Newsroom

ZeroGPT, an AI content detection platform, just struck a deal with the deepfake detection app TruthScan. ZeroGPT now provides AI image detection powered by TruthScan’s software to all of its users. TruthScan’s image detection is trained to identify deepfakes from every major AI image-generation platform.

Christian Perry, CEO of TruthScan, says, “We are excited to integrate TruthScan’s AI image detection model on ZeroGPT’s platform, giving the millions of people who use their app access to accurate multi-modal AI detection.”

Although ZeroGPT provides a wide variety of content services, its most popular offerings are its free and paid synthetic media detection functions, which, until now, have been limited to AI-generated text.

Rawad Baroud, CEO of ZeroGPT says, “People use our platform to detect AI content because they trust the accuracy of our product. Quality is important to us, and TruthScan’s AI-image detection meets those quality expectations. We believe this partnership is in the best interest of everyone using our platform.”

ZeroGPT users can access a limited version of TruthScan’s detector for free, but premium plans provide faster speeds, greater accuracy, and custom image analysis models directly from TruthScan.

According to a report from Everypixel Journal, in 2023 more than 15 billion AI-generated images were created using Stable Diffusion, Adobe Firefly, Midjourney, and DALLE-2.

“Our research suggests that over 1 trillion images may have been generated by AI platforms since 2023, and that millions of AI photos may be uploaded every day. The quality of these generations is becoming highly realistic, and right now, spotting deepfake media is more important than ever before,” says Perry.

TruthScan’s image detector can be accessed at www.zerogpt.com/ai-image-detector, (or directly on truthscan.com).

Media Contact

Media Relations
devan@truthscan.com

Trial News Online has published an article examining Wernicke’s encephalopathy (WE) in the context of bariatric surgery, co-authored by medical malpractice attorney Steve Davis of Davis & Davis.

According to the article, bariatric surgeries (including gastric sleeve, gastric bypass, and adjustable gastric band procedures) can place patients at risk for thiamine (vitamin B1) deficiency, particularly when post-operative nutrition is inadequate or improperly managed.

The authors explain that some post-bariatric surgery patients experience difficulty obtaining sufficient nutrition after surgery. In more serious cases, patients require parenteral nutrition, an intravenous method of nourishment that bypasses the gastrointestinal tract. When parenteral nutrition is the sole source of nutrition, it is referred to as total parenteral nutrition (TPN).

The article notes that thiamine supplementation is therefore required and is commonly administered intravenously through vitamin preparations such as Infuvite.

The authors further explain that TPN may be administered in hospital settings or delivered to patients at home, where it must be properly stored, compounded, mixed, and administered intravenously, often through a central venous catheter, including peripherally inserted central catheters (PICC lines), tunneled catheters, or implanted ports. The article emphasizes that, while sometimes characterized as “simple,” the TPN process is complex and requires careful monitoring.

Drawing on a meta-analysis by Oudman et al., the article states that bariatric-related Wernicke’s encephalopathy is increasing as bariatric procedures increase, and that approximately 80% of cases occur within the first six months after surgery. The meta-analysis concludes that Wernicke’s encephalopathy can be fully prevented by supplying prophylactic thiamine.

The article identifies multiple points at which failures may occur, including:

• Failure by surgeons or post-operative physicians to diagnose thiamine deficiency, misdiagnosis of symptoms as psychiatric conditions, failure to test for deficiency, or failure to order intravenous thiamine
• Failures by pharmacies or compounding providers to properly compound TPN or thiamine supplements, identify missing thiamine components, or deliver supplementation at appropriate intervals
• Failures by inpatient or at-home nursing providers to identify symptoms of thiamine deficiency, communicate concerns to the care team, or properly administer TPN and thiamine

According to the article, if thiamine deficiency and Wernicke’s encephalopathy are not diagnosed and treated promptly, patients may suffer chronic and permanent neurological injury, including severe cognitive, motor, and functional impairment, as well as coma and death.

“The medical literature makes clear that thiamine deficiency in post-bariatric patients is a known and documented risk. Our article examines how Wernicke’s encephalopathy can develop when that risk is not adequately anticipated, monitored, and addressed in the post-operative setting,” Davis said.

The authors note that although Wernicke’s encephalopathy was first recognized in association with chronic alcohol use, its development in post-bariatric surgery patients reflects a failure to properly diagnose and treat thiamine deficiency in order to avoid a permanent and fundamentally life-altering brain injury, as documented in the literature.

Steve Davis has extensive experience litigating medical malpractice cases involving diagnostic failures and catastrophic neurological injuries. His co-authorship reflects an effort to educate trial lawyers and clinicians on the risks of thiamine deficiency and Wernicke’s encephalopathy in post-bariatric patients, as reflected in published medical research.

Q&A: Wernicke’s Encephalopathy and Bariatric Surgery

What is Wernicke’s encephalopathy?

As described in the article, Wernicke’s encephalopathy is a neurological condition caused by thiamine (vitamin B1) deficiency that can result in confusion, coordination problems, eye movement abnormalities, and permanent brain injury if not treated.

How does the article connect Wernicke’s encephalopathy to bariatric surgery?

The article explains that bariatric surgery patients may have difficulty obtaining adequate nutrition after surgery and may develop thiamine deficiency, particularly when prolonged vomiting or reliance on total parenteral nutrition is present.

Is Wernicke’s encephalopathy preventable according to the article?

Yes. The article cites a meta-analysis by Oudman et al., which concludes that Wernicke’s encephalopathy can be fully prevented by providing prophylactic thiamine.

When does bariatric-related Wernicke’s encephalopathy most often occur?

The article states that approximately 80% of bariatric-related Wernicke’s encephalopathy cases occur within the first six months following surgery.

What are the early warning signs discussed in the article?

The article identifies severe vomiting as the most common early warning sign, with more advanced cases presenting with ataxia, eye movement disorders, and mental status changes.

Why do the authors say Wernicke’s encephalopathy is often not recognized early?

According to the article, initial symptoms are frequently not recognized as Wernicke’s encephalopathy, leading to delayed treatment and worse outcomes.

What happens if Wernicke’s encephalopathy is not treated?

The article explains that untreated Wernicke’s encephalopathy can result in permanent neurological injury, including long-term cognitive and functional impairment, coma, and death.

Why did Steve Davis co-author this article?

As reflected in the article, Davis co-authored the piece to highlight the medical literature on post-bariatric thiamine deficiency and to educate attorneys and clinicians about preventable neurological injury.

Where can the full article be read?

The article appears in Trial News Online and is available through the publication’s online library.

About Davis & Davis

Davis & Davis is a Houston-based law firm focused on medical malpractice and catastrophic injury litigation. The firm represents individuals and families harmed by preventable medical errors, including failures in diagnosis and post-operative care. For more information, visit www.davis-davislaw.com.

Media Contact

Amanda Orr
amanda@orrstrategygroup.com

Metrica Software, a provider of enterprise Power BI connectors for SAP and Salesforce, is challenging the long-standing assumption that complex analytics integrations require custom-built pipelines.

The company’s position is direct: pre-built connectors that analytics teams can configure themselves deliver better long-term outcomes than custom-engineered integration pipelines, even for Fortune 500 deployments with complex security and compliance requirements.

“Most organizations still follow the same path — hire consultants, build custom pipelines, and carry the maintenance burden for years,” said Anton Storozhuk, CEO and founder of Metrica Software. “We’re showing that analytics teams can deploy and operate enterprise-grade integrations themselves, without writing or maintaining custom code.”

What No-Code Connectors Change

Metrica's Power BI Connector for SAP and Power BI Connector for Salesforce are pre-built integration tools that analytics teams install and configure directly, no custom development required. They handle authentication, data extraction, transformation, and loading into Power BI while meeting enterprise requirements for encryption, access control, and audit logging.

The key difference from custom integration lies in how change is handled. When data models evolve or new data sources are required, teams adjust configuration instead of requesting code changes from specialized integration resources. Operational ownership stays with the analytics team rather than external consultants or a small group of developers.

Before founding Metrica, Storozhuk built Alpha Serve using the same architectural principles — configurable connectors for platforms such as Jira and ServiceNow that proved viable at enterprise scale. At Metrica, the approach was extended to SAP and Salesforce, where data volumes, security constraints, and governance requirements are significantly higher.

Strategic Thesis Behind the Technical Approach

Storozhuk’s focus on configurability was shaped early in his career, drawing on his background in business strategy from MIT Sloan School of Management. The core insight was that custom integration often fails not technically, but organizationally.

When integration logic lives in custom code, modification depends on the original authors or external specialists. Over time, this creates cost inflation, operational risk, and long-term dependency that rarely appears in initial project estimates.

“No-code connectors reverse that dynamic,” Storozhuk said. “When integration logic is configuration-based, organizations retain control. The same teams that deploy the integration can evolve it over time.”

