Listen to today’s podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/silk-logic-small-business-daily/id1841930957
Small Business Daily Podcast — 01/31/2026
Today’s podcast episode was created from the following stories: big bets on autonomous systems, bold moves in AI infrastructure, and the tools reshaping customer experience.
Uber’s new plan to deploy 25,000 robotaxis will come from an autonomous trucking company — led by an Uber alum
Uber is investing 250 million dollars in Waabi to eventually roll out 25,000 robotaxis, a deal tied to undisclosed milestones and without a stated timeline or automaker partner. Waabi aims to apply its generalizable AI driver and mixed-reality simulation to ride-hailing, prioritizing scalable mass deployment over being first to pull safety drivers.
Apple buys “Silent Speech” AI startup for $2B, because talking is so 2025
Apple has acquired Israeli startup Q.ai for nearly 2 billion dollars to advance silent-speech interfaces that infer intent from facial micro-movements and subtle audio cues. Expect potential integrations across wearables like AirPods and Vision Pro as Apple pushes a more private, gesture-like future for device control.
DeepSeek has reportedly been given conditional approval by the Chinese government to buy Nvidia’s AI GPUs
Reuters-sourced reports suggest China may allow DeepSeek to purchase Nvidia H200 GPUs under regulatory conditions still being finalized, with other tech giants reportedly in the queue. If confirmed, the move could materially boost Chinese AI capabilities and signal a thaw toward pragmatic access to US-designed compute.
Decagon triples valuation to 4.5B dollars with 250M dollar Series D
Decagon raised 250 million dollars led by Coatue and Index to scale its agentic AI concierge platform for enterprise customer support, tripling its valuation to 4.5 billion dollars. With growing adoption across global brands and measurable savings, the company is expanding omnichannel capabilities while tackling integration and trust hurdles.
Perplexity signs 750 million dollar AI cloud deal with Microsoft, Bloomberg News reports
Perplexity inked a three-year, 750 million dollar agreement to run frontier models via Microsoft’s Azure Foundry, while maintaining its AWS spend. The pact broadens access to systems from OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI as Perplexity navigates legal scrutiny over its agentic shopping feature.
Apple acquires Israeli audio AI startup Q.ai, reportedly for 1.6 billion dollars
Apple confirmed the purchase of Q.ai, with Reuters reporting a valuation around 1.6 billion dollars; the startup specializes in whispered-speech understanding and facial micro-movement detection. Q.ai’s 100-strong team will join Apple, bolstering audio and sensing capabilities that echo earlier wins like PrimeSense’s role in Face ID.
South Korea debuts foundation model in sovereign AI push
SK Telecom unveiled A.X K1, a 519-billion-parameter sovereign model geared for Korean language, math, and coding, to serve as a teacher for distilled industry models. Framed as national AI infrastructure, the effort emphasizes performance, data residency, and security as South Korea localizes chips-to-services across its AI stack.
