News from the AI & ML world
DeeperML - #amazon
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@learn.aisingapore.org
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Amazon is expanding its AI capabilities, focusing on both customer-facing and internal operational improvements. A key development is the enhanced Amazon Q Business, a generative AI-powered assistant now supporting anonymous user access. This feature allows businesses to create public-facing applications, such as Q&A sections on websites, documentation portals, and self-service customer support, without requiring user authentication. This provides guest users with AI-driven assistance to quickly find product information, navigate documentation, and troubleshoot issues.
The anonymous Amazon Q Business applications can be integrated into websites using either an embedded web experience via an iframe or through customized interfaces built with Chat, ChatSync, and PutFeedback APIs. Amazon offers a consumption-based pricing model for these anonymous applications, charging based on the number of Chat or ChatSync API operations. This allows businesses to offer powerful AI assistance to a wider audience while maintaining control over costs and deployment. In addition to AI-powered customer service, Amazon is also enhancing its warehouse operations with the introduction of the Vulcan robot. Equipped with gripping pincers, built-in conveyor belts, and a pointed probe, Vulcan is designed to handle 75% of the package types in Amazon's fulfillment centers. This robot represents a significant advancement in robotics, as it can "feel" objects, enabling it to handle a variety of items with the necessary strength and agility. Amazon says this "touch" capability is a fundamental leap forward, differentiating Vulcan from previous robots that lacked the ability to sense contact. Recommended read:
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Evan Ackerman@IEEE Spectrum
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Amazon is enhancing its warehouse operations with the introduction of Vulcan, a new robot equipped with a sense of touch. This advancement is aimed at improving the efficiency of picking and handling packages within its fulfillment centers. The Vulcan robot, armed with gripping pincers, built-in conveyor belts, and a pointed probe, is designed to handle 75% of the package types encountered in Amazon's warehouses. This new capability represents a "fundamental leap forward in robotics," according to Aaron Parness, Amazon’s director of applied science, as it enables the robot to "feel" the objects it's interacting with, a feature previously unattainable for Amazon's robots.
Vulcan's sense of touch allows it to navigate the challenges of picking items from cluttered bins, mastering what some call 'bin etiquette'. Unlike older robots, which Parness describes as "numb and dumb" because of a lack of sensors, Vulcan can measure grip strength and gently push surrounding objects out of the way. This ensures that it remains below the damage threshold when handling items, a critical improvement for retrieving items from the small fabric pods Amazon uses to store inventory in fulfillment centers. These pods contain up to 10 items within compartments that are only about one foot square, posing a challenge for robots without the finesse to remove a single object without damaging others. Amazon claims that Vulcan's introduction is made possible through key advancements in robotics, engineering, and physical artificial intelligence. While the company did not specify the exact number of jobs Vulcan may create or displace, it emphasized that its robotics systems have historically led to the creation of new job categories focused on training, operating, and maintaining the robots. Vulcan, with its enhanced capabilities, is poised to significantly impact Amazon's ability to manage the 400 million SKUs at a typical fulfillment center, promising increased efficiency and reduced risk of damage to items. Recommended read:
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Evan Ackerman@IEEE Spectrum
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Amazon has unveiled Vulcan, an AI-powered robot with a sense of touch, designed for use in its fulfillment centers. This groundbreaking robot represents a "fundamental leap forward in robotics," according to Amazon's director of applied science, Aaron Parness. Vulcan is equipped with sensors that allow it to "feel" the objects it is handling, enabling capabilities previously unattainable for Amazon robots. This sense of touch allows Vulcan to manipulate objects with greater dexterity and avoid damaging them or other items nearby.