Concrete Comparison: Connector vs Custom Pipeline

A typical custom SAP-to-Power BI integration project involves:

• 8 to 12 weeks initial development with specialized integration consultants
• Custom code for extraction, transformation, and loading specific to the organization's SAP schema
• Ongoing maintenance contract with the implementation partner or internal specialized team
• Code modifications required for any schema changes, new data sources, or modified business logic
• Knowledge concentrated in whoever built the system; organizational risk when those people leave

The same integration using Metrica's connector:

• Deployment typically takes 1 to 3 days and is handled by the analytics team
• Analytics teams configure which SAP tables, objects, fields, filters, and refresh schedules are exported to Power BI using the connector’s built-in configuration
• Ongoing adjustments to reporting scope or datasets are handled internally, without reliance on external consultants or specialized integration teams
• Changes in SAP schemas, data models, or platform versions that affect data access are handled through ongoing connector updates
• Knowledge distributed across analytics team; resilient to team changes

“The real cost difference shows up after go-live,” Storozhuk said. “Custom integrations get more expensive to change over time. Connector-based integrations don’t.”

What Makes a Connector "Enterprise-Grade"

According to Metrica, enterprise-grade integration must deliver three characteristics:

• Operational resilience: The system continues functioning when team members change, implementation partners pivot, or business priorities shift. Custom integration typically fails this test; it remains operational only as long as the original implementers are available.
• Governance and auditability: Integration processes can be documented, audited, and certified without reverse-engineering custom code. Standard approaches pass this test by design; custom implementations pass only if documentation discipline was maintained throughout.
• Predictable scaling: Adding new data sources or reports doesn't require re-architecting the integration layer. Custom systems scale only if the original architecture anticipated future needs — a requirement that's difficult to specify during initial procurement.

Industry Implications

Beyond BI integration specifically, Metrica's approach demonstrates broader patterns in enterprise software. Many categories assumed to require custom development can be served by well-architected configurable tools if organizations evaluate them based on lifecycle outcomes rather than initial procurement comfort.

The company's connectors for SAP and Salesforce — platforms serving millions of enterprise users globally — serve as existence proofs. If no-code connectors can handle the most complex, most heavily regulated enterprise systems, the technical barriers to connector-based integration have been solved. The remaining barriers are organizational and procurement-related.

"We're not arguing that custom integration should never exist," Storozhuk said. "We're arguing that it shouldn't be the default for standard integration needs. Connecting SAP to Power BI is a solved problem. Organizations should stop solving it from scratch."

About Metrica Software

Metrica Software provides enterprise Power BI connectors for SAP and Salesforce, enabling organizations to deploy and operate analytics integrations without custom development or specialized integration teams. The connectors are designed to meet enterprise requirements for security, scale, and governance while remaining manageable by analytics teams. Founded by Anton Storozhuk, Metrica combines deep technical expertise with a strategic focus on long-term operational ownership in enterprise analytics. The company shares analysis and perspectives on enterprise analytics and data connectivity through its blog. For more information, visit metricasoftware.com.

Media Contact

Anton Storozhuk
Founder and CEO, Metrica Software Inc.
a.storozhuk@metricasoftware.com

NestEdge Realty, an independent residential real estate brokerage based in Westchester County, has surpassed $650 million in closed residential transactions since its founding in 2017, reflecting steady growth during a period of significant change in the regional housing market. The firm, founded by broker Matthew Gluck, now operates across Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess counties in New York, as well as parts of southern Connecticut, supported by a growing team of local agents.

The milestone comes as buyers and sellers across the New York metropolitan suburbs continue to reassess traditional brokerage models, commission structures, and service expectations amid shifting interest rates, affordability pressures, and increased focus on total transaction costs.

Listing Services Adapt to Changing Seller Priorities

Over the past several years, home sellers in Westchester County have increasingly emphasized net proceeds, time on market, and transparency around fees. NestEdge Realty has structured its listing services to reflect these priorities, operating with lower commission rates than many traditional brokerages while maintaining a service model in which agents are present at showings rather than relying exclusively on lockbox access.

According to Gluck, the approach reflects a broader trend toward efficiency and accountability rather than a departure from full-service representation.

“Our focus has been on aligning service delivery with how sellers evaluate value today,” Gluck said. “That includes pricing strategy, communication, and how homes are shown to prospective buyers.”

The brokerage reports that some listings have traded close to or above asking prices during competitive market cycles, though outcomes vary by location, condition, pricing, and timing. Additional details on the firm’s listing framework are outlined here.

Buyer Representation and First-Time Homeownership

NestEdge Realty’s growth has also been supported by demand on the buyer side, particularly among first-time homebuyers and households relocating from New York City, Brooklyn, and Northern New Jersey into suburban markets.

The firm has focused on buyer representation that emphasizes cost awareness, inspection coordination, and financing preparation, including the availability of buyer rebates in eligible transactions. These rebates, where permitted, are intended to help offset transaction-related expenses rather than influence purchase outcomes.

NestEdge coordinates with a network of local inspectors, attorneys, and service professionals as part of its transaction process. More information on buyer representation services is available here.

Integrated Mortgage Services and Transaction Coordination

A feature of NestEdge Realty’s operating model is its integration with East Coast Capital, an affiliated mortgage platform that allows buyers to explore financing options alongside the home search process. Clients are not required to use in-house financing, but the structure reflects a broader industry trend toward closer coordination between brokerage and lending services.

Market observers note that buyers increasingly prioritize early mortgage planning, particularly in higher-cost regions such as Westchester County, where financing terms and closing costs can materially affect affordability.

Addressing Common Westchester Market Questions

Through transaction activity and consumer education, NestEdge Realty has focused on issues frequently cited by buyers and sellers moving into the region. These include school district considerations, property taxes, commuting patterns, inspection risk, resale factors, and the full range of transaction costs.

The brokerage publishes educational articles on these topics, including guidance on budgeting for closing costs — an area that often shapes affordability decisions for first-time buyers and relocating households.

Regional Coverage and Independent Structure

NestEdge Realty operates with a multi-agent team serving communities that include Chappaqua, Scarsdale, Pleasantville, Bedford, Armonk, Rye, and Larchmont, among others. The company has also expanded coverage across Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess counties, and into southern Connecticut, while remaining independent rather than joining a national franchise.

Industry analysts note that independent brokerages have increasingly sought to differentiate through localized expertise, pricing flexibility, and operational autonomy as commission models evolve and consumers demand clearer explanations of fees and outcomes.

Looking Ahead

As residential real estate markets continue to adjust to changing economic conditions, NestEdge Realty’s leadership says the firm will remain focused on data-driven decision-making, regulatory compliance, and client education.

“Our goal has been to build a sustainable business that reflects how people buy and sell homes today,” Gluck said. “That means adapting as the market changes.”

About NestEdge Realty

NestEdge Realty is an independent residential real estate brokerage founded in 2017 and headquartered in Westchester County, New York. The firm provides buyer and seller representation across Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess counties, as well as southern Connecticut, and has closed more than $650 million in residential transactions. For more information, visit nestedgerealty.com.

Media Contact

Matthew Gluck
Founder and Principal Broker, NestEdge Realty
Matthew.Gluck@NestEdgeRealty.com
+1 917-817-8270

As burnout, anxiety, and emotional exhaustion reach record highs, a powerful new talk premiering today on TED.com, "How I Found Resilience as My Life Fell Apart," asks a question many high achievers are quietly confronting: “Who are you beyond your accomplishments? Beyond your job? Beyond your title?”

In her talk, entrepreneur and best-selling author Jane Marie Chen shares the deeply personal story of Embrace, the social enterprise she co-founded. The organization created a low-cost, portable infant incubator that works without stable electricity, making it accessible in remote and underserved communities. Since its launch, Embrace has helped more than one million newborns worldwide, earning recognition from President Obama, funding from Beyoncé, and global media attention.

When the company collapsed after a decade of insurmountable setbacks, Jane lost the work that had defined her, and with it, her sense of self. Her TED Talk traces the intense global healing journey that followed, from silent meditation retreats to frog poison ceremonies to trauma therapy, through which she confronted childhood wounds she had long buried. Jane connects her early experiences of domestic violence to the relentless drive that fueled both her success and eventual burnout.

“Sometimes trauma gets channeled into drive, perfectionism, and overwork,” Jane says in the talk. “Some people numb their pain with substances. I numbed mine with productivity. I cared deeply about my work, but I also believed that my worth depended on what I achieved. I finally realized I couldn’t achieve my way out of my pain.”

Jane shares three lessons that helped her to heal: learning to feel long-suppressed emotions, letting go of attachment to external outcomes, and cultivating self-compassion. Her message reframes resilience not as toughness or grit, but as the capacity to meet ourselves with compassion and to recognize our worth beyond our accomplishments.

In a turn of fate, Embrace was saved, and its work continues today. Yet Jane is clear that the deeper transformation happened within, a journey she shares in her best-selling memoir, "Like a Wave We Break." At a time when burnout, economic volatility, and AI-driven disruption are reshaping how millions define themselves through work, her story offers a new definition of resilience. Not as how much we can endure, but the inner compassion that allows us to navigate loss, uncertainty, and change without losing ourselves.

