If the rumor mill is to be believed, 2026 will feature an unusually large harvest of Apple products. This is shaping up to be a standout year for MacBooks, and we might be only a couple weeks away from seeing the first new models.
Apple’s “Special Experience” slated for Wednesday, March 4, indicates that the company is set to unveil new products soon. While I was expecting to see new MacBooks hit by the end of this month, the early-March event still fits Apple’s spring refresh schedule. We could see a new MacBook unveiled on March 4 along with an eighth-gen iPad Air and a low-cost iPhone 17E. Taking place in New York, London and Shanghai instead of at Apple HQ in Cupertino, California, these smaller media gatherings might be indicative of less explosive reveals. It’s more likely we see MacBook chipset upgrades than more experimental MacBook products rumored for later in the year.
The MacBook Pro is lined up to be the first MacBook update of the year, with Apple bringing the higher-powered M5 Pro and M5 Max chips to both the 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro lines in March. Then Apple could move to the other end of the spectrum and release its rumored $599 budget MacBook. Also in the first half of the year, the MacBook Air is likely to receive an M5 chip refresh. And before the year is out, we could see the first MacBook Pros with OLED touchscreens.
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Watch this: Apple’s iPhone 17E Is Near: Here’s What We Expect
Internet speculation has given way to more concrete evidence of these MacBook releases, as Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman cites internal Apple communications that reveal “a remarkably busy 2026 with a slew of product releases over the next several weeks.”
According to Gurman, the M5 refreshes for the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air could be just around the corner, and the budget MacBook might not be far behind. Let’s take a closer look at the timing, pricing and details of the MacBook refreshes expected this year.
The reported 2026 MacBook release timeline
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While the rumors swirl about the MacBook releases expected this year, we don’t have exact dates for when the new models will be announced. It’s extremely likely that Apple’s March media event will set the stage for the company to unveil more M5 MacBook Pros and the MacBook Air, but it’s harder to pinpoint when the other products are slated for release. From what I’ve gathered online, here’s my best guess of when we might see new MacBooks this year.
March: M5 Pro and M5 Max MacBook Pros, M5 MacBook Air
First half of 2026: Budget MacBook (estimated price of $599)
Second half of 2026: Touchscreen OLED MacBook Pro
Read on for a closer look at the timing, pricing and details of the MacBook refreshes expected this year.
The 14-inch M5 MacBook Pro released in October, so we’re expecting the rest of the lineup very soon.
Apple/CNET
M5 Pro and M5 Max updates for the MacBook Pro
The MacBook Pro was the first MacBook to receive Apple’s latest M5 processor when the 14-inch MacBook Pro was released last October. Now, Apple is expected to extend its M5 offerings and bring the higher-powered M5 Pro and M5 Max chips to the MacBook Pro.
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The 16-inch MacBook Pro is still waiting for its M5 update and should also get M5 Pro and M5 Max chips at the same time as its smaller Pro sibling.
CNET’s Lori Grunin tested the M5 chip and noted that it delivers big performance improvements over the M4 “in the narrow areas where it applies, namely on-GPU processing for AI and ray-traced graphics.” Still, the M5 MacBook Pro struggles to keep up with the world of AAA gaming.
The M5 Pro and M5 Max processors will likely follow in the footsteps of previous M-series Pro and Max chips, featuring additional CPU and GPU cores and higher memory allotments.
MacBook Pro models with these high-end chips come at higher prices geared toward processing-intensive tasks like video rendering, 3D modeling and AI workloads. If pricing remains stable, which isn’t a sure bet with the worldwide RAM shortage, the 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M5 Pro chip will likely start at $1,999 and the 16-inch Pro with an M5 Pro will likely start at $2,499.
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As with the last MacBook Pro update last October, these M5 updates will be internal upgrades without any significant changes to the laptop’s design. According to Bloomberg’s Power On newsletter, these M5 Pro and M5 Max updates will arrive with Apple’s next major Mac software update, MacOS 26.3, in February or March. Now that Apple has unveiled its March 4 event date, it has become much more likely that we’ll see these upgraded MacBook Pros arrive next month. If you are eyeing a MacBook Pro purchase, it probably makes sense to hold off and wait for the new models to arrive.
Finally, a true budget MacBook?
Apple is reportedly planning to enter the budget laptop market with a low-cost model that’ll be much more affordable than the current cheapest model, the M4 MacBook Air, which starts at $999. This new model will ditch Apple’s M-series in favor of an A-series chip — the same processor that powers the iPhone and could cost as little as $699 or as low as $599 with Apple’s education discount.
Apple already makes the claim that the A19 Pro chip that debuted in the iPhone 17 Pro and the iPhone Air provides “MacBook Pro levels of compute.” But according to industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, it’s possible — even probable — that a budget MacBook would utilize an A18 Pro chip (the chip used in the iPhone 16 Pro) instead.
A budget laptop with an A18 Pro chip would likely offer diminishing returns in comparison to the MacBook M4 chips, running roughly 40% slower than the current generation of Macs. The A18 Pro also doesn’t feature support for Thunderbolt ports, so the budget MacBook would likely come outfitted with less-capable USB-C ports instead.
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The new rumored budget MacBook will be even more compact than the smallest M4 MacBook Air model.
