Regional

AI News Brief: Developments in EconomyAI, climate issues, and private capital are revealing growing divergence among Asian economies. As the IMF annual meetings wrapped up in Bangkok, Thailand, participants noted that while Asia has shown considerable economic resilience amid energy supply shocks and a worsening cost-of-living crisis, with overall growth holding up well, that resilience is becoming increasingly uneven — some countries are falling behind because they’ve missed the AI wave and other favorable trends.

AI News Brief: In an interview, Vanderbilt University Chancellor Daniel Diermeier noted that the intense US-China rivalry in tech and AI is putting universities under a dual squeeze: they need to keep pace with technological progress and keep research and teaching relevant, while also facing increasingly heavy national security compliance demands. He specifically pointed out that universities must confront the real national security concerns tied to ‘high-risk technology’ and ‘dual-use te…

AI News Brief: Vivian Toh is editor-in-chief of TechTechChina, a London-based Chinese tech media outlet. This commentary focuses on the US-China AI dialogue, noting that US President Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping met for a walk along the White House’s ‘Presidential Walk of Fame’ on September 24, with a new round of talks expected in November. The piece stresses that both sides must ensure the AI dialogue produces substantive results rather than devolving into…

AI news brief: Southeast Asian countries are caught in the crossfire of escalating US-China competition in artificial intelligence. The report notes that Southeast Asian economies including Singapore have long tried to balance relations between Washington and Beijing while maintaining tech and business ties with both, but this ‘don’t pick a side’ strategy is facing growing pressure. As the US-China AI rivalry keeps heating up, governments and companies across the region are starting to worry they may eventually be forced to make a clear choice between two separate tech ecosystems, chip supply chains, or cloud infrastructures, rather than continuing to walk the middle ground.

AI News Brief: Institutional investors like CalPERS are ramping up scrutiny of AI governance, aiming to protect portfolio value through mechanisms like proxy voting against companies that mismanage AI risk. The report notes that the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) has for the first time included AI-related provisions in its latest proxy voting guidelines, part of a…

AI News Brief: DeepSeek suffered roughly five hours of service disruption on Thursday, with its V4-Pro and V4.1-Flash models and chat service completely unavailable from 8am to 1pm local time. The incident occurred in Guangzhou, affecting core model services at the Chinese AI startup. Outside observers speculate the outage may be…

AI News Brief: Jack Clark, co-founder and policy chief at Anthropic, said on October 16 at the IMF-World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, that AI-producing nations need to establish ‘common-sense standards’ for regulating the technology. He made the remarks during a panel discussion titled ‘AI and the Global Economy: From Risk to Opportunity.’ Clark argued that establishing such regulatory standards would build confidence in AI technology, which in turn would help drive global economic growth.

AI news brief: Chinese officials proposed on Friday adding artificial intelligence, biopharmaceuticals, and photovoltaic technology to an export control list, aiming to prevent ‘improper proliferation’ of these critical capabilities, as trade and tech tensions between China and the West continue to escalate. The proposal, put forward by Chinese authorities on Friday, covers three major technology areas: AI, biopharmaceuticals, and solar photovoltaic technology. The report notes that Shanghai hosted the World Artificial Intelligence Conference this past July, highlighting China’s momentum in AI development…

AI News Flash: Johor, Malaysia — a maker of critical optical communication components that supply AI data center networks says it plans to more than triple its Malaysian manufacturing capacity by the end of 2028 to meet unprecedented demand growth. The company is Taiwan’s FICG, which adopted a ‘China+1’ strategy at the request of US customers to diversify production away from its heavy concentration in China. FICG began mass production earlier this year at its first plant under its Malaysian subsidiary Pro3C, and…

AI news flash: TSMC posted a record-high profit in Q3 2026, with net income up 68.7% year-over-year — the sixth straight quarter of record earnings. Demand driven by the AI wave keeps running strong, with orders for the most advanced process chips booming while demand for supporting chips rises right alongside, keeping TSMC’s growth momentum at full speed. See the original article for details.