Vulcan operates using "end of arm tooling" that includes force feedback sensors. These sensors enable the robot to understand how hard it is pushing or holding an object, ensuring it remains below the damage threshold. Amazon says that Vulcan can easily manipulate objects to make room for whatever it’s stowing, because it knows when it makes contact and how much force it’s applying. Vulcan helps to bridge the gap between humans and robots, bringing greater dexterity to the devices. The introduction of Vulcan addresses a significant challenge in Amazon's fulfillment centers, where the company handles a vast number of stock-keeping units (SKUs). While robots already play a crucial role in completing 75% of Amazon orders, Vulcan fills the ability gap of previous generations of robots. According to Amazon, one business per second is adopting AI, and Vulcan demonstrates the potential for AI and robotics to revolutionize warehouse operations. Amazon did not specify how many jobs the Vulcan model may create or displace. Recommended read:
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@techradar.com
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AWS News Blog
, Data Phoenix
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AI adoption is accelerating rapidly, with Amazon reporting that a UK business is adopting AI every 60 seconds. This surge in adoption is highlighted in a recent AWS report, which indicates a 33% increase in the past year, bringing the total of UK businesses utilizing AI to 52%. Startups appear to be leading the charge, with 59% adoption rate, and are also more likely to have comprehensive AI strategies in place compared to larger enterprises, 31% versus 15% respectively. Benefit realization is also on the rise, with 92% of AI-adopting businesses reporting an increase in revenue, a substantial jump from 64% in 2024.
Amazon is also introducing new tools to assist developers in building and scaling AI solutions. Amazon Q Developer is now available in preview on GitHub, enabling developers to assign tasks to an AI agent directly within GitHub issues. This agent can develop features, conduct code reviews, enhance security, and migrate Java code. The tool aims to accelerate code generation and streamline the development process, allowing developers to quickly implement AI-driven functionalities within their projects. Installation is simple, and developers can begin using the application without connecting to an AWS account. Adding to its suite of AI offerings, Amazon has launched Nova Premier, its most capable foundation model, now generally available on Amazon Bedrock. Nova Premier is designed to handle complex workflows requiring multiple tools and data sources. It boasts a one-million token context window, enabling it to process lengthy documents and large codebases. One notable feature of Nova Premier is its model distillation capabilities, allowing users to transfer its advanced features to smaller, faster models for production deployment. Amazon is investing in AI training, with a UK initiative to train 100,000 people in AI skills by the end of the decade, collaborating with universities such as Exeter and Manchester. Recommended read:
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Michael Nuñez@AI News | VentureBeat
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venturebeat.com
, www.marktechpost.com
Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced significant advancements in its AI coding and Large Language Model (LLM) infrastructure. A key highlight is the introduction of SWE-PolyBench, a comprehensive multi-language benchmark designed to evaluate the performance of AI coding assistants. This benchmark addresses the limitations of existing evaluation frameworks by assessing AI agents across a diverse range of programming languages like Python, JavaScript, TypeScript, and Java, using real-world scenarios derived from over 2,000 curated coding challenges from GitHub issues. The aim is to provide researchers and developers with a more accurate understanding of how well these tools can navigate complex codebases and solve intricate programming tasks involving multiple files.
The latest Amazon SageMaker Large Model Inference (LMI) container v15, powered by vLLM 0.8.4, further enhances LLM capabilities. This version supports a wider array of open-source models, including Meta’s Llama 4 models and Google’s Gemma 3, providing users with more flexibility in model selection. LMI v15 delivers significant performance improvements through an async mode and support for the vLLM V1 engine, resulting in higher throughput and reduced CPU overhead. This enables seamless deployment and serving of large language models at scale, with expanded API schema support and multimodal capabilities for vision-language models. AWS is also launching new Amazon EC2 Graviton4-based instances with NVMe SSD storage. These compute optimized (C8gd), general purpose (M8gd), and memory optimized (R8gd) instances offer up to 30% better compute performance and 40% higher performance for I/O intensive database workloads compared to Graviton3-based instances. They also include larger instance sizes with up to 3x more vCPUs, memory, and local storage. These instances are ideal for storage intensive Linux-based workloads including containerized and micro-services-based applications built using Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service(Amazon EKS),Amazon Elastic Container Service(Amazon ECS),Amazon Elastic Container Registry(Amazon ECR), Kubernetes, and Docker, as well as applications written in popular programming languages such as C/C++, Rust, Go, Java, Python, .NET Core, Node.js, Ruby, and PHP. Recommended read:
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@amazon.jobs
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IEEE Spectrum
, Amazon Science homepage
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Amazon is rapidly advancing the integration of robotics and artificial intelligence within its warehouses, marking a significant shift in how the e-commerce giant handles order fulfillment. This push for automation is not just about efficiency; it's about meeting the increasing demands of online shoppers. Amazon's fulfillment centers are becoming showcases for cutting-edge technology, demonstrating how robotics and AI can revolutionize warehouse operations. One example is the deployment of "Robin," a robotic arm capable of sorting packages for outbound shipping by moving them from conveyors to mobile robots, with over three billion successful package moves already completed across various Amazon facilities.