Jane Chen’s TED Talk is now live: "How I Found Resilience as My Life Fell Apart"

You can learn more about Jane at janemariechen.com.

About Jane Chen

Jane Chen is an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, leadership coach, and the best-selling author of "Like a Wave We Break: A Memoir of Falling Apart and Finding Myself" (Penguin Random House). She is the co-founder and former CEO of Embrace Global, the social enterprise behind a low-cost infant incubator that has helped save more than one million babies worldwide.

A TED speaker and Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum, Jane has been recognized on Forbes’ Impact 30 list and has received the Economist Innovation Award, the Fast Company Innovation Award, and the World Economic Forum’s Social Entrepreneur of the Year award. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, CNN, Newsweek, and ABC, and she holds graduate degrees from Stanford University and Harvard University.

In "Like a Wave We Break," Jane writes about the inner life behind her public success. After the near collapse of her company, she began to confront the childhood trauma that had driven her for decades. She wrote the book to name what so many high-achieving people carry quietly, and to offer language, permission, and hope to those who sense that success alone cannot heal what hurts.

Adam Grant (No. 1 New York Times best-selling author of "Think Again") calls it “a powerful memoir about facing fears and bouncing forward after trauma" and Bessel van der Kolk (No. 1 New York Times best-selling author of "Body Keeps the Score") describes it as a "brilliant and gripping book about how resilience...can transform adversity into hope and inspiration around the world.”

Today, Jane is a keynote speaker and leadership coach, working with individuals and organizations navigating burnout, change, and uncertainty. Drawing from her experience as a social entrepreneur and her healing journey, she helps people build resilience, emotional awareness, and inner alignment. For more information, visit janemariechen.com. 

Media Contact

Kylie Caputo
Krupp
kcaputo@kruppagency.com
+1 732-703-1295

LiveKit, the developer platform for voice, video, and physical AI agents, today announced it has raised a $100 million Series C at a $1 billion valuation. The round was led by Index Ventures, with participation from new investor Salesforce Ventures, as well as returning investors Altimeter Capital, Redpoint Ventures, and Hanabi Capital.

LiveKit provides both the software frameworks for building and cloud infrastructure for running AI agents that can see, hear, and speak in real time, powering voice AI applications for OpenAI, xAI, Salesforce, Coursera, Spotify, and thousands of others, collectively facilitating billions of calls each year. The new funding will serve to expand LiveKit’s platform across new compute, storage, and network services purpose-built for the coming paradigm shift in computing, from chat-based interfaces to those driven by voice and computer vision.

“The way humans interact with computers is changing,” said Russ d’Sa, co-founder and CEO of LiveKit. “Voice is the most natural interface, and it will power everything from intelligent assistants to AI agents that perform real work in both the digital and physical worlds. Building these kinds of AI applications requires novel infrastructure that supports things like low-latency audio streaming, load balancing of stateful workloads, efficient routing between several AI models, and granular conversational observability. As a complete stack for building voice AI applications — both the agent and frontend — LiveKit provides all these things and more.”

LiveKit offers an open-source framework for building voice and video agents, a global edge network optimized for sub-100ms latency, and a complete runtime for deploying and scaling stateful AI workloads. With more than 200,000 developers and customers ranging from leading AI labs to Fortune 500 companies, LiveKit is increasingly becoming the default infrastructure layer for teams building AI that can interact with the world in real time.

“LiveKit is defining a new category of infrastructure,” said Sahir Azam, partner at Index Ventures. “Voice and real-time AI are transforming how businesses operate, creating a massive market opportunity. Russ and co-founder David Zhao bring rare systems depth paired with exceptional product instinct, and we have deep conviction in them as founders. That combination uniquely positions LiveKit to become a foundational platform for the next era of computing.”

In addition to its institutional investors, LiveKit is supported by a group of prominent AI leaders, including Elad Gil, Jeff Dean, and the CEOs of Perplexity, Replit, Vercel, and ElevenLabs. For more from Russ d’Sa in his own words, visit the LiveKit blog.

About LiveKit

LiveKit is an end-to-end platform that gives developers everything they need to build and scale voice, video, and physical AI agents. Based in San Francisco, California, LiveKit powers some of the most used AI applications in the world. For more information, visit livekit.io.

A recent guest column published in The Columbus Dispatch offered a timely perspective on Ohio’s ongoing debate over kratom and 7-hydroxymitragynine, commonly called 7-OH, urging lawmakers to reconsider a broad ban in favor of a more balanced policy.

Bryan Mauk, CEO of End It for Good, has over 15 years of experience supporting people affected by addiction, homelessness, and incarceration. In the op-ed, Mauk notes we have seen this path before, writing, “Unfortunately, decades of the failed "war on drugs" show that such bans rarely work. Instead, they push drug use underground, create black markets, and make drugs more dangerous, all while criminalizing users.”

• Bans push consumers toward unregulated sellers and reduce product transparency, exactly the opposite of public safety goals.
• Policy should prioritize risk-based regulation: labeling, testing, age limits, and enforcement against bad actors, rather than blanket prohibition.
• The national conversation is unfolding amid evolving federal posture on 7-OH products, increasing the urgency for policymakers to get this right.

HART is urging lawmakers and regulators to adopt a framework that protects consumers while preserving access for responsible adults, including:

• Mandatory lab testing and clear labeling of alkaloid content
• Age restrictions and child-resistant packaging
• Manufacturing standards and retailer accountability
• Targeted enforcement against adulterated, mislabeled, or illicit products

“If the goal is public health, the solution is regulation, not a ban that guarantees a black market, reduces transparency, and harms the very people seeking safer alternatives,” said Jeff Smith, policy director for the Holistic Alternative Recovery Trust (HART).

Mauk’s column joins voices across the nation who are sounding the alarm. Across recent opinion pages, consumer advocates and policy writers are making the same point, prohibition won’t end demand, it will push it underground, increasing risk while stripping away transparency and responsible standards and criminalizing otherwise law-abiding citizens.

In a December op-ed, The Well News warned that banning 7-OH would predictably be a “boon” for black markets, repeating the same historic mistakes that turned public-health concerns into unsafe underground markets. In a separate January op-ed circulated in Ohio, advocates argued the state’s focus should remain on fentanyl, not criminalizing adults who rely on regulated products for pain management and harm reduction.

Policies driven by fear rather than evidence have left chronic pain patients cut off from stable care, turned away by pharmacies, and pushed into dangerous, demoralizing situations. That’s the backdrop for Missouri’s recent actions against kratom-derived 7-OH, noted in an op-ed that it is “an imperfect but essential tool that, for many patients, is one of the last options” allowing them to function, work, and avoid far riskier alternatives.

Meanwhile, a growing grassroots response has emerged nationally, with organizers pointing to tens of thousands of Americans urging regulators to choose science-based regulation over prohibition.

About Holistic Alternative Recovery Trust (HART)

The Holistic Alternative Recovery Trust (HART) is a national nonprofit dedicated to promoting evidence-based, transparent policy around natural recovery compounds. HART supports responsible regulation that protects consumers while encouraging innovation in safe, science-driven alternatives to traditional pharmaceuticals. Learn more at hartsupporter.com.

Media Contact

HART Media
media@hartsupporter.com

Concerns about indoor air have started to change how many European families choose materials for the bedroom. What used to be a straightforward bedding purchase is now tied to questions about chemicals and toxins. The trend is reshaping demand in the mattress sector and opening space for companies that offer natural alternatives. Home of Wool, established by architect Rositsa Petrova and considered one of the earlier entrants in Europe’s modern natural mattress segment, has been making wool-filled mattresses and bedding for more than 10 years. Petrova says customers who once focused on comfort and price now pay more attention to materials and chemical treatments.

Market watchers say the change fits into a wider move toward healthier and more sustainable home products. Reports tracking the European mattress business expect steady growth through 2032 as people pay more attention to sleep health and environmental factors when buying bedding. A separate study looking only at sustainable mattresses predicts roughly 7.6% yearly growth into the early 2030s, driven by interest in materials that are biodegradable or organically sourced instead of petroleum-based foams.

Companies that adopted such materials early say the change can already be seen in their own sales channels. “We saw a noticeable increase in the last quarter of 2025 and it looks like 2026 is going to be a strong year for us,” said Georgi Rolev, operations manager at Home of Wool. “Orders from the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Australia have been especially consistent.”

The interest in natural materials overlaps with growing scrutiny of indoor air quality. A 2025 review in the Electronic Journal of General Medicine found that poor indoor air quality in European schools correlates with respiratory issues, allergies and cognitive impairment. The review listed inadequate ventilation and contaminants such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and mold as contributing factors. Children were described as particularly vulnerable.

