IT news, innovations and digital technologies in Kyiv region. Latest tech events
Samsung will hold its The First Look presentation on January 4 in Las Vegas, two days before CES 2026. The company will showcase TVs and home appliances with enhanced artificial intelligence capabilities and may hint at updates to the Galaxy lineup.
In its Year in Search 2025 report, Google named the most popular queries: the chatbot Gemini was the top trending search, while another AI, DeepSeek, ranked seventh. Among news topics were the India–England match and an attempted assassination of Charlie Kirk; film, food and sport were also mentioned.
OpenAI is developing an experimental mechanism called Confession that requires the model to report instruction violations or manipulations of its responses. The system rewards candid explanations of the process, not just the correctness of the answer.
Meta has poached Alan Dye, who led Apple's interfaces team for more than ten years. He will work on AI features for glasses and VR headsets, report to Andrew Bosworth, and will start on December 31.
After eight years at Microsoft, Leonid Polupan has become the CEO of systems integrator Seeton in Ukraine and Azerbaijan as of December 1. Yevhen Kahanovskyi has assumed interim responsibilities at Microsoft for the Baltics and Ukraine.
Loong UAV is testing the M9 — a loitering UAV reminiscent of the Iranian Shahed‑136. The drone is designed for strikes against deep targets, tactical attacks and extended reconnaissance; it can carry up to 50 kg of payload and has a flight endurance of up to 9 hours.
From December 23, most Vodafone subscription plans will change: part of the data allowance and included minutes will be usable in the EU without extra charges, and prices will remain at current levels.
Hyundai Motor Group is preparing to launch a mass-market four-wheeled mobile robot, the Mobile Eccentric Droid (MobED). Series production will begin in the first half of 2026; the company plans to sell thousands of units.
The Android 16 QPR2 update is rolling out to Pixel 6 and newer models. Mail notifications have gained AI summaries and priority sorting. Icon settings, screen options, new calling features, and updates to security and parental controls have also been added.
After the December 3 launch from a pad in the Gobi Desert, the first stage of the Zhuque-3 rocket experienced an "anomalous burn," causing it to miss the landing point and crash. LandSpace received engineering data for follow-up tests.
Google is experimenting with AI-generated headlines in the Discover feed: some of the reworded headlines have proved misleading or inaccurate. The service is adding flagged summaries. The company says this is an experiment for a subset of users. Other product changes were also announced.
XploraOne — a compact device for children from HMD and Xplora that does not support installation of third-party apps and blocks access to social networks and the browser. The device offers basic functions and parental controls; price and release date were not disclosed.
The Israel Defense Forces plan to ban the official use of Android smartphones for officers at the rank of lieutenant colonel and above — they will be issued iPhones. The decision is being justified by the risks of cyberattacks and security tests; the order is expected soon.
In November, at a British airbase, new systems to protect aircraft from missiles and hostile radars were tested during the Viking Flame exercises. Two Saab JAS 39 Gripen fighters were used in the trials; radar suppression and air-defence attacks were simulated.
Huawei has introduced a fluffy interactive AI Pet toy with a built‑in chatbot that responds to touch and voice, saves conversation history, and operates via an app on HarmonyOS 5. In China it is priced at 399 yuan; availability abroad is unknown.
Gradium, a company developing AI voice models, launched in Paris and raised $70 million. Investors include Eric Schmidt and Xavier Niel; the round was led by FirstMark Capital and Eurazeo. The founders are engineers from Google, Meta and Jane Street.
Chinese DeepSeek announced two new AI models: the general-purpose DeepSeek‑V3.2 with support for external tools and the math‑oriented DeepSeek‑V3.2‑Speciale, which competes with Gemini 3 Pro.
Court records, materials from publishers, regional archives and documents on Russia's actions are being collected from more than 90 institutions to train a national large language model based on the open Gemma architecture.
The Ministry of Digital Transformation announced plans to open Ukraine’s first "clean room" for microchip development in 2026. The project has funding and is accompanied by training programs and the drafting of legislation.
On 1 December the EU4UA Defence Tech programme launched with support from the EU and BRDO to strengthen air defence. The programme has a budget of €3.3 million and offers grants of up to €150,000 for the development and testing of prototypes. Applications are open until 14 January 2026; the programme runs through February 2027.
The Lithuanian Ministry of Defence has signed a contract with Saab Dynamics for a third MSHORAD short-range air-defence module. The cost exceeds €119 million; installation on JLTV armoured vehicles includes a separate integration agreement of about €11 million.
Companies have unveiled a service that lets users establish a connection between Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud in minutes rather than through days of configuration; Salesforce was among the first to test it.
The Ministry of Digital Transformation and Kyivstar have chosen the open Gemma 3 model as the basis for creating a Ukrainian large language model. It will be adapted to Ukrainian, further trained on national data, and tested using their own benchmarks.
Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun said the company plans to introduce humanoid robots in factories within five years, cited the use of an X‑ray system with computer vision as an example, and assessed the potential market opportunity.
In Morrow County, Oregon, nitrates in drinking water were found at levels up to ten times the standard. Researchers link the elevated levels to increases in cancer cases and miscarriages; large data centers operate in the region.
In the beta version of the ChatGPT Android app (1.2025.329), lines in the code were found that hint at advertising — references to an "ads feature," "search ad" and "bazaar content." The release has not yet been published. Monetization via advertising and other updates had been discussed earlier.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order launching "Genesis Mission" — a plan to integrate AI into scientific research. The Department of Energy will open datasets and equipment to external researchers working with artificial intelligence tools.
BGV estimates annual production from three deposits at 1,340 tonnes of uranium, which could meet the needs of Ukraine’s nuclear power sector. The group has invested more than $10 million in exploration, carried out technical and environmental assessments, and plans to use the fuel in future reactors.
French President Emmanuel Macron said that Brussels is too slow to investigate American tech companies because of U.S. pressure over the EU’s digital laws. He accused the European Commission and member states of being afraid to pursue cases in the face of an American onslaught.
Anduril Industries experienced difficulties with drones in Ukraine. In 2024, Ukraine’s SBU halted the use of Altius drones because they were vulnerable to Russian electronic warfare systems.