Amazon's robotics innovations are not limited to sorting packages. They are also focused on solving complex problems like robotic stowing, which involves intelligently placing items in cluttered storage bins. This requires robots to understand the three-dimensional world, manipulate a variety of objects, and even create space within bins by gently pushing items aside. Amazon's commitment to building safe and reliable technology that optimizes the supply chain is evident in its development of collaborative robots like Proteus, Cardinal, and Sparrow, as well as its new approach to inventory management through Containerized Storage. These systems are designed to work alongside humans safely, reducing physically demanding tasks and improving workplace ergonomics. The company has deployed more than 750,000 mobile robots across its global operations. Amazon's approach to robotics development involves rigorous testing in real-world environments, starting with small-scale implementations before wider deployment. Furthermore, Amazon is committed to upskilling its workforce. This commitment means that employees get the chance to learn new skills and use new innovative tools to deliver even more value for customers. Recommended read:
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mike@marketingaiinstitute.com (Mike@marketingaiinstitute.com
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AWS News Blog
, Bernard Marr
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Amazon is aggressively pursuing advancements in artificial intelligence, marking a significant push into the AI agent arena. The company has unveiled Nova Act, an AI system designed to control web browsers and autonomously perform tasks such as booking reservations, ordering food, and filling out forms. This new AI has the potential to streamline and automate various online activities, reducing the need for human intervention. The integration of Nova Act into the upcoming Alexa+ upgrade could put this powerful AI agent into the hands of millions of users worldwide.
Amazon is also introducing Nova Sonic, a new foundation model aimed at creating human-like voice conversations for generative AI applications. Nova Sonic unifies speech recognition and generation into a single model. It enables developers to create natural, conversational AI experiences. This integrated approach streamlines development and reduces complexity when building voice-enabled applications. The model delivers expressive speech generation and real-time text transcription without requiring a separate model. These advancements reflect Amazon's commitment to investing in AI for future growth. CEO Andy Jassy highlighted the importance of aggressive AI investments in a recent shareholder letter, noting plans to spend over $100 billion on capital expenditure in 2025. He described AI as a "once-in-a-lifetime reinvention of everything we know". The move towards agentic AI, as demonstrated by Nova Act and Nova Sonic, is expected to revolutionize various aspects of customer experiences and workplace productivity. Recommended read:
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Danilo Poccia@AWS News Blog
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Amazon has unveiled Nova Sonic, a new foundation model available on Amazon Bedrock, aimed at revolutionizing voice interactions within generative AI applications. This unified model streamlines the development of speech-enabled applications by integrating speech recognition and generation into a single system. This eliminates the traditional need for multiple fragmented models, reducing complexity and enhancing the naturalness of conversations. Nova Sonic seeks to provide more human-like interactions by understanding contextual nuances, tone, prosody, and speaking style.
Amazon Nova Sonic powers Alexa+ and is already incorporated into Alexa+, Amazon’s upgraded voice assistant. Rohit Prasad, Amazon’s head of AI, explained that Nova Sonic is good at deciding when to pull information from the internet or other apps. For example, if you ask about the weather, it checks a weather website. If you want to order groceries, it connects to your shopping list. This integrated approach reduces complexity when building conversational applications and delivers expressive speech generation and real-time text transcription without requiring a separate model, resulting in adaptive speech responses. The model is designed to recognize when users pause, hesitate, or even interrupt, responding fluidly to mimic natural human conversation. Developers can leverage function calling and agentic workflows to connect Nova Sonic with external services and APIs. The model currently supports American and British English, with plans to add more languages soon. This commitment to responsible AI also includes built-in protections for content moderation and watermarking. Amazon claims that the new model is 80% cheaper to use than OpenAI’s GPT-4o and also faster. Recommended read:
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Allison Siu@NVIDIA Blog
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Amazon is currently testing a new feature called "Buy for Me" within its mobile shopping app. This innovative tool allows users to purchase products from third-party brand websites that are not directly sold by Amazon, all without ever leaving the Amazon app environment. The feature leverages AI agents to seamlessly complete the purchase process on these external sites. "Buy for Me" is in a limited beta release for select iOS and Android users in the U.S.