Josh Goldman/CNET
The other way Apple will reportedly keep the prices down on this new budget MacBook is by shrinking the display size. Kuo reported the laptop will feature an “approximately 13-inch display,” which is a claim corroborated by Gurman. It could feature a 12.9-inch screen, which would be a bit smaller than the 13.6-inch MacBook Air. But it should also be a little lighter than the 2.7-pound Air, making it not only the most affordable MacBook but also the most portable.
This new budget MacBook will compete with Chromebooks and entry-level Windows laptops, which would be a new segment of the market for an Apple laptop. Gurman wrote that the device is intended for “people who primarily browse the web, work on documents or conduct light media editing.” This could be the new MacBook for students. Timing is a little murkier for the release of this budget MacBook, but hopefully it will arrive before the start of the next school year.
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M5 coming to the MacBook Air
Just as Apple is reportedly gearing up to give its premium MacBook Pros a refresh with new, more powerful chips, the thinnest, most portable MacBooks are also set to get an upgrade. It’s fairly standard for the MacBook Air to get a springtime refresh, and the M4 MacBook Air was released in March 2025.
Gurman reported that we’ll likely see an M5 MacBook Air release during the first quarter of the year, so we can expect the refresh in the same time frame this year. Like the MacBook Pros, we’re not expecting to see a redesign with the M5 MacBook Air. A new-look Air is at least a couple more years away, according to Gurman.
The 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage that have been integrated into previous versions of the MacBook Air will likely be standard for any M5 MacBook Air. (I’m keeping my fingers and toes crossed that the minimum storage gets moved up to 512GB, though.)
The M4 MacBook Air starts at $999, and I expect pricing to remain unchanged for the M5 Air.
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The first OLED MacBook Pros
Would Apple release two different sets of MacBook Pro laptops in the same year? It’s more likely than you’d think, and it wouldn’t be unprecedented.
Apple released two generations of MacBook Pros in 2023, beginning the year with M2 MacBook Pros and ending it with M3 MacBook Pros. So we know that if Apple deems an advancement significant enough, it will issue multiple refreshes in the same year.
An OLED MacBook Pro lineup would certainly qualify as one of those advancements. According to Gurman, the OLED MacBook Pros would achieve several firsts for Mac computers, integrating a brand new generation of chips and a touchscreen display. Like the previous MacBook Pros, the OLED MacBook lineup would include both 14- and 16-inch models.
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The first Macs with OLED displays are also rumored to borrow the Dynamic Island camera cutout from the iPhone.
Kerry Wan/ZDNET
Apple has been catching up to the rest of the industry by integrating OLED panels into more products, including some of its previous iPhone and iPad Pro models. But as Gurman noted, this will mark the “first time that this higher-end, thinner system is used in a Mac.”
Touchscreen displays have been common in Windows laptops for some time, but this rumored design would be the first time Apple integrates them into a MacBook. “The company has taken years to formulate its approach to the market, aiming to improve on current designs,” wrote Gurman. “[Apple] has developed a reinforced hinge and screen hardware to prevent the display from bouncing back or moving when touched.”
The design will reportedly still integrate standard MacBook Pro keyboard and trackpad functionality. What will apparently change, however, is the camera cutout at the top of the screen. Gurman reported that Apple is retiring the iconic “notch” in favor of “a so-called hole-punch design that leaves a display area around the sensor,” similar to the Dynamic Island introduced on the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max.
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The OLED MacBook Pros could be the first Mac computers to use next-generation M6 chips, according to Gurman. They’ll also feature thinner, lighter frames that make them more portable than current MacBook Pro designs.
If the MacBook Pro adopts a touchscreen design, the computer will be the closest merger between Mac and iPad we’ve seen yet. Industry analyst Kuo believes this shift “reflects Apple’s long-term observation of iPad user behavior, indicating that in certain scenarios, touch controls can enhance both productivity and the overall user experience.”
As it stands, though, the OLED MacBook Pro will still provide a more traditional computer experience than other Apple products — don’t expect the fully hands-on, tactile navigation of an iPad quite yet. A trackpad and keyboard control scheme will remain important pillars of the MacBook experience.
The pricier components and OLED panels will likely result in an increase in the price of the OLED MacBook Pro. The OLED models will likely be several hundred dollars more than their current Liquid Retina display counterparts. The current 14-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,999, and the 16-inch Pro begins at $2,499.
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The OLED MacBook Pros are rumored to go into production this year. While Gurman previously reported that the OLED MacBook Pros might be released in early 2027, more recent internal reports suggest that Apple is targeting the end of 2026 for a potential release.
Join Hannah Alpert (NASA Ames) to explore thermal data from the record-breaking 6-meter LOFTID inflatable aeroshell. Learn how COMSOL Multiphysics® was used to perform inverse analysis on flight thermocouple data, validating heat flux gauges and preflight CFD predictions. Attendees will gain technical insights into improving thermal models for future HIAD missions, making this essential for engineers seeking to advance atmospheric reentry design. The session concludes with a live Q&A.
Users of the Apple Wallet app can now use a digital Car Key to lock and unlock the Toyota Rav4, but the feature’s availability has yet to expand to other Toyota vehicles.