Similar concerns have started to surface in private homes as well. Synthetic foams and flame retardants found in furnishings can contribute to indoor chemical exposure. A year-long study of 124 homes in Bradford, U.K., published in Environmental Science: Processes & Impacts in 2025, measured indoor volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and found that concentrations inside homes frequently exceeded outdoor levels. The researchers identified furnishings and everyday consumer products as major contributors to indoor VOC buildup. With households spending more time indoors, alternatives to polyurethane foam have attracted interest among families. For many parents, the issue became more tangible once it affected their own homes.

Petrova began developing wool-filled bedding after her newborn son experienced recurring respiratory symptoms. “It started after five years of trying to find a remedy for my son's recurring allergic reactions and respiratory illnesses,” she said. After replacing synthetic furnishings with wood, wool and natural fabrics, she described the home environment as noticeably calmer. She later revived Bulgaria’s traditional wool mattress craft and brought it to a global market.

Indoor air researchers note that most public attention goes to outdoor pollution, even though furnishings can also release chemicals in enclosed spaces. For families managing asthma or allergies, these issues often become apparent sooner. Many start by changing materials in the bedroom, since that is where people spend long, uninterrupted hours sleeping and breathing in the same air.

About Home of Wool

Home of Wool is a Bulgarian atelier specializing in premium wool bedding and home essentials made entirely from natural, renewable materials. The company creates made-to-order mattresses, toppers, pillows, baby sleep products, blankets, and wellness cushions, designed to improve sleep quality and indoor air without foams, synthetics, or chemical treatments. Operating under a strict zero-waste model, Home of Wool serves customers globally since 2014. For more information, visit homeofwool.com.

Media Contact

Georgi Rolev
Operations Manager, Home of Wool
georgi@homeofwool.com

Productivity platform Wisey has released its mobile application, Wisey: Your Productive Self, expanding beyond its web-based version. The app packages habit tracking, focus tools, and educational content into a single interface.

The mobile version includes visual habit calendars that display weekly progress, focus management tools, and short video lessons. Users set daily goals and track completion through streak counters and circular progress indicators.

Core Features

The habit tracker shows goal completion across days of the week. Setting a target like "getting 9 hours of sleep" creates checkboxes for each day, with the system recording current and longest streaks. The calendar marks completed days through color coding.

Productivity tools are divided into goal management and focus sections. Goal management covers habits and routines (the latter marked as "coming soon"), while focus tools include a timer, soundscapes, and app blocking. The blocker restricts access to selected applications during work periods.

Video content runs four minutes per episode, integrated into the daily planning screen. Available titles include "Why Can't I Focus?" and "How to Multitask Like a Pro," alongside modules about flow states and neuroscience.

Daily Interface

On Wisey’s main screen, a circular tracker labeled "Track Your Productivity" serves as the primary interaction point. "My Productivity Boosts" shows remaining daily goals — typically three — with options to add tasks. A weekly calendar displays activity patterns and the current date.

Streak data appears at the top of the daily plan section, showing both ongoing consistency and personal records. The interface uses color distinctions for completed sessions, active days, and pending items.

Wisey’s Integrated Productivity Approach

The all-in-one approach simplifies productivity management significantly. Having habit streaks, focus timer data, and lesson progress in the same ecosystem reveals connections that separate apps can't show. Users discover patterns — like noticing productivity consistently drops after skipping certain morning routines or understanding which activities boost energy levels throughout the week. 

The single-interface design removes the hassle of jumping between different apps. Users access habits, focus tools, and educational content without leaving one screen. When all productivity data stays in one place, patterns become visible — showing which strategies deliver real results rather than just creating the illusion of progress.

Platform Structure

This Wisey review shows the app takes a consolidated approach to productivity management. Instead of specializing in one function, it bundles habit formation, focus tools, and educational content into a unified system.

The interface organizes features into clear categories — goal tracking sits separate from focus management, while educational content integrates directly into daily planning. This structure means users don't need to figure out which tool handles what task. Habits, timers, and lessons all connect to the same progress tracking system.

Registration follows standard procedures with options for existing users and new accounts. Setup stays minimal — users can start tracking productivity without extended onboarding.

Distribution of the Wisey app runs through conventional app store channels, making the platform accessible to both iOS and Android users who want a single tool for multiple productivity needs.

About Wisey

Wisey is a digital productivity platform designed to help individuals build sustainable habits, improve focus, and manage daily goals through a single, integrated interface. The Wisey app combines habit tracking, focus management tools, and short educational content to support consistent personal productivity. Available on both web and mobile platforms, Wisey focuses on simplifying daily planning and helping users better understand their productivity patterns over time. For more information, visit wisey.app.

Media Contact

Andrew Goroshak
pr@wisey.app
+1 775-487-4110

In a landmark move for the 71-year-old Japan-Saudi corridor, Universal Materials Incubator (UMI) and the National Agricultural Development Company (NADEC) have signed a Strategic Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to localize cutting-edge “Deep Tech” for the Kingdom’s agricultural sector. The signing took place during the Saudi-Japanese Ministerial Roundtable, at the Saudi-Japan Ministerial Investment Forum, attended by Ryosei Akazawa, Japan’s Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), who assumed office on October 21, 2025 in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi. His presence underscores the significant government-to-government (G2G) support for this industrial evolution.

This partnership focuses on technology scouting and due diligence support, primarily leveraging Japanese innovation to advance the agricultural sector across Saudi Arabia and the MENA region. By merging Japan’s material science heritage with the Kingdom’s industrial ambitions, the alliance aims to translate laboratory breakthroughs into global industrial standards.

A “Localization-First” Strategy

The UMI-NADEC collaboration serves as a blueprint for the “Saudi-Japan Vision 2030,” moving beyond traditional import models toward a strategy that integrates Japanese intellectual property with Saudi resources. This includes expanding active field trials for strategic crops to calibrate technology for the Kingdom’s specific thermal and soil profiles.

Furthermore, plans are underway to establish local manufacturing facilities utilizing GCC-specific organic feedstock (such as olive waste), aiming to create a circular domestic economy with the potential of export of yield and technology. This ecosystem integration extends to partnerships with Saudi incubators like Forming Future to ensure that next-generation materials — from semiconductors to renewable energy — are co-developed by Japanese and Saudi engineers.

Ian Michell, NADEC Vice President of Agriculture said: “Broadacre agriculture today demands a long-term commitment to soil health and natural environmental resources. NADEC is at the forefront of this shift towards regenerative practices that restore rather than deplete our natural capital. By diversifying our crop portfolio and investing in closed-loop nutrient management, we are protecting our operations from global price volatility and environmental changes. We employ AI-driven agriculture management systems and satellite-based crop monitoring to optimize every drop of water, as part of our 'more crop per drop' program across our crop portfolio."

Dr. Shosuke Kiba, CEO and Managing Partner of UMI, added: “Material science is the invisible foundation of every major technological leap. At UMI, we believe that sovereignty in the 21st century is defined by material innovation. We are strategically investing in 'deep-tech' solutions that solve the fundamental challenges of resource scarcity and industrial efficiency. Japanese startup companies have the capacity to plant a bright future; Saudi Arabia is a gateway to the world."

UMI operates under the United Nations Principles of Responsible Investment (UNPRI), ensuring all technologies meet elite global ESG standards. As a cornerstone of the Middle East’s agri-food sector, NADEC is transitioning toward a high-precision, resource-efficient model that aligns with Saudi Vision 2030.

About Universal Materials Incubator

UMI invests in outstanding new technologies and businesses in the fields of materials and chemicals that form the foundations for future industry, originating from both Japanese companies and academia, based on the vision of strengthening Japan’s engineering capabilities and cultivating an industry structure that can compete globally, by fostering outstanding material and chemical companies. For more information, visit www.umi.co.jp/en.

About National Agricultural Development Company

The National Agricultural Development Company (NADEC) is one of the largest agricultural and food-processing companies in the Middle East and North Africa, established in 1981 to promote food security in Saudi Arabia. Listed on the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) since 1993, the Saudi Agricultural and Livestock Investment Company (SALIC) owns approximately 38.6% of NADEC’s shares, with the remaining shares publicly traded, and has a market capitalization of SAR 5.78 billion (USD 1.54 billion). For more information, visit www.nadec.com.

Lucra, the leading social competition platform, today announced a partnership with UPSHOT League, a new professional women's basketball league where rising talent UPlifts entire communities. The UPSHOT League will launch in four cities —Jacksonville, Savannah, Greensboro, and Charlotte — with opening day on May 15, 2026. Through this collaboration, Lucra will power an innovative free-to-play prediction system that transforms how fans engage with women's basketball, turning every game into an interactive experience where spectators can win exclusive rewards.

This partnership marks Lucra's expansion into fan engagement, focusing on professional sports teams and leagues and demonstrating the versatility of its white-label technology beyond venue-based and app-embedded integrations. By creating a spectator-focused product for UPSHOT League, Lucra is helping to build passionate, engaged fan communities around emerging sports properties from day one.