When a customer searches for an item not available on Amazon, the app will display qualifying products from external brand sites in a dedicated section titled "Shop brand sites directly". Tapping on one of these items opens a product detail page within the Amazon app. From this page, users can select the "Buy for Me" option, granting Amazon permission to complete the transaction. Amazon's AI, combined with Anthropic's Claude, securely enters the payment and shipping information, while the brand handles fulfillment, customer service, and any potential returns. This initiative showcases the potential of narrowly scoped, highly specialized AI agents in providing useful services. It keeps customers within Amazon's ecosystem while extending functionality beyond its own inventory. Retailers can deepen customer engagement, enhance their offerings and maintain a competitive edge in a rapidly shifting digital marketplace by tapping into AI agents. Recommended read:
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Allison Siu@NVIDIA Blog
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Data Phoenix
, www.producthunt.com
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Amazon has recently introduced two significant advancements in the realm of artificial intelligence: Nova Act, an AI model designed for browser-based task automation, and a testing phase for the ‘Buy for Me’ feature in its mobile shopping application. Nova Act, currently available as a research preview, prioritizes the reliable execution of simple commands over complex workflows. Amazon aims to unlock the potential of truly autonomous and capable AI agents. The Nova Act SDK allows developers to experiment with the model's capabilities, enabling agents to complete tasks such as submitting out-of-office requests and configuring automatic replies.
The company stresses that genuine AI agents should not primarily focus on conversation or knowledge retrieval, differentiating them from current AI-powered assistants. According to Amazon, Nova Act is designed to complete tasks and act in digital and physical environments on behalf of the user. The potential applications extend to complex, multi-step workflows, such as organizing a wedding or handling complex IT tasks. The company has designed Nova Act to prioritize reliability by accurately completing simpler, low-level actions that, according to the company, trip rival models more often, such as date picking or navigating drop-downs and pop-ups. Simultaneously, Amazon is testing the ‘Buy for Me’ feature, which integrates AI agents into the mobile shopping app to facilitate purchases from third-party brand websites, even for products not directly sold by Amazon. This feature, in limited beta for select iOS and Android users in the U.S., allows users to authorize Amazon to complete transactions on external brand sites, utilizing Amazon’s Nova AI, along with Anthropic’s Claude via Bedrock, to securely handle payment and shipping details. While the brand handles fulfillment, customer service, and returns, customers can track their purchases within the Amazon app, representing a narrowly scoped, highly-specialized AI agent doing something useful. Recommended read:
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Nishant N@MarkTechPost
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AI ? SiliconANGLE
, AI News
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Amazon has unveiled Nova Act, a new AI model designed to automate web browser tasks and build AI agents. This research preview, from the Amazon AGI San Francisco Lab, allows AI to take control of web browsers and perform independent actions. The goal is to create agents capable of performing tangible, multi-step tasks in diverse digital and physical environments, such as organizing a wedding or handling complex IT tasks. Amazon envisions agents as more than just responders, but as entities capable of performing these tasks to increase business productivity.
To help facilitate the development of these agents, Amazon is releasing a research preview of the Amazon Nova Act SDK. The SDK enables developers to create agents capable of automating web tasks like submitting out-of-office notifications, scheduling calendar holds, or enabling automatic email replies. It breaks down complex workflows into dependable "atomic commands," such as searching, checking out, or interacting with specific interface elements. This SDK supports browser manipulation via Playwright, API calls, Python integrations, and parallel threading to overcome web page load delays, further enhancing accuracy and control. Recommended read:
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Nishant N@MarkTechPost
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Amazon has unveiled Nova Act, a new AI agent designed to interact with web browsers and automate tasks. Released as a research preview, the Nova Act SDK allows developers to create AI agents capable of automating tasks such as filling out forms, navigating web pages, and managing workflows. U.S.-based users can access the SDK through the nova.amazon.com platform.