Apple Car Key can be used to unlock the 2026 Toyota Rav4. Screenshot credit: Reddit user Piecake1234
Since 2020, the Car Key feature has allowed iPhone and Apple Watch owners to unlock and start their cars with the use of mobile devices. According to a social media post spotted on Monday, the 2026 Toyota Rav4 has gained support for Apple’s Car Key system. More than 30 vehicle manufacturers already support Apple’s Car Key feature. At WWDC 2025, Apple explained that Car Key would make its way to 13 additional vehicle brands. Toyota might be the latest automaker to roll out Apple Car Key support, but there are a few caveats. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums
After a decade helping Avalara scale its tax software business, Alesia Pinney is taking aim at a different kind of tax headache.
Pinney is CEO and co-founder of Legata, a Seattle-area startup helping affluent households create estate plans.
She said the idea for Legata grew out of frustration with Washington’s estate tax and how little many families understand about the risk to their assets.
“There are so many people who don’t really realize that they’re going to lose family wealth if they don’t plan,” Pinney said.
Legata’s online platform walks households through creating wills, trusts and related documents so they preserve available exemptions and reduce potential estate tax exposure. The company aims to modernize what Pinney describes as an increasingly strained system: more affluent households, fewer estate planning attorneys, and complex state-by-state tax rules.
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Washington is one of a handful of states with its own estate tax, separate from the federal estate tax, that applies to estates exceeding $3 million per person. The debate over estate taxes has been heating up after Washington lawmakers passed a bill last year that increased the top rate to as high as 35%, among the highest in the country.
Pinney said she supports rolling back the estate tax hike “because we are losing entrepreneurs and will continue to do so if we aren’t more thoughtful about taxation.”
The CEO published a recent blog post detailing how Washington’s estate tax can impact cases involving Washington property or business interests.
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After launching last year with an initial focus on Washington state, Legata is now serving clients nationwide. “There’s kind of an estate planning crisis all over the country,” Pinney said.
Legata is aimed at households with roughly $1 million to $20 million in assets. Pinney said traditional estate-planning services tend to focus either on people with very modest estates that will never face estate tax, or on ultra-high-net-worth families with complex needs.
The cost is $1,495 to create an estate plan, plus $195 per year for an ongoing subscription. The subscription includes document storage, updates when laws change, and reminders about tasks such as retitling assets.
Pinney said Legata can also be used by attorneys who are overwhelmed by demand. Many estate-planning lawyers, she said, already turn away clients because they lack capacity.
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The company uses artificial intelligence internally to help draft and curate content, but Pinney said all materials that reach customers are reviewed by lawyers.
Pinney spent more than 12 years at Avalara and was its chief legal officer and an executive vice president, helping lead the company through its IPO and subsequent $8.4 billion private equity deal in 2022. She started her career as a CPA at Deloitte before becoming a corporate attorney at Perkins Coie.
Legata’s leadership team also includes other former Avalara employees: Legata co-founder Henry Frantz was a legal operations manager at Avalara, while CMO Bryan Wiggins was vice president of marketing.
Legata has raised $725,000 in funding and employs less than 10 people. Pinney said the startup is under review by regulators in Washington state to provide legal services.
Generative AI has been rapidly adopted by many different types of industries. Experimentation with Large Language Models alone is not enough to successfully implement generative AI. Organizations also need reliable generative AI system integrators who can align AI models with enterprise architecture, security standards, regulatory requirements, and long-term scalability objectives.
To compile this list of companies, we used reputable B2B directories such as Clutch, GoodFirms, DesignRush, and Gartner Peer Insights, and surveyed over 70 different AI and software development firms that operate globally. This article is not meant to be a ranking but rather a curated list of selected trusted generative AI system integrators in 2026.
Leading Generative AI System Integrators You Can Trust in 2026
Below is the complete list of generative AI system integrators featured in this article:
Cleveroad
DataArt
Grid Dynamics
ITRex Group
Cognizant
Thoughtworks
Globant
Endava
Devoteam
Zfort Group
All of these businesses have a wealth of technical expertise, verified customer references, and enterprise-level generative AI-based solution delivery experience.
1. Cleveroad
Cleveroad is a reputable generative AI system integrator that offers generative AI development to large corporations and startups. The business offers generative AI consulting with an emphasis on ROI and AI readiness, LLM fine-tuning and optimization, RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) integration, and custom AI agent development. Additionally, Cleveroad develops multimodal AI programs that produce code, images, and text.
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To guarantee scalable, secure deployments, the team collaborates with OpenAI, Azure OpenAI, Google Gemini, Anthropic Claude, vector databases, and MLOps pipelines. With 77 reviews and an average rating of 4.9/5 on Clutch, Cleveroad is an ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified business that is regularly acknowledged as a trustworthy AI integration partner in regulated industries.
2. DataArt
DataArt is a globally recognized software engineering company that specializes in developing enterprise-level Artificial Intelligence systems. The company provides custom AI solutions through several channels, including deploying Large Language Models (LLMs), automating workflows using AI-powered tools and applications, integrating knowledge graphs into an organization’s existing infrastructure, and providing advanced data engineering services to enable or facilitate the use of generative AI systems.