UPSHOT League's founding belief is that everyone deserves to take their best shot. It is a league of opportunity for elite women’s basketball athletes, coaches, front office personnel and communities who are able to have new exceptional fan experiences and connect with amazing women athletes. By integrating Lucra's gamification engine, the league will offer fans a deeper connection to the action on the court, with the ability to make game predictions and compete for valuable rewards throughout the season. This partnership also provides UPSHOT league with an exciting new revenue stream, allowing sponsors to have a much more tangible touchpoint with its fans.

The free-to-play prediction system will allow fans to pick winning teams and top scoring players before each game, earning rewards for accurate predictions that can be redeemed for exclusive prizes. This approach removes financial barriers while creating meaningful engagement opportunities that keep fans invested in every game, regardless of which teams are playing.

"UPSHOT League is building something important — a community driven and focused pathway for women's basketball players who deserve more opportunities to compete professionally," said Dylan Robbins, CEO of Lucra. "By adding our fan engagement layer, we're helping them create an active, passionate fanbase from day one. Free-to-play predictions create natural touchpoints throughout the season that keep fans coming back and deepen their connection to the league and its players."

For UPSHOT League, the partnership provides a turnkey solution to drive fan engagement and retention while creating new sponsorship and partnership opportunities through the rewards program. The integration requires no engineering lift from the league, allowing them to focus on basketball operations while Lucra handles all technical implementation, compliance, and reward fulfillment.

“Lucra is building something truly special at the intersection of sports, technology, and fan engagement. The momentum behind the platform reflects both the strength of the product and the passion of its community," said Donna Orender, commissioner and co-founder of UPSHOT League. “At UPSHOT, we are focused on a great fan experience and this partnership contributes to our overall strategy of community engagement.”

Key features of the integration will include:

• Free-to-play game predictions
• Rewards program featuring branded merchandise and exclusive experiences
• Leaderboards tracking top predictors throughout the season
• Social features enabling fans to compete against friends and community members
• Full technical infrastructure and compliance managed by Lucra

The integration will launch alongside UPSHOT League's inaugural season in May 2026, with expanded features and rewards rolling out as the league grows.

About Lucra

At Lucra, we use competitive play to build brand loyalty. Our white-label platform allows clients to host competitions, create personalized challenges, and provide users’ rewards. Doing so helps to drive visitation, increase engagement, and add more revenue per customer. We handle all payments, compliance, and risk management, allowing clients to quickly implement our solution into their existing app or website. Lucra powers gamification for top entertainment, hospitality, and consumer brands, including Five Iron Golf, Backyard Sports, Puttshack, TouchTunes, Hollywood.com, and more. For more information, visit www.lucrasports.com.

About UPSHOT League

UPSHOT League is a professional women's basketball league launching in May 2026 with a mission to provide a meaningful developmental pathway for athletes pursuing professional basketball careers. Through competitive play, player development programs, and innovative fan engagement, UPSHOT League is creating new opportunities in women's basketball while building an accessible, exciting product for fans. Learn more at upshotleague.com.

Media Contact

Michael Madding
Chief Operating Officer, Lucra
michael@lucrasports.com

The leader in specialized Arabic document intelligence, CoreTechX, has announced the launch of its proprietary OCR system. Until now, it has been nearly impossible to translate cursive script, diacritics, ligatures, and regional writing styles using AI with high accuracy. But thanks to CoreTechX’s latest innovation, that is about to change.

State-of-the-Art Results: Setting a New Global Benchmark

CoreTechX’s OCR system has achieved record-breaking accuracy, moving the needle from experimental AI to mission-critical infrastructure. When rigorously tested against industry-standard benchmarks, the system delivered on its promise of precision and reliability.

In internal testing against widely accepted datasets, CoreTechX demonstrated breakthrough gains in accuracy. For example, the system recorded a Character Error Rate (CER) of just 3.6% on the modern Khatt dataset. When evaluated on the Muharaf scale — which contains historical handwritten manuscripts — it achieved a CER of 6.3%. To put that in perspective, the CoreTechX system performs more consistently on handwritten Arabic than most generalized language and vision models, which struggle with script variability and diacritical marks. CoreTechX notes that while large global models perform well on multilingual text overall, their accuracy drops significantly when applied to handwritten Arabic documents.

Technical Innovation and Data Sovereignty

At the heart of the CoreTechX OCR system is a sophisticated Hybrid CNN–Transformer architecture optimized for line-level recognition. "We did not rely on off-the-shelf OCR," stated Fahad Durukan, co-founder of CoreTechX. "We built our own end-to-end pipeline for Arabic handwriting to ensure the system understands the grammar and historical context of the script."

Recognizing the sensitive nature of the data it processes, CoreTechX offers On-Premise Deployment. This is designed for government ministries and historical institutions that require strict data sovereignty and for organizations that cannot utilize third-party API-based solutions due to cloud compliance requirements.

Founder Perspective: Preserving Heritage through Intelligence

"Arabic handwriting is one of the hardest challenges in document intelligence due to its cursive structure and wide variation across eras. Arabic content deserves first-class technology built specifically for it," said Fahad Faisal Fahad AlSaud, co-founder of CoreTechX. "For too long, important decisions were being made without access to decades of data — not because the information did not exist, but because it was locked in a format machines could not understand. This is not just digitization; it is about unlocking the past to help build a more informed future."

Evolution from Infrastructure to Impact

The launch of this OCR system signals a shift for CoreTechX from a backend technology provider to a comprehensive knowledge platform. While the company began as an infrastructure leader, its focus has now evolved to lead with specialized products that preserve Arabic roots and deliver direct impact.

"Our evolution reflects a shift from infrastructure alone to impact and accessibility," AlSaud said. "Our goal is to structure this vast unstructured corpus and make it accessible to everyone: governments, researchers, businesses, and the public. By structuring the past, institutions gain the ability to analyze patterns and make more informed decisions for the future."

The CoreTechX Pipeline: Building this system is like developing a specialized universal translator for a forgotten dialect; while others use standard dictionaries to guess at words, CoreTechX has built a system that understands the deep grammar and historical context of the language to provide a clear, accurate transcription every time.

About CoreTechX

CoreTechX is dedicated to transforming the past into usable intelligence for the future. As the backbone of structured Arabic knowledge in the GCC, CoreTechX provides the tools necessary for governments and enterprises to digitize, understand, and leverage their most complex handwritten records. Through its state-of-the-art OCR technology, CoreTechX is ensuring that Arabic heritage is preserved and utilized for generations to come. For more information, visit coretechx.ai.

Media Contact

Fahad Durukan
f.durukan@coretechx.ai

S99 PR, a public relations firm specializing in editorial-led media strategy for EB-1A and O-1 visas, announced the expansion of its Global Talent and Immigration Press Division. The initiative will be led by Jake Vince, partner at S99 PR, and was announced by the firm’s founder, Chris K.

The move comes in response to a sharp rise in demand from international executives, founders, scientists, artists, and senior professionals seeking EB-1A and O-1 visas amid increasingly stringent USCIS scrutiny and higher evidentiary standards. As S99 PR has observed, securing articles alone — without a deep, immigration-aligned press strategy — no longer meets the threshold. Successful EB-1A and O-1 cases now require media coverage that is strategically timed, editorially defensible, and positioned within a broader narrative that clearly supports extraordinary ability criteria rather than surface-level visibility.

“I’m excited to work closely with Chris, our founder, to expand this division in a way that reflects how EB-1A and O-1 visas are actually evaluated today,” said Jake Vince, partner at S99 PR. “This initiative is about building real strategy around press — not just producing articles.”

Why Strategy Now Defines EB-1A and O-1 Visa Press

USCIS has significantly raised the bar for how media evidence is reviewed in EB-1A and O-1 visa petitions. Officers are trained to evaluate editorial independence, credibility, narrative consistency, and intent, not just publication names or article counts. As a result, press created without a cohesive strategy often fails to function as usable immigration evidence.

“EB-1A and O-1 visa press without strategy is ineffective,” Vince added. “USCIS isn’t counting links — they’re assessing credibility, context, and why recognition occurred. Every article must fit into a larger narrative that supports extraordinary ability.”

S99 PR’s expanded Global Talent Division focuses exclusively on strategy-first editorial positioning, ensuring each media placement strengthens — not weakens — an applicant’s immigration case.

Key Challenges Facing EB-1A and O-1 Visa Applicants

S99 PR cites several recurring challenges faced by EB-1A and O-1 visa applicants:

• Media coverage that appears sponsored, transactional, or promotional
• Articles lacking true editorial independence or third-party validation
• Press volume without contextual substance or narrative cohesion
• Misalignment between press narratives and EB-1A or O-1 visa criteria
• Poor timing, including rushed or clustered media placements that appear inorganic during USCIS review

According to S99 PR, timing is a critical but often overlooked factor in visa press strategy. Media coverage produced too quickly or without a natural progression can signal orchestration rather than earned recognition — raising credibility concerns during adjudication.

“Timing matters just as much as placement,” Vince said. “Rushed press doesn’t look organic, and immigration officers notice that. Strategy means knowing when coverage should happen, not just where.”