Nova Act distinguishes itself by focusing on reliability in completing complex, multi-step tasks by breaking down workflows into atomic commands and integrating with tools like Playwright for direct browser manipulation. Developers can enhance functionality further by interleaving Python code. Early benchmarks suggest Nova Act outperforms competitors like OpenAI’s CUA and Anthropic’s Claude 3.7 Sonnet on specific web interaction tasks, demonstrating Amazon’s commitment to advancing agentic AI. Recommended read:
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@techstrong.ai
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THE DECODER
, eWEEK
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Amazon has recently launched "Interests," a new AI-powered feature designed to help customers discover products tailored to their hobbies and preferences. This AI assistant allows users to describe what they are shopping for using everyday language, prompting the system to proactively identify products based on personal preferences. Users can refine their searches by specifying preferred materials, colors, or price ranges, enabling hyper-specific shopping suggestions.
The Interests AI is currently available to a limited group of U.S. customers through the Amazon Shopping app and mobile website, with plans for broader access in the coming months. This development aligns with Amazon's increased focus on generative AI, joining initiatives like AI-generated review summaries and enhancements to its AI chatbot, Rufus, and the personal assistant Alexa. The company is also testing "Health AI," a health chatbot to answer medical questions and suggest relevant products. Recommended read:
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OODA OG@OODAloop
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Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced Ocelot, its first quantum computing chip, entering the competitive race against other tech giants like Google and Microsoft. The chip, developed by the AWS Center for Quantum Computing at the California Institute of Technology, represents the first generation of hardware that implements superior error correction. Amazon says it is a proof-of-principle demonstration—a step on the path to creating a larger machine that can deliver on the industry’s promised killer applications, such as fast and accurate simulations of new battery materials.
This new processor, dubbed Ocelot, aims to reduce the costs of implementing quantum error correction by up to 90% compared to current methods. It consists of nine qubits, five of which are "cat qubits" used to store information, and four transmons which monitor the information in the cat qubits. AWS researchers used Ocelot to encode a single error-corrected bit of information in its nine qubits, showing promise in overcoming the barrier that has made scaling up the technology difficult. Oskar Painter, the head of quantum hardware at AWS, said the design strategy requires only a 10th as many qubits per bit of information. Recommended read:
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Andrew Liszewski@The Verge
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Amazon has announced Alexa+, a new, LLM-powered version of its popular voice assistant. This upgraded version will cost $19.99 per month, but will be included at no extra cost for Amazon Prime subscribers. Alexa+ boasts enhanced AI agent capabilities, enabling users to perform tasks like booking Ubers, creating study plans, and sending texts via voice command. These new features are intended to provide a more seamless and natural conversational experience. Early access to Alexa+ will begin in late March 2025 for customers with eligible Echo Show devices in the United States.
Amazon emphasizes that Alexa+ utilizes a "model agnostic" system, drawing on Amazon Bedrock and employing various AI models, including Amazon Nova and those from Anthropic, to optimize performance. This approach allows Alexa+ to choose the best model for each task, leveraging specialized "experts" for orchestrating services. With seamless integration into tens of thousands of devices and services, including news sources like Time, Reuters, and the Associated Press, Alexa+ provides accurate and real-time information. Recommended read:
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Andrew Liszewski@The Verge
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Amazon has unveiled Alexa+, a generative AI-powered upgrade to its digital assistant, Alexa. This reboot includes a monthly subscription fee, marking a significant shift for the service. The new AI assistant was revealed at a news conference in New York, with Amazon showcasing its enhanced capabilities.
Alexa+ is scheduled to roll out in March 2025 for $20 per month, but it will be available for free to Amazon Prime subscribers. The AI assistant will work on "almost every" Alexa device the company has shipped. The service promises advanced features such as booking concert tickets, making dinner reservations, and organizing information from handwritten documents. Recommended read:
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