DataArt has extensive knowledge and experience working with Financial Services and Medical Organizations that are heavily regulated, helping clients safely adopt Artificial Intelligence. The company’s emphasis on responsible AI development includes governance frameworks and models for explaining an algorithm’s decision-making process.
3. Grid Dynamics
Grid Dynamics is an innovator in AI-powered digital transformations and generative AI integration for large enterprises. This includes (but does not limit) the customization of foundation models, AI search and recommendation technologies, MLOps automation and deployment along with scalable data platforms.
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Also trading on NASDAQ under the ticker (GDYN) Grid Dynamics is consistently recognized as a provider of excellence in engineering within both AI and Cloud-native modernization. They often partner with Fortune 1000 companies and have demonstrated strong capabilities in large scale data infrastructures and real-time AI applications.
4. ITRex Group
The ITRex Group specializes in offering AI and data engineering services that include the integration of generative AI, as well as intelligent automation, computer vision, and predictive analytics. They work with enterprises to create AI-based personal assistants, intelligent document processing systems, and recommendation engines.
Clutch has recognized ITRex for their generative AI services, as well as numerous other B2B directories for their AI/big data services. ITRex’s generative AI solutions are designed to be scalable and work with ERPs, CRMs, and legacy systems for the enterprise.
5. Cognizant
Cognizant is a worldwide consulting firm specializing in technology solutions through the provision of enterprise AI services, such as the redesign of AI platforms, conversational AI, and intelligent automation. The company connects foundational AI models to enterprise systems as well as offers AI governance structures.
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Cognizant, considered to be a Fortune 500 business, partners with major AI suppliers and cloud services companies in order to implement large-scale AI transformation projects across highly regulated sectors.
6. Thoughtworks
Advanced software engineering and AI strategy consulting are the primary focuses of Thoughtworks. By incorporating generative AI into digital platforms that feature responsible AI design, modern architecture, and a DevOps transformation.
Thoughtworks has been recognized with many awards within their industry for technology innovations and expertise in Agile transformations.
7. Globant
Globant provides empathetic digital experiences and enterprise AI solutions leveraged by AI technologies via their AI Design Studio, based on Generative Graphics, for a large-scale event to take maximum advantage of LLM use and Digital Platform Transformation.
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The company is publicly traded (GLOB) as of October 18, 2021, and has received a broad array of global technology awards, both from IDG and from various newspapers such as Forbes.
8. Endava
Endava offers services related to digital transformation and AI integration for technology companies and financial services firms. Their services involving generative AI include developing chatbots, implementing intelligent automation solutions, and integrating enterprise AI with existing systems/technologies used by organizations.
Endava trades publicly (NYSE: DAVA) and has formed alliances with Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure.
9. Devoteam
Devoteam specializes in providing cloud transformation services, along with AI integration solutions. They have generative AI capabilities through LLM deployments, AI governance, and enterprise automation built on top of leading Cloud platforms.
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Additionally, they are multi-Cloud partners holding certifications across all three major providers (AWS, Google Cloud and Microsoft).
10. Zfort Group
Zfort Group has expertise in providing development and integration for AI solutions, especially generative AI, along with offerings in blockchain as well as providing customised enterprise software solutions (including but not limited to the development of chatbots, development of analytical AI systems) as well as automation tools for their customers.
Zfort Group is showcased within several B2B directories as well as deliver services to SME and mid-sized businesses with competencies around integrating AI technologies with existing infrastructures.
Final Thoughts
Remember that when selecting your generative artificial intelligence system integrator for 2026, it is essential to evaluate very carefully the provider you choose by analyzing their technical capabilities, security standards, proven success from independent customer feedback, and documented experience deploying projects in the field. All of the companies listed here have proven dependable over time by being recognized within their industries as having delivered quality integration to customers with proven success at the enterprise level.
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As generative AI continues to grow, working closely with well-established and secure system integrators will be crucial for converting AI experiments into measurable business results.
At CES 2026 in Las Vegas, Singapore-based startup Strutt introduced the EV1, a powered personal mobility device that uses lidar, cameras, and onboard computing for collision avoidance. Unlike manually-steered powered wheelchairs, the EV1 assists with navigation in both indoor and outdoor environments—stopping or rerouting itself before a collision can occur.
Strutt describes its approach as “shared control,” in which the user sets direction and speed, while the device intervenes to avoid unsafe motion.
“The problem isn’t always disability,” says Strutt cofounder and CEO Tony Hong. “Sometimes people are just tired. They have limited energy, and mobility shouldn’t consume it.”
Building a mobility platform was not Hong’s original ambition. Trained in optics and sensor systems, he previously worked in aerospace and robotics. From 2016 to 2019, he led the development of lidar systems for drones at Shenzhen, China-based DJI, a leading manufacturer of consumer and professional drones. Hong then left DJI for a position as an assistant professor at Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen—a school known for its research in robotics, human augmentation, sensors, and rehabilitation engineering.
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However, he says, demographic trends around him proved hard to ignore. Populations in Asia, Europe, and North America are aging rapidly. More people are living longer, with limited stamina, slower reaction times, or balance challenges. So, Hong says he left academia to develop technology that would help people facing mobility limitations.
