Telecom
Zoho Corporation to Leverage NVIDIA NeMo to Build LLMs
Zoho Corporation, a global technology company headquartered in Chennai, announced today that it will be leveraging the NVIDIA AI accelerated computing platform – which includes NVIDIA NeMo, part of NVIDIA AI Enterprise software – to build and deploy its large language models (LLMs) in its SaaS applications.
Once the LLMs are built and deployed, they will be available to Zoho Corporation’s 700,000+ customers across ManageEngine and Zoho.com globally.
Over the past year, the company has invested more than USD 10 million in NVIDIA’s AI technology and GPUs, and plans to invest an additional USD 10 million in the coming year. The announcement was made during the NVIDIA AI Summit in Mumbai.
Ramprakash Ramamoorthy, Director of AI at Zoho Corporation, commented, “Many LLMs on the market today are designed for consumer use, offering limited value for businesses.
“At Zoho, our mission is to develop LLMs tailored specifically for a wide range of business use cases.
“Owning our entire tech stack, with products spanning various business functions, allows us to integrate the essential element that makes AI truly effective: context.”
Zoho prioritises user privacy from the outset to create models that are compliant with privacy regulations from the ground up, rather than retrofitting them later.
Its goal is to help businesses realise ROI swiftly and effectively by leveraging the full stack of NVIDIA AI software and accelerated computing to increase throughput and reduce latency.
Zoho has been building its own AI technology for over a decade and adding it contextually to its wide portfolio of over 100 products across its ManageEngine and Zoho divisions.
Its approach to AI is multi-modal, geared towards deriving contextual intelligence that can help users make business decisions.
The company is building narrow, small and medium language models, which are distinct from LLMs. This provides options for using different size models in order to provide better results across a variety of use cases.
Relying on multiple models also means that businesses that do not have a large amount of data can still benefit from AI. Privacy is also a core tenet in Zoho’s AI strategy, and its LLM models will not be trained on customer data.
“The ability to choose from a range of AI model sizes empowers businesses to tailor their AI solutions precisely to their needs, balancing performance with cost-effectiveness,” said Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, Asia South at NVIDIA.
“With NVIDIA’s AI software and accelerated computing platform, Zoho is building a broad range of models to help serve the diverse needs of its business customers.”
Through this collaboration, Zoho will be accelerating its LLMs on the NVIDIA accelerated computing platform with NVIDIA Hopper GPUs, using the NVIDIA NeMo end-to-end platform for developing custom generative AI—including LLMs, multimodal, vision, and speech AI.
Additionally, Zoho is testing NVIDIA TensorRT-LLM to optimise its LLMs for deployment and has already seen a 60% increase in throughput and 35% reduction in latency compared with a previously used open-source framework.
The company is also accelerating other workloads like speech-to-text on NVIDIA accelerated computing infrastructure.
As Africa and MENA’s startup ecosystems transition from post-correction resilience into a new phase of disciplined growth, the Africa Startup & VC Landscape Preview (ASVLP 2026) will convene leading founders, investors, policymakers, and ecosystem builders on January 29, 2026, for its second annual, agenda-setting virtual forum.
Following a challenging global venture cycle, 2025 marked a notable rebound across the African ecosystem, with startups raising an estimated $3.2–$3.3 billion over the full year.
The recovery was accompanied by significant structural shifts: Kenya emerged as the leading destination among Africa’s “Big Four” markets for the first time, while Nigeria recorded a year-on-year funding decline, reflecting changing investor preferences, macroeconomic pressures, and a broader recalibration toward capital efficiency and sustainability.
Sectorally, fintech remained the most funded vertical, while climate & energy, AI-enabled solutions, healthtech, and infrastructure-adjacent businesses gained increasing attention. Across Africa and MENA, development finance institutions (DFIs) and family offices played a more pronounced role in anchoring funds, deploying catalytic capital, and supporting blended-finance structures, reshaping how early-stage and growth capital is mobilized.
ASVLP 2026 is designed to translate these data points into forward-looking strategy.
The forum will bring together venture capitalists, angel investors, LPs, DFIs, family offices, founders, corporate leaders, and regulators from Africa, MENA, Europe, and North America to assess 2025 outcomes and chart priorities for 2026.
The program will feature keynotes, fireside chats, panels, and deep-dive roundtables, including discussions on:
· The 2026 Africa & MENA FinTech Landscape, focusing on security, profitability, regulation, and growth frontiers
· Emerging Fund Managers, capital formation, and LP alignment
· Talent, operator depth, and institutional capacity as constraints to scale
· Regulatory evolution and cross-border market integration
A major highlight of ASVLP 2026 will be the Final DealRoom Pitch Session, where a curated group of high-potential startups will present to an experienced panel of investors.
• Founders can apply to pitch via: bit.ly/ASVLP-DR-Founders
• Investors seeking DealRoom access can request entry via: bit.ly/ASVLP-DR-Investors
Confirmed speakers for ASVLP 2026 include Khaled Ismail (HIMangel), Idris Ayodeji Bello (LoftyInc Capital), Zachariah George (Launch Africa), Tosin Faniro-Dada (Breega), Selma Ribica (FirstCircle Capital), Maha Mandour (COREangels MEA), Joe Kinvi (Borderless), Remi Prunier (Orange Ventures MEA), Karima El Hakim (Plug and Play Tech Center), Souheil Guessoum (President, The Confederation of Citizen Employers – Algeria (CAPC)), Remi Prunier (Partner, Orange Ventures, MEA), Maha Mandour (COREAngels MEA), Ali Hussein (President, Kenyan FinTech Association), Patrick Okebu (CIO, Interswitch Group) among other leading voices shaping capital, policy, and innovation across the region.