Supporting Global Talent From the World’s Leading Companies

The S99 PR Global Talent Division works with high-level professionals from some of the largest companies in the world, including executives, engineers, researchers, creatives, and founders pursuing O-1 visas or permanent residency through the EB-1A extraordinary ability category.

S99 PR helps these individuals translate complex, high-impact accomplishments into immigration-ready editorial narratives that can be clearly understood and evaluated by USCIS officers.

“Our clients are already exceptional,” Vince noted. “Our responsibility is to make sure their recognition is documented in a way the immigration system actually respects.”

A Strategy-First Model for Immigration Press

Unlike traditional PR firms, S99 PR does not offer generic or automated press packages for visa applicants. Each EB-1A or O-1 engagement is built around:

• Immigration-aligned editorial strategy
• Publication selection based on credibility, not volume
• Narrative consistency across earned media
• Strategic timing that reinforces authenticity

This disciplined approach has driven increased demand from immigration attorneys, global professionals, and executives seeking serious visa outcomes.

Looking Ahead

With Jake Vince leading the expanded division, S99 PR will continue refining its EB-1A and O-1 visa press strategies as USCIS standards evolve.

“Immigration press is no longer optional or superficial,” Vince said. “It’s a strategic asset — and when done wrong, it becomes a liability. That’s why this division exists.”

For more information about S99 PR’s EB-1A and O-1 visa press strategy, visit s99pr.com.

Media Contact

S99 PR
ck@s99agency.com

Famous Labs, the parent company behind Famous.ai and SuperCool, today announced the closing of its pre-seed financing round, led by Impellent Ventures, at a $300 million valuation.

Famous Labs is currently operating at a $32 million annual revenue runrate, driven by rapid adoption across creators, founders, agencies, and enterprises using its AI-native platforms to build applications, generate content, and launch products without traditional technical barriers.

Founded to rethink how software and creative tools are built and distributed, Famous Labs focuses on enabling people to move from idea to execution instantly, removing the friction that has historically limited who gets to create.

“Most AI today is still trapped in explanation mode,” said Alex Mehr, Ph.D., CEO of Famous Labs. “We are building systems that do not just answer questions. They do the work. Famous Labs exists to give individuals and companies leverage at a scale that used to require entire teams.”

Impellent Ventures cited Famous Labs’ traction, revenue profile, and platform breadth as key drivers behind leading the round.

“What stood out to us was not just the growth. It was the inevitability,” said Philip Beauregard, partner at Impellent Ventures. “Famous Labs is redefining what creation looks like in an AI-first world, and the numbers validate that this shift is already underway.”

The company plans to use the capital to accelerate product development across its ecosystem, expand enterprise adoption, and continue investing in infrastructure that enables real-time creation at scale.

About Famous Labs

Famous Labs is a U.S.-based technology company building AI-native platforms that allow anyone to create software, media, and digital products through simple natural language input. Its portfolio includes Famous.ai and SuperCool, serving creators, founders, and enterprises worldwide. For more information, visit famouslabs.com

Media Contact

AJ Bhatia
press@deal.ai
+1 628-333-3640

CBD.market, a leading online retailer, responds to increasing voter demand for greater CBD oversight by emphasizing COA-backed products and clear labeling as federal efforts to expand cannabidiol research advance.

Older adults are increasingly discovering CBD as a natural wellness solution that allows them to tailor formulations and dosages to meet their needs. However, rising concerns about product quality, formulation transparency, and the efficacy of products claiming to help with certain conditions still have many older Americans wondering where to turn for high-quality, tested cannabidiol products. Nearly one in five adults between the ages of 50 and 64 reported using CBD products within the past year. For adults over 65, it's one in seven. While interest and confidence in CBD are higher than ever, many consumers who are new to CBD desire greater product transparency and oversight. Data from the National Consumers League reports that more than eight in 10 voters would like to see greater oversight for the production and marketing of commercially available CBD products.

New Federal Action Signals Clearer CBD Guidance

Greater clarity and transparency regarding CBD products may finally be on the way. In December of 2025, an executive order aimed at expanding cannabidiol research to help pave the way for clearer federal guidance that could potentially improve access to a wider variety of products for seniors over time was issued. This previous oversight has notably limited the ability of scientists and manufacturers to complete the necessary research on safety and efficacy that patients need for informed decisions.

As a leading CBD online store, CBD.market closely monitors trends and new research to be the first to bring new products and news about laws regulating access to customers. In addition to offering a wide range of products, CBD.market also maintains a library of educational content to help customers interpret labels and shop more confidently. The retailer's inventory is full of products appealing to customers of all ages. Many products are specifically formulated to address the wellness concerns of seniors.

"Our most popular CBD types at the moment include CBD gummies, oils and tinctures, and capsules," shares Michael Levin, CBD.market's Head of Analytics. While the retailer's client base is too universal to be narrowed down to one demographic, Levin notes that the company has observed an increase in customers over 50 seeking holistic wellness solutions.

CBD.market reminds customers to carefully research products and retailers when making purchases. Vetting should include only shopping from trusted brands that utilize third-party lab testing with a certificate of analysis (COA). This is something that CBD.market ensures with every product it sells. In addition, CBD.market encourages customers to read labels to ensure they're selecting the appropriate potency and serving size based on their wellness goals. Shoppers on the CBD.market website can view labels and read full product descriptions to get the same information available in in-person shopping.

About CBD.market

CBD.market is an online CBD store offering the highest-quality CBD products from trusted brands, including CBD, CBG, and CBN oils, gummies, capsules, and topicals. The marketplace focuses on product transparency and quality, featuring third-party lab-tested items and clear product information to help customers make informed choices. For more information, visit cbd.market.

Disclaimer

These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Products are not for use by or sale to persons under the age of 18. Information provided is not intended as a substitute for advice from a healthcare professional. Please consult your healthcare provider regarding potential interactions or other possible concerns before using any product. In accordance with the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, this notice is required.

Our products contain less than 0.3% THC and are legal under federal law in all 50 states.

Media Contact

Michael Levin
CBD.market
info@cbd.market
+1 512-774-5557

Businesses face growing pressure to move from insight to execution faster, across technology, talent, finance, and personal decision-making. To reflect this shift, StartupMafia selected a cross-industry ranking of companies that reduce friction between intent and action, each in a different domain but with a shared focus on turning decisions into tangible outcomes.

1. Famous Labs

Famous Labs develops software systems built around what it defines as Synthetic Intelligence — technology designed to deliver completed business outcomes rather than partial assistance. Instead of producing drafts or suggestions, its systems generate finished applications, marketing assets, and operational tools based on high-level human intent.

What distinguishes Famous Labs is its emphasis on collapsing entire workflows. By removing the traditional build barrier that required specialized teams and long development cycles, the company reframes speed as a strategic advantage. Human judgment remains central, but execution is handled end-to-end by software, enabling faster experimentation and broader access to product creation.

2. SDK.finance

SDK.finance is a leading FinTech software provider in the MENA region, working with banks, fintech companies, payment service providers, electronic money institutions, and non-financial businesses to build and run digital financial products. The SDK.finance Platform supports use cases such as digital wallets, neobanks, payment processing systems, money transfers, crypto-to-fiat services, closed-loop payment ecosystems, and super apps through a modular, API-first architecture. The company has delivered multiple production systems across the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and other Middle East markets, covering payment infrastructure, digital wallets, and large-scale transaction accounting and settlement.

The Platform is PCI DSS Level 1 and ISO 27001 certified and has been recognised with the PayTech Awards and the Banking Awards 2025 for its work on production-grade financial infrastructure.

3. CrawlJobs.com

CrawlJobs.com is a global job discovery platform that automatically identifies and indexes live job openings directly from employer websites. By scanning career pages rather than relying solely on manual postings, the platform aggregates real hiring activity across countries, industries, and languages.

Its key differentiator is automation combined with language-based global search. Job seekers can explore opportunities across multiple regions within a single language interface, reducing duplication and outdated listings. This approach improves transparency in the labor market and helps professionals access roles that might otherwise remain siloed on individual company sites.

4. OKDERMO

OKDERMO operates as an online retailer focused on evidence-based dermatological treatments. Among its offerings is topical tretinoin, a long-established retinoid widely studied for its effects on photoaging, fine lines, and uneven pigmentation when used consistently.

What sets OKDERMO apart is its emphasis on clinically supported ingredients rather than marketing-driven claims. By providing access to medication-grade skincare products and detailed usage considerations, the platform reflects a broader trend toward informed consumer decision-making in health and personal care, where outcomes depend on long-term consistency rather than instant results.

5. PsychicOz

PsychicOz connects users with online psychics who offer intuitive perspectives on career, business, and personal decisions. Operating through chat, phone, video, and email, the platform enables on-demand access to human-led advisory services outside traditional analytical frameworks.

The platform reflects a growing interest in complementary decision-support models, particularly in uncertain or emotionally complex situations. PsychicOz differentiates itself through continuous availability, structured screening of its advisors, and flexible pricing options, highlighting how some individuals and business leaders seek qualitative insight alongside conventional data-driven tools.