Not a Wheelchair—an EV
EV1 combines two lidar units, two cameras, 10 time-of-flight depth sensors, and six ultrasonic sensors. Sensor data feeds into onboard computing that performs object detection and path planning.
“We need accuracy at a few centimeters,” Hong says. “Otherwise, you’re hitting door frames.”
Using the touchscreen interface, users can select a destination within the mapped environment. The onboard system calculates a safe route and guides the vehicle at a reduced speed of about 3 miles per hour. The rider can override the route instantly with joystick input. The system even supports voice commands, allowing the user to direct the EV1 to waypoints saved in its memory.
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The user can say, for example, “Go to the fridge,” and it will chart a course to the refrigerator and go there, avoiding obstacles along the way.
The Strutt EV1 puts both joystick controls and a lidar-view of the environment in front of the device’s user. Strutt
Driving EV1 in manual mode, the rider retains full control, with vibration feedback warning of nearby obstacles. In “copilot” mode, the vehicle prevents direct collisions by stopping before impact. In “copilot plus,” it can steer around obstacles while continuing in the intended direction of travel.
“We don’t call it autonomous driving,” Hong says. “The user is always responsible and can take control instantly.”
Hong says Strutt has also kept its users’ digital privacy in mind. All perception, planning, and control computations, he says, occur onboard the device. Sensor data is not transmitted unless the user chooses to upload logs for diagnostics. Camera and microphone activity is visibly indicated, and wireless communications are encrypted. Navigation and obstacle avoidance function without cloud connectivity.
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“We don’t think of this as a wheelchair,” Hong says. “We think of it as an everyday vehicle.”
Strutt promotes EV1’s use for both outdoor and indoor environments—offering high-precision sensing capabilities to navigate confined spaces. Strutt
To ensure that the EV1 could withstand years of shuttling a user back and forth inside their home and around their neighborhood, the Strutt team subjected the mobility vehicleto two million roller cycles—mechanical simulation testing that allows engineers to estimate how well the motors, bearings, suspension, and frame will hold up over time.
The EV1’s 600-watt-hour lithium iron phosphate battery provides 32 kilometers of range—enough for a full day of errands, indoor navigation, and neighborhood travel. A smaller 300-watt-hour version, designed to comply with airline lithium-battery limits, delivers 16 km. Charging from zero to 80 percent takes two hours.
“A retail price of $7,500 raises serious equity concerns,” says Erick Rocha, communications and development coordinator at the Los Angeles-based advocacy organization Disability Voices United,. “Many mobility device users in the United States rely on Medicaid,” the government insurance program for people with limited incomes. “Access must not be restricted to those who can afford to pay out of pocket.”
Medicaid coverage for high-tech mobility devices varies widely by state, and some states have rules that create significant barriers to approval (especially for non-standard or more specialized equipment).
Even in states that do cover mobility devices, similar types of hurdles often show up. Almost all states require prior approval for powered mobility devices, and the process can be time-consuming and documentation-heavy. Many states rigidly define what “medically necessary” means. They may require a detailed prescription describing the features of the mobility device and why the patient’s needs cannot be met with a simpler mobility aid such as a walker, cane, or standard manual wheelchair. Some states’ processes include a comprehensive in-person exam, documenting how the impairment described by the clinician limits activities of daily living such as toileting, dressing, bathing, or eating. Even if a person overcomes those hurdles, a state Medicaid program could deny coverage if a device doesn’t fit neatly into existing Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System billing codes
“Sensor-assisted systems can improve safety,” Rocha says. “But the question is whether a device truly meets the lived, day-to-day realities of people with limited mobility.”
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Hong says that Strutt, founded in 2023, is betting that falling sensor prices and advances in embedded processing now make commercial deployment of the EV1 feasible.
The design will look familiar if you’ve ever pulled the standard jack out of the back of your car. However, this one isn’t made fully out of steel. It relies on an M6 bolt and a rivet nut, but everything else is pure plastic. In this scissor jack design, rigid PETG arms are held in a scissor jack shape with a flexible TPU outer layer. Combined with the screw mechanism, it’s capable of delivering up to 400 pounds of force without failing. It’s an impressive figure for something made out of 80 grams of plastic. The idea came about because of [Alan’s] recent build of a RatRig VCore4 printer, which has independent dual extruders. This allowed the creation of single prints with both rigid and flexible filaments included.
[Alan] did test the jack by lifting up his vehicle, which it kind of achieved. The biggest problem was the short stroke length, which meant it could only raise the back of the car by a couple inches. Printing a larger version could make it a lot more practical for actual use… if you’re willing to trust a 3D-printed device in such use.
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Files are on Printables if you wish to make your own. It’s worth paying attention to the warning upfront that [Alan] provides—”THIS CAN CREATE A LOT OF FORCE (400+ lbs!), WHICH MEANS IT CAN STORE A LOT OF ENERGY THAT MIGHT BE RELEASED SUDDENLY. Please be cautious using 3d-printed objects for high loads and wear appropriate safety equipment!”
Funnily enough, we’ve featured 3D printed jacks before, all the way back in 2015! Video after the break.
Last year, Google first enabled AirDrop compatibility on Pixel 10 devices, a change that finally let Android phones share files with iPhones using Apple’s own system. Now, Google is expanding its Quick Share feature, and Pixel 9 phones are next in line.