“The conversation has shifted,” said Uche Aniche, Convener of ASVLP. “It’s no longer about whether capital will return to Africa and MENA, but what kind of capital, deployed with what discipline, and in service of which long-term outcomes. ASVLP exists to help the ecosystem make sense of that transition.”
Participation in ASVLP 2026 is free but strictly by invitation.
Interested participants are encouraged to repost the official announcement on LinkedIn and comment #ASVLP2026 to receive a private registration link. They could also email [email protected] and request invite.
Major social media giants Meta Platforms, TikTok and Alphabet’s YouTube will face a landmark jury trial this week in Los Angeles County Superior Court over allegations that their addictive designs have fuelled a youth mental health crisis, marking the first such case to reach this stage.
Social Media
The pivotal personal injury lawsuit centres on a 19-year-old Californian woman identified as K.G.M., who claims her childhood immersion in Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok—engineered with endless scrolls, autoplay videos, notifications and algorithms—sparked severe anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts.
Dozens of similar suits have surged since 2022 from families, schools and states, accusing the firms of burying internal research on teen harms while prioritising ad revenue through youth-targeted engagement hooks, despite Section 230 protections for user content.
Plaintiffs seek damages and design overhauls, arguing platforms bypassed parents and preyed on vulnerable kids; defendants counter there’s no clinical “social media addiction” diagnosis, no proven causation—kids with issues often use less—and they’ve added safeguards like parental controls and time limits.
Echoing Australia’s under-16 bans, the trial will scrutinise thousands of internal documents, expert testimonies and K.G.M.’s story, potentially expanding tech liability amid debates where studies show complex links, not direct causation, between screen time and disorders like eating issues or self-harm.
A win could mandate warning labels, age gates or algorithm tweaks, reshaping global platforms as U.S. Surgeon General advisories and global scrutiny intensify pressure on Big Tech to prioritise child safety over profits.
Meta is gearing up to trial paid subscription services on Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, aiming to diversify revenue streams beyond advertising while maintaining free core access for all users.
Meta
The subscriptions will offer enhanced tools tailored for everyday users, creators, and businesses, including advanced content creation, sharing, and workflow features distinct from the existing Meta Verified verification program. Unlike a uniform rollout, Meta plans varied testing formats per app to match diverse audiences, experimenting with feature bundles based on user feedback to refine the model.
A key element involves integrating Manus, the autonomous agent firm Meta acquired for $2 billion in December, into these apps alongside its enterprise sales. Manus enables complex task automation with minimal input, with early signs like Instagram shortcuts already spotted by reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi.
Video tools feature prominently: Meta’s Vibes short-form video generator in the Meta AI app shifts to freemium, where paid tiers unlock higher monthly creation limits beyond the free baseline. On Instagram, subscriptions could enable unlimited audience lists, non-follower tracking, and anonymous Story views, though specifics for Facebook and WhatsApp remain under wraps.
Drawing from Meta Verified’s 2023 launch—which provides badges, support, and protection mainly for creators—these broader plans target wider appeal amid industry shifts. Ad growth slows against TikTok competition, while Snapchat+ boasts 16 million subscribers at $3.99 monthly, proving demand for value-driven paid perks despite subscription fatigue risks from streaming and storage fees.
Meta will phase tests gradually, prioritizing feedback to shape long-term viability without alienating free users.
NITDA, NBC Explore Strategic Collaboration on Digital Transformation, Media Regulation
NDIC Seeks EFCC’s Support to Trace, Recover Assets of Failed Banks
Interpol Arrests over 570 Cybercriminals across Africa
NIGCOMSAT Adopts Government’s Performance System
ASVLP 2026: Africa, MENA VCs Gear Up as Tech Funding Hits $4.1bn Rebound
19 Nigerian Banks Meet CBN Recapitalization Targets Ahead of March Deadline
Jumia CEO says Black Friday Signals Nigeria’s E-Commerce Maturity
Galaxy Backbone Celebrates the Federal Government’s Paperless Civil Service Milestone
DStv Offers Instant Package Upgrade for Customers from January to February
Banks to Impose N50 Stamp Duty on Transfers of N10,000 and Above from January 1
News3 days agoLIRS to Invoke NTAA to Recover Unpaid Taxes from Bank Accounts, Others
News3 days agoAnambra Cuts Monday Pay to Kill Sit-at-Home
E-Financial3 days agoFirst Asset Management Receives Upgraded Ratings from Agusto &Co and DataPro
E-Financial3 days agoNIBSS, Others Flag 13,417 Nigerian Fraudsters on Person of Interest Portal
General News3 days agoNigeria Treats Religious Violence as Attack on State – NSA Ribadu
E-Financial3 days agoCBN Prepares Fresh Debit Card Rules to Improve ATM Services
E-Financial2 days agoCBN Upgrades Licences of Opay, Moniepoint, Kuda, Palmpay, Paga to National Status
News2 days agoTech Executives Double Down on AI, Talent and Adaptive Strategies to Lead in the Intelligence Age