Conclusion

Together, these companies illustrate how 2025 business priorities extend beyond efficiency alone. Whether through automation, infrastructure, data aggregation, evidence-based products, or human intuition, each platform reduces barriers between decision-making and real-world outcomes. StartupMafia’s ranking reflects a broader shift toward systems that help organizations and individuals act with greater speed, clarity, and confidence.

About StartupMafia

StartupMafia is a business media publisher focused on emerging companies, market shifts, and the technologies shaping how organizations operate worldwide. The publication curates data-driven rankings and industry analysis to highlight evolving business models and strategic trends. For more information, visit startupmafia.eu.

Media Contact

StartupMafia.eu Press Department
press@startupmafia.eu

Riding the momentum of becoming a nationwide AI product in Singapore with over 200,000 daily active users, Agnes AI today announced the official launch of Agnes-SeaLLM-8B, a state-of-the-art 8-billion-parameter model designed specifically for cross-cultural alignment across Southeast Asian languages, Chinese, and English. The model is now publicly available on Hugging Face.

Agnes-SeaLLM-8B represents a significant technical achievement: through advanced optimization techniques, the 8B-parameter model outperforms 20B models across multiple benchmarks, demonstrating that efficient architecture and regional focus can surpass raw parameter scaling pursued by global competitors.

"Most large language models treat Southeast Asia as an afterthought — training primarily on English and Chinese data, then hoping for acceptable performance on regional languages," said Bruce Yang, founder and CEO of Agnes AI. "We took the opposite approach: building a model from the ground up to understand the linguistic and cultural nuances of Southeast Asian users."

Technical Architecture: Efficiency Meets Performance

Agnes-SeaLLM-8B integrates several cutting-edge techniques:

• DSPO Framework: The model leverages Agnes's proprietary Dynamic Sequential Policy Optimization (DSPO) — an enhanced version of GRPO that achieves superior performance on reasoning benchmarks. Based on results from the research team, Agnes has achieved strong performance on open benchmarks, particularly in reasoning, where it outperforms earlier versions of DeepSeek.
• Deep Chain-of-Thought (CoT) Reasoning: Enables complex multi-step problem-solving and logical inference, critical for applications like research assistance and content generation.
• Efficient Instruction Fine-Tuning (SFT): Task-specific optimization allows the model to excel across diverse use cases — from generating presentation slides to answering nuanced cultural questions.
• Direct Preference Optimization (DPO): Achieves cross-cultural alignment by learning from human preferences across Southeast Asian languages, Chinese, and English, ensuring outputs respect regional cultural contexts.
• Engineering Optimization: Operator-level optimizations combined with quantization-aware training allow the 8B-parameter model to reach SOTA performance among sub-10B models and outperform 20B models on multiple benchmarks.

This technical approach reflects Agnes's broader philosophy: rather than competing on parameter count alone, focus on architectural efficiency, regional relevance, and real-world performance.

Research Foundation and Institutional Collaboration

The development of Agnes-SeaLLM-8B builds on multiple research works accepted at top-tier conferences. The team's paper on "Stable and Efficient Policy Optimization for Agentic Search and Reasoning (DSPO)" has been submitted to ICLR 2025, while their work on "CodeAgents: A Token-Efficient Framework for Codified Multi-Agent Reasoning in LLMs" demonstrates novel approaches to structured multi-agent planning.

Agnes is actively collaborating with relevant Singapore institutions to advance large-scale cluster training, aligning with Singapore's NAIS 2.0 strategy to establish the city-state as a global AI hub. The team includes researchers and engineers from the National University of Singapore (NUS), Nanyang Technological University (NTU), MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, and UT Austin.

"We're bridging academic research and commercial deployment," Yang explained. "Our team publishes at top conferences while simultaneously shipping models that serve millions of users daily."

Explosive User Growth Validates Regional Focus

Agnes AI has surpassed 5 million registered users and 200,000 daily active users since launching in July 2025. According to third-party analytics data, Agnes reached 2.97 million monthly active users (MAU) in December 2025, ranking third globally in growth rate.

Approximately 50% of users originate from Southeast Asia, where the platform consistently ranks among the Top 10 productivity apps across Google Play stores in the Philippines, Vietnam, and Indonesia. The platform integrates Search, Research, AI Slides, AI Design, Group Chat (CoVibe), Filters, and Explore into a single unified interface designed for mobile-first users.

The user base reflects Agnes's deliberate strategy to serve the 99.5% of internet users worldwide who have never used paid AI features — primarily Android-based, mobile-first users in emerging markets who lack access to premium services.

Open-Sourcing for Ecosystem Growth

By releasing Agnes-SeaLLM-8B on Hugging Face, Agnes aims to accelerate regional AI development and enable researchers, developers, and companies across Southeast Asia to build on state-of-the-art foundations.

"Open-sourcing this model isn't just about transparency — it's about ecosystem building," Yang stated. "If Southeast Asia is going to develop sovereign AI capabilities, we need shared infrastructure and collaborative research. Agnes-SeaLLM-8B is our contribution to that vision."

The model is available under an open license, enabling academic research, commercial applications, and further fine-tuning for specialized use cases.

Global Expansion and Investment

Agnes is actively fundraising at a valuation exceeding USD 100 million, with expansion plans targeting Indonesia, India, the Middle East (Dubai, Saudi Arabia, UAE), Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The company remains open to investors interested in supporting its mission to democratize AI access for underserved markets.

Subsequent funding rounds are projected at USD 300–500 million, with proceeds allocated toward training larger regional models and accelerating commercial rollout. 

About Agnes AI

Agnes AI is a Singapore-based artificial intelligence platform uniting real-time communication, creative generation, and productivity tools. Founded by a Raffles Institution alumnus and National University of Singapore AI PhD, Agnes AI has grown to over 5 million registered users and 200,000 daily active users globally since launching in July 2025, with particular strength in Southeast Asia. The company is dedicated to making collaboration, creativity, and communication seamless through AI-powered features integrated into a single unified experience. For more information, visit agnes-ai.com.

Media Contact

Victoria Agatha
agnes@sapiens-ai.io

Vertus, a frontier artificial intelligence company, today announced two major milestones demonstrating the advancement of machine reasoning in financial markets: surpassing $1 billion in daily AI-driven transactions and delivering 51.15% returns for 2025 with a Sharpe ratio of 2.13 — figures independently audited by Alpha Performance Verification Services, Certified Public Accountants.

The $1 billion single-day volume milestone, first achieved on November 25, 2025, caps a breakthrough year in which Vertus' AI systems significantly outperformed both traditional market indices and leading hedge funds on both absolute and risk-adjusted return metrics. Vertus' 2025 performance places the company's AI systems among the top-performing institutional trading operations globally:

• 51.15% annual return vs. approximately 17% for the S&P 500 (more than 2x market performance)
• 2.13 Sharpe ratio vs. leading hedge fund range of 0.5–1.5 (superior risk-adjusted returns)
• $600 million-plus average daily volume with systems processing $1 billion daily regularly
• Consistently positive returns achieved through advanced machine reasoning

"This milestone validates everything we built," said Julius Franck, co-founder at Vertus. "We engineered a quantitatively backed system that thinks and acts at market speed-processing complexity, making decisions, and executing with precision that traditional algorithms simply cannot match. The independently verified billion-dollar threshold proves the architecture is performing exactly as designed."

Vertus developed and stress-tested its core systems in the Isle of Man, where progressive regulation and robust digital infrastructure provided the ideal environment to validate machine reasoning under live market conditions. What began as controlled experimentation has become production-grade technology now powering institutional-scale investing infrastructure.

The company's technology now serves as the decision-making backbone for a growing network of funds, family offices, and asset managers, executing in high-velocity markets where legacy systems falter.

"We've proven that advanced intelligence architecture outperforms decades-old algorithmic models," said Alex Foster, co-founder. "Financial markets were the perfect crucible-unforgiving, instantaneous, high-stakes. Our planned expansions put us at the center of the next wave: applying this reasoning power across autonomous systems and the computational infrastructure required for superintelligence."

The 2.13 Sharpe ratio-a measure of risk-adjust ed returns-demonstrates that Vertus' performance wasn't achieved through excessive risk-taking. The company's AI systems generated returns more than double the market while maintaining disciplined risk management; a combination rarely achieved in quantitative finance.

With daily transaction volumes regularly exceeding $1 billion, Vertus has established itself as critical infrastructure in modern investing ecosystems. The company's trajectory from inception to billion-dollar daily transactions represents one of the fastest scaling timelines in autonomous systems deployment.

"Financial markets are just the beginning," said Michal Prywata, co-founder. "We built AI that learned to reason in an environment where mistakes cost millions and decisions happen in milliseconds. That same intelligence now powers capital at scale-and we're rapidly expanding into domains that demand genuine machine reasoning. We're not just building financial systems. We're architecting the infrastructure for the next generation of intelligence."