Exciting News🎉 Starting today, we are bringing Quick Share compatibility with AirDrop to the Google Pixel 9, 9 Pro and 9 Pro Fold! The feature will roll out over the next few days. https://t.co/MzJkpG4NIV
However, the company hasn’t explained why the Pixel 9a is excluded from this wave of compatibility. The feature will roll out over the coming weeks in phases.
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How to set up Quick Share with AirDrop on Pixel phones
To enable the feature on a Pixel 9 series phone, follow these steps: Settings > System > Software updates > install the latest Google Play System update.
Make sure the Quick Share extension is also updated by opening Settings > All services > System services > Quick Share extension and installing the available update.
To receive files from a Pixel, Apple device owners need to set their AirDrop visibility to “Everyone for 10 Minutes,” allowing the connection to establish.
Google’s promise on privacy and performance
Screenshot | Google
Google says the update allows Pixel 9 users to easily share high-resolution files with iPhones, iPads, and macOS devices. This makes it easier for friends using Apple products to exchange content over Bluetooth.
Google also says that privacy and speed remain priorities, adding that the system uses multiple layers of protection to keep shared files secure. The feature uses a direct, peer-to-peer connection, so files are not sent through servers, logged, or shared beyond the transfer itself.
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For Pixel 9 users, it’s a small update that finally removes a big everyday annoyance when sharing files with iPhone friends.
As AI-powered coding tools flood the market, a critical weakness has emerged: by default, as with most LLM chat sessions, they are temporary — as soon as you close a session and start a new one, the tool forgets everything you were just working on.
Developers have worked around this by having coding tools and agents save their state to markdown and text files, but this solution is hacky at best.
Qodo, the AI code review startup, believes it has a solution with the launch of what it calls the industry’s first intelligent Rules System for AI governance — a framework that gives AI code reviewers persistent, organizational memory.
The new system, announced today as part of Qodo 2.1, replaces static, manually maintained rule files with an intelligent governance layer. It automatically generates rules from actual code patterns and past review decisions, continuously maintains rule health, enforces standards in every code review, and measures real-world impact.
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For Itamar Friedman, CEO and co-founder of Qodo, the release represents a pivotal moment not just for his company but for the entire AI development tools space.
“I strongly believe that this announcement of ours is most important we ever done,” Friedman said in an interview with VentureBeat.
The ‘Memento’ problem
To explain the limitation of current AI coding tools, Friedman invokes the 2000 Christopher Nolan film Memento, in which the protagonist suffers from short-term memory loss and must tattoo notes on his body to remember crucial information.
“Every time you call them, it’s a machine that wakes up from scratch,” Friedman said of today’s AI coding assistants. “So all it can do is, before it goes to sleep and restart, it could write whatever it did in a file.”
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This approach—saving context to markdown files like agents.md or napkin.md—has become a common workaround among developers using tools like Claude Code and Cursor. But Friedman argues this method breaks down at enterprise scale.
“Think about heavy duty software where you now have, let’s say, 100,000 of those sticky notes,” he said. “Some of them are sticky notes. Some of them are huge explanations. Some of them are stories. You wake up and you get a task. The first thing that [the AI] is doing is statistically starting to look for the right memos… It’s much better than not having it. But it’s very random.”
From stateless to stateful
The evolution of AI development tools has followed a clear trajectory, according to Friedman: from autocomplete (GitHub Copilot) to question-and-answer (ChatGPT) to agentic coding within the IDE (Cursor) to agentic capabilities everywhere (Claude Code). But he contends all of these remain fundamentally stateless.
“In order for software development to really revolutionize how we do software development for real world software, it needs to be a stateful machine,” Friedman said.
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The core challenge, he explained, is that code quality is inherently subjective. Different organizations have different standards, and even teams within the same enterprise may approach problems differently.
“In order to really reach high level of automation, you need to be able to customize for the specific requirements of the enterprise,” Friedman said. “You need to be able to provide code in high quality. But quality is subjective.”
Qodo’s answer is what Friedman describes as “memory that is built over a long time and is accessible to the coding agents, and then they can poke and check and verify that what they’re actually doing is according to the subjective needs of the enterprise.”
How Qodo’s Rules System works
Qodo’s Rules System establishes what the company calls a unified source of truth for organizational coding standards. The system includes several key components:
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Automatic Rule Discovery: A Rules Discovery Agent generates standards from codebases and pull request feedback, eliminating manual authoring of rule files.
Intelligent Maintenance: A Rules Expert Agent continuously identifies conflicts, duplicates, and outdated standards to prevent what the company calls “rule decay.”
Scalable Enforcement: Rules are automatically enforced during pull request code review, with recommended fixes provided to developers.
Real-World Analytics: Organizations can track adoption rates, violation trends, and improvement metrics to prove standards are being followed.
Friedman emphasized that this represents a fundamental shift in how AI code review tools operate. “It’s the first time that AI code review tool is moving from reactive to proactive,” he said.
The system surfaces rules based on code patterns, best practices, and its own library, then presents them to technical leads for approval. Once accepted, organizations receive statistics on rule adoption and violations across their entire codebase.
