withdraw her purported profits from the app but was asked to make an additional payment to 'activate' the withdrawal," he said in a statement today. Alwi said the victim lodged a police report on July 29. He said the case is being investigated under Section 420 of the Penal Code for cheating. Alwi advised the public to exercise caution when dealing with online investment offers, particularly those that promise high returns in a short period.
Irish Times
11-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
The Irish Times view on AI and Ireland: the future will not wait
Artificial intelligence is no longer a distant concept confined to Silicon Valley or science fiction. It is here, now, reshaping economies, transforming industries and prompting governments to rethink everything from education and employment to ethics and regulation. The question Ireland must urgently confront is whether it is truly prepared for the scale and speed of change AI is set to unleash. There are reasons both for cautious optimism and concern. Ireland has long positioned itself as a European technology hub, hosting the headquarters of many of the world's leading tech firms. Government agencies are actively courting AI investment. Research centres in Irish universities are leaders in developing cutting-edge AI applications. The recent launch of an AI Skills programme by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment signals a growing recognition of the need to upskill the workforce. But the evidence of the last decade also suggests that Irish regulators struggle to come to terms with the challenges posed by US tech companies which are not slow to wield their considerable political influence. The establishment of an Oireachtas Committee on Artificial Intelligence, which met for the first time this week, marks a step in deepening political and legislative engagement with the issue. The committee has the potential to initiate a broader public and legislative debate on AI policy that balances innovation with the safeguarding of democratic values and public interest. But for this to succeed, it will need to act in constructive coordination with education, enterprise and civil society. Because readiness is about more than strategy documents, it must reach into the heart of how we educate, train, and govern. Schools, for example, are already grappling with how to prepare students for a new world in which traditional educational metrics are no longer credible. The reformed Leaving Certificate, with its increased emphasis on project work, now faces an unexpected challenge: how to assess students fairly in a world where generative AI can produce plausible essays and design projects at the click of a button. READ MORE Equally urgent are the labour market implications. AI is set to displace roles in sectors ranging from transport and customer support to software development and legal services. Without a serious, joined-up national response, Ireland could face widening inequality, social dislocation and a growing digital divide. Nimble policymaking and innovative thinking are imperative. But this moment also requires political will and public investment. AI is not just a technological leap. It is a societal transformation. If Ireland is to thrive in this new age, it must act with speed, coherence and purpose. The future will not wait.
Yahoo
08-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Meta reportedly in talks to invest billions of dollars in Scale AI
Meta is discussing a multi-billion dollar investment in Scale AI, according to Bloomberg. In fact, the deal value could reportedly exceed $10 billion, making it the largest external AI investment for the Facebook parent company and one of the largest funding events ever for a private company. Scale AI (whose CEO Alexandr Wang is pictured above) provides data labeling services to companies such as Microsoft and OpenAI to help them train their AI models. Much of that labeling work is done by contractors — in fact, the Department of Labor recently dropped its investigation into whether the company was misclassifying and underpaying employees. According to Bloomberg, the company saw $870 million in revenue last year and expects to bring in $2 billion this year. Meta was already an investor in Scale AI's $1 billion Series F, which valued the company at $13.8 billion. Scale AI also built Defense Llama, a large language model designed for military use, on top of Meta's Llama 3.
