🔎 Today’s Daily Sift: AI/Robotics

• NVIDIA’s Jetson AGX Thor ($3,499) lands — 7.5× faster than Orin, 3.5× more efficient, 128GB memory, 2,070 FP4 TFLOPs. Already powering humanoids at Amazon, Agility, Figure

• OpenAI’s Sora Turbo expands — HD text-to-video with scene blending, frame filling and loops. Safety filters target deepfakes and misuse

• Figure AI rockets to a $39B valuation after raising $1B+ from Nvidia, Intel, Salesforce, LG, Qualcomm. Betting humanoids solve logistics & labor gaps

• Dyna Robotics secures $120M. Its DYNA-1 robot ran 24hrs, folding 900 napkins with 99% accuracy. A general-purpose foundation model for hotels, gyms, factories

• Recirculate project: AI+KUKA robot dismantles EV batteries. ML detects screws & wires, IDs packs without QR codes, automates lid & module removal .

• Ukraine debuts Combat Gereon UGV: modular, AI-enabled, frontline-tested. Built for quick deployment with soldier-friendly controls

• Humanoids edge into warehouses — Amazon (Digit), GXO, Mercedes (Apollo). Market projected $15B by 2030 (39% CAGR). But critics point to short runtimes (Digit only ~30 mins of real work)

• Robotics startups raised $6B in 2025 YTD. Investors chasing verticals like healthcare, warehousing & construction over consumer humanoids

• AI under scrutiny: FTC probes chatbots & child safety; Geoffrey Hinton warns of job losses. Klarna call centers already cut staff. Yet UK study finds neurodiverse workers thrive with AI tools

• Business & legal heat: Workday buys Sana for $1.1B to embed AI in HR . Authors sue Apple for allegedly training OpenELM on pirated books, echoing Anthropic’s $1.5B settlement