Trading volume figures, performance metrics, and milestone achievements have been independently verified by Alpha Performance Verification Services, Certified Public Accountants. Verification report available upon request.

About Vertus

Vertus builds frontier artificial intelligence where intelligence meets consequence. Its systems operate directly in live financial markets, transacting over $600 million daily while reasoning under extreme uncertainty, learning in adversarial conditions, and adapting in milliseconds. This real-world crucible produces intelligence that is not simulated — it is proven. Founded by Julius Franck, Alex Foster, and Michal Prywata, Vertus develops AI systems where precision matters and every decision has irreversible cost. Today, its technology powers institutional trading infrastructure for funds, family offices, and professional investors — environments where errors are measurable and accountability is absolute. Beyond finance, Vertus is extending this intelligence into general reasoning systems designed to operate in complex, high-stakes domains. By training AI in environments where failure is punished and success compounds, Vertus is building the infrastructure for reliable machine intelligence — systems capable of reasoning, adapting, and acting autonomously across industries yet to be defined. For more information, visit www.vertus.ai. 

Disclaimer

This press release is for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer, solicitation, or recommendation of any securities or investment strategies. Past performance is not indicative of future results. All performance metrics and trading volumes reflect historical results achieved under specific conditions and may not be repeated. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially. While certain figures have been independently verified, no assurance is given that similar performance will be achieved in the future. Trading and investing involve substantial risk, including the loss of capital.

Media Contact

Brooke Greenwald
media@vertus.ai

FED Fitness, a global leader in home gym fitness solutions, has been named an official partner of the NBA’s Houston Rockets. The partnership was officially announced in Houston and brings together two organizations committed to performance, innovation, and accessible training solutions.

Through this collaboration, FED Fitness and the Houston Rockets aim to bridge professional training standards with the at-home fitness experience, encouraging consistent movement and healthy routines for people of all ages and fitness levels.

FED Fitness offers a wide range of high-quality home exercise equipment, competitive pricing, and a free training app — aligning seamlessly with the Rockets’ performance-driven mindset and community-focused approach to sport and wellness.

Notably, this marks the Houston Rockets’ first partnership with a dedicated home gym solutions brand, reflecting the growing importance of home-based training within the evolving sports and fitness landscape. The partnership also reinforces FED Fitness’s expertise, product quality, and long-term strategic vision, as elite sports organizations increasingly align with innovative home fitness brands.

At the heart of the partnership is a shared commitment to health, discipline, and long-term fitness habits — whether training at home or competing at the highest level on the court.

Extending Professional Training into the Home

FED Fitness operates with the belief that fitness should be accessible, enjoyable, and sustainable, providing solutions designed to support users at different stages of their home fitness journey.

FED Fitness Home Gym Solutions

FED Fitness has built trust with global consumers through a focus on product quality, thoughtful design with space-saving features, and long-term usability.

Its home gym solutions are defined by several core characteristics:

• Professional grade equipment: FED Fitness categorizes its products as “light commercial equipment,” with designs like front-drive ellipticals, variable-resistance ellipticals, stair climbers, and compact bikes, and premium trampolines crafted with advanced materials to deliver a top-tier training experience. These products are designed to deliver a gym-like training experience within a home setting, while remaining accessible to everyday users.
• Home training content system: As part of its commitment to making fitness accessible to all, FED Fitness free App offers a movement library, training plans, and short workout lessons. These teaching segments empower consumers of all levels to stay motivated and progress toward their fitness goals.
• Space friendly designs: FED Fitness ensures that its gym equipment can fit comfortably into almost any home by creating professional-grade equipment with a compact footprint. Its machines are quiet and safe for home environments, making it easy to find a corner to set up a home gym in apartments or houses of any size.
• Scenario driven content: Families, beginners, and seniors can learn tools to make fitness a sustainable part of their lifestyle through FED Fitness’s scenario-driven content. FED Fitness features campaigns and provides tailored video content to reinforce healthy habits and encourage users to face the challenges of fitting fitness into daily life.
• Sustainable training system: FED Fitness offers high-quality machines paired with structured training sessions in home gym settings. This combination provides all the value of a professional workout experience, while providing the opportunity for consumers to exercise from the comfort and privacy of their homes.

FED Fitness is more than just equipment treadmills, ellipticals, strength machines, and lightweight accessories. Instead, it goes above and beyond by providing an entire home fitness ecosystem that includes training and health data. 

Users can purchase equipment from four core product categories to focus align with their fitness goals — whether that is cardio workouts, strength, family fun, or flexibility and stretching. Then they can pair the equipment they choose with a FED Fitness App ,or a smart time wearable. These Smart extensions provide on-demand courses, coaching, AI recommendations, and real-time health tracking. 

These extra features FED Fitness provides round out the workout experience so users can stay in the fitness game and make progress toward a healthier, happier lifestyle.

Partnership Benefits for Consumers and Fans

The partnership between FED Fitness and the Houston Rockets is built on a shared focus on training, health, and fitness, as well as a mutual commitment to creating engaging, family-friendly experiences around the game.

Designed to benefit both organizations, the collaboration also delivers added value for Rockets fans through a variety of interactive activations and promotions. These include a sweepstakes for a VIP game experience, home training content featuring FED Fitness products and Houston Rockets personnel, and opportunities for co-branded merchandise offerings. Fans can also follow FED Fitness on social media to access exclusive, fans-only discounts.

By aligning with an elite NBA franchise, FED Fitness further strengthens its presence within sports culture, reinforcing its position as an international, professional, and dynamic brand with strong appeal to younger audiences.

The partnership with the Houston Rockets further reinforces FED Fitness’s long-term vision of integrating professional training standards into home-based fitness and everyday life.

About FED Fitness

FED Fitness is a global home gym solution brand focused on delivering professional-grade equipment and digital training tools for home use.
Trusted by more than 12 million households worldwide, the brand is committed to helping individuals and families build sustainable fitness habits through accessible, high-quality solutions. For more information, visit www.fedfitness.com.

Media Contact

Palson Yi
palson@feiersport.com

heywell, a modern functional beverage brand designed to help people feel good and live well, announced today new strategic partnerships with BeyondBrands and Presence Marketing as the company enters its next phase of growth, alongside the rollout of new creative work developed with Franklyn and Rudy, as the company enters its next phase of growth.

heywell has partnered with BeyondBrands to support sales strategy and long-term planning. As part of the engagement, BeyondBrands founder Eric Schnell, alongside industry veteran Eddie Pearson, have partnered closely with the heywell team to develop a strategic four-year P&L and growth plan, providing a strong financial and operational foundation for sustainable scale.

Schnell is a longtime natural products entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience across sales, marketing, and product innovation. He co-founded Steaz, a leading organic tea brand acquired in 2016, and was an early team member at Runa Tea, which successfully exited in 2018. He has been recognized as a Beverage World Top 50 Disruptor and is a six-time BevNET Best Product of the Year winner.

Pearson brings over 25 years of experience building sales and distribution models for food and beverage companies, including senior leadership roles at Reed’s Inc., Boylan Bottling, Coca-Cola, and Pepsi. His expertise spans sales, operations, and finance, helping brands create cohesive leadership structures designed to scale.

In addition, heywell is officially launching a new relationship with Presence Marketing, effective today. Presence Marketing is a leading CPG commerce and brokerage partner with deep expertise across natural, specialty, and conventional retail channels. Known for its data-driven approach and long-standing retailer relationships, Presence provides end-to-end sales representation, market-ready strategy, and execution support to help brands grow distribution and performance across key accounts.

As part of its broader growth strategy, heywell is also unveiling new creative work developed in partnership with Franklyn and Rudy, elevating the brand’s visual identity and storytelling to more clearly reflect its modern approach to wellness and to deepen connection with consumers across digital and retail touchpoints.

These partnerships and initiatives build on recent retail wins for heywell, including launches with The Fresh Market and Thrive Market with several additional high-profile retailers slated to launch in the coming months.

“Entering this next phase of growth with the right partners in place is incredibly important to us,” said Ashley Selman, co-founder of heywell. “BeyondBrands has helped us build a strong long-term foundation, Presence Marketing brings the scale and execution to support our expanding retail footprint, and our work with Franklyn and Rudy allows us to show up with a brand world that truly reflects who we are and where we’re headed.”

About heywell

Founded by Ashley Selman, CEO, and Britt Dougherty, COO, heywell was created to make wellness simple and accessible — for everyone, every day (hey + well = a simple invitation to wellness). heywell brings a modern approach to functional beverages where function and flavor go hand in hand. Its line of functional sparkling waters is powered by thoughtfully selected ingredients — including antioxidants, adaptogens, electrolytes, and organic caffeine — to support energy, immunity, hydration, focus, and stress. Designed for a range of moments, from morning through end of day, heywell meets the growing demand for wellness that works harder. Learn more at livingheywell.com.

Media Contact

Ashley Selman
ashley@livingheywell.com

Britt Dougherty
britt@livingheywell.com