A tighter connection between memory and agents
What distinguishes Qodo’s approach, according to Friedman, is how tightly the rules system integrates with the AI agents themselves—as opposed to treating memory as an external resource the AI must search through.
“At Qodo, this memory and agents are much more connected, like we have in our brain,” Friedman said. “There’s much more structure to it… where different parts are well connected and not separated.”
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Friedman noted that Qodo applies fine-tuning and reinforcement learning techniques to this integrated system, which he credits for the company achieving an 11% improvement in precision and recall over other platforms, successfully identifying 580 defects across 100 real-world production PRs.
Friedman offered a prediction for the industry: “When you look one year ahead, it will be very clear that when we started 2026, we were in stateless machines that are trying to hack how they interact with memory. And we will have a very coupled way by the end of 2026, and Qodo 2.1 is the first blueprint of how to do that.”
Enterprise deployment and pricing
Qodo positions itself as an enterprise-first company, offering multiple deployment options. Organizations can deploy the system entirely within their own infrastructure via cloud premise or VPN, use a single-tenant SaaS option where Qodo hosts an isolated instance, or opt for traditional self-serve SaaS.
The rules and memory files can reside wherever the enterprise requires—on their own cloud infrastructure or hosted by Qodo—addressing data governance concerns that enterprise customers typically raise.
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On pricing, Qodo is maintaining its existing seat-based model with usage quotas. At present, the company offers three pricing tiers: a free Developer plan for individuals with 30 PR reviews per month, a Teams plan at $38 per user per month (with 21% savings available for annual billing) that includes 20 PRs per user monthly and 2,500 IDE/CLI credits, and a custom-priced Enterprise plan with contact-us pricing that adds features like multi-repo context awareness, on-prem deployment options, SSO, and priority support.
Friedman acknowledged the ongoing industry debate about whether seat-based pricing makes sense in an age of AI agents but said the company plans to address this topic more comprehensively later this year.
“If you get more value, you pay more,” Friedman said. “If you don’t, then we’re all good.”
Early customer response
Ofer Morag Brin of HR technology company Hibob, an early user of the Rules System, reported positive results in a press statement Qodo shared with VentureBeat ahead of the launch.
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“Qodo’s Rules System didn’t just surface the standards we had scattered across different places; it operationalized them,” Brin said. “The system continuously reinforces how our teams actually review and write code, and we are seeing stronger consistency, faster onboarding, and measurable improvements in review quality across teams.”
Founded in 2018, Qodo has raised $50 million from investors including TLV Partners, Vine Ventures, Susa Ventures, and Square Peg, with angel investors from OpenAI, Shopify, and Snyk.
In a week overflowing with great deals, this is the one that caught my eye for its nostalgic appeal.
Lego has more than its fair share of themed building sets that are fun for all ages, but let’s be honest, the intricate sets made for adults are the most fun.
The Model 72046 provides a nearly life-sized replica of the original Nintendo Game Boy, all built from Lego bricks.
As a child of the 80s and 90s, I can’t tell you just how much I would have given for something like this back in the day.
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I should also mention, in case you’re worried about not being able to tell which game is currently being displayed on the console, the set comes with lenticular screens that emulate the different lighting conditions of the original Game Boy.
I’ll admit, as someone who built all three of the Lego Nintendo Entertainment System sets back in the day, Lego’s adult builds can be relatively pricey, but this one’s down to just £40.99 and is a far better buy if you want a more intricately designed model.
The instructions are easy to follow and there’s even a section of the instruction booklet that offers a tutorial on how to read the instructions.
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Still, even if you are a Lego veteran, this particular set is a nice win for adult collectors, gamers and Nintendo fans alike, with a display stand to set the model off even better.
A high-stakes trial sparked by a California woman who first logged onto social media at age 10. Another lawsuit in Georgia filed by a school district despairing at distracted students. Dozens more legal actions brought by state attorneys general accusing digital platforms of playing mindgames with children.
These are among thousands of lawsuits filed against social media companies with the claim that they purposely designed their apps to be addictive to young users, causing mental health harm and interfering with their education in the pursuit of profit.
Plaintiffs in these cases are pursuing a new legal strategy: they’re claiming that it’s the design of social media platforms — not the content — that is leading to harm.
This month, the first case to go to trial will test the strength of that theory and shape how thousands of other lawsuits against social media companies are argued.
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The trial comes at a time when schools find themselves on the frontlines of an ongoing youth mental health crisis that accelerated during the pandemic.
Child online safety advocates have told EdSurge that while they’ve been sounding the alarm on the harms that children face online, there hasn’t been meaningful change from social media platforms. Educators have long been frustrated over shrinking attention spans and mental health issues they say have worsened as students spend more time online. That frustration has crescendoed into a wave of cellphone bans and wider debate about how much time kids should be spending with screens.
‘Addictive’ Apps
Legal experts say that what sets this new wave of litigation apart from past lawsuits is that plaintiffs are accusing social media platforms of purposefully designing “addictive” platforms. That means cases will hinge on the plaintiffs’ ability to prove that social media companies had a duty to warn them about the pitfalls of using social media, failed in that duty, and caused harm as a result — invoking the need for consumer protection rather than raising issues with content.
Arguments in a case that began in early February in California Superior Court in Los Angeles, spotlight a plaintiff known in court filings as KGM who claims her use of social media from a young age led to mental health issues, including depression and anxiety.
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Arguments in lawsuits brought by school districts, which have been consolidated in the Northern District of California, are expected to start during the summer.
Joseph McNally, former federal prosecutor and director of Emerging Torts and Litigation at McNicholas & McNicholas in California, says that the landmark mass legal action of his childhood was against the tobacco industry for knowing and doing nothing about the addictive and deadly nature of its products. This wave of social media lawsuits will be that for kids today, he believes.
“At a high level, what the school districts are saying is, ‘You targeted kids,’” McNally explains. “‘You knew that your product was potentially dangerous because it was addictive.’”
Tied into accusations that social media companies intentionally made their products addictive to kids, school districts are also arguing that these companies have created a public nuisance, according to corporate attorney Princess Uchekwe, of The Chief Counsel in New York.
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A lawsuit in California accuses social media companies of negligence by designing “addictive” apps and failing to warn users of potential harm. The case’s outcome will affect thousands of similar lawsuits around the country. Document source: Los Angeles Superior Court of California
“Essentially, these schools are saying that because social media platforms are so addictive to children and are creating so many of these mental health issues,” Uchekwe explains, “that as a society, it’s now become a public nuisance that we have to deal with. For school districts in particular, they are saying that now they have to redirect resources that could otherwise be used on teaching and the curriculum to manage these mental health issues that are caused by excessive usage of these social media platforms.”
A Novel Argument
Another novel issue that will be tested by these cases is whether social media companies can successfully invoke the protection of Section 230, McNally says. It’s the part of the 1996 telecommunications law that says online platforms cannot be held liable for content posted by third parties, and it’s widely regarded as making free and open communication online possible.
Meta is defending itself in these lawsuits by arguing that it’s the content and not the app itself that’s causing social media addiction, McNally explains. Plaintiffs are sticking to the argument that platform features like Instagram’s algorithm are at fault for addiction.
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“It’s a tough line, because in many ways, the content and the features and the platform are very much inextricably intertwined,” McNally says. “A jury’s going to have to sort through what is platform harm versus content harm, and that’s not an easy task.”
The defense’s strategy is taking shape in the courtroom. YouTube, part of the ongoing trial in Los Angeles, is arguing that it’s not a social media platform at all — but an entertainment platform akin to Netflix. Meta has argued that KGM’s childhood mental health issues didn’t originate from her use of social media.
Social media companies are also arguing that ‘social media addiction’ is not a clinically recognised condition — and that even if it was, there’s no proof that use of their platforms directly causes mental health harm.
“In these social media cases, what [plaintiffs are] alleging here is harm to the mind,” Uchekwe explains, “and that can be very, very difficult to prove, because mental health is just so multifaceted. It’s going to rely on a lot of expert testimony, a lot of the evidence, maybe a lot of the internal documents that they have during discovery that show that these companies knew, for example, that these features were super addictive and did not really do anything to alleviate that.”
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McNally echoed her analysis of the importance internal documents will play. As an example, he pointed to an internal Instagram email that appears in court records in the Northern District of California case coming to trial in the summer. It states: “IG [Instagram] is a drug. We are pushing users.”
“I spent 17 years as a federal prosecutor, and some of the most compelling evidence in any trial are insider emails,” McNally says. “Anybody can come to court 10 years later and get on the stand and testify as to what they thought or what they intended. But really, when you dive into contemporaneous emails that are happening at the time a product is being developed, or a time that an issue is being evaluated, that will really tell you the story.”
Emails presented in arguments during the trial that’s underway revealed an internal debate at Instagram over whether to reverse a ban on facial filters that mimicked the results of plastic surgery. Some team members wanted to keep the ban in place while gathering more information on the filter’s potential effects on teen girls.
“Plaintiffs have identified some emails here that, when you just look at them on their face, certainly show that there was a debate going on at Facebook on the addictive nature of Instagram and other products,” McNally says. “The defendants will argue that they evaluated that, they weighed that, or they’re being taken out of context, but there are some really, really strong internal emails that I think strengthen the plaintiff’s hand here.”
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Why a Bellwether Case?
The ongoing trial in the Los Angeles Superior Court of California has been called a “bellwether” or “landmark” case because, in the simplest terms, it will test whether the legal theories argued by both sides are successful or not.
If the plaintiffs win the Los Angeles case and are awarded substantial damages, for example, it would encourage social media companies to settle other cases rather than go to trial.
“On the other side of that,” McNally says, “if the jury comes back and ultimately concludes that the plaintiffs didn’t meet their burden and finds that the defendants are not liable, then the tech companies would really have the upper hand.”
The Los Angeles case will reveal jurors’ views on addiction, as it relates to Instagram, YouTube and other social media, McNally says: “If a jury comes back and doesn’t buy the addiction theory here, it makes those cases that the school districts have a lot more challenging to bring.”
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He adds that this is the start of a long road for school districts and others pursuing litigation against social media companies. While the platforms won’t go away, McNally predicts that companies’ desire to project trustworthiness and have good reputations will motivate them to put up more safeguards for kids.