[3/20 18:00] Tesla Terafab AI Chip Factory Formally Launches Today / Darts Star Luke Littler Trad...

Kind: captions Language: en This is the AI news flash for March 20th, 6 p.m. UTC. First up, Tesla has formally launched its Terrafab AI chip manufacturing facility today, March 21st. The project, which Elon Musk previewed on March 14th, with a launches in 7 days announcement, carries an estimated cost of $25 billion and is expected to be located at the north campus of Giga, Texas in Austin. The facility targets two nanometer process technology with 100,000 wafer starts per month. Its first product, the AI5 chip, promises 40 to 50 times the compute performance and nine times the memory of the current AI4 chip, powering full self-driving and Optimus robots. Tesla aims for full vertical integration, combining logic processing, memory, and advanced packaging under one roof. Small batch production is expected in 2026 with volume production projected for 2027. Next, 19-year-old darts champion Luke Litler has applied to trademark his face with the UK Intellectual Property Office to combat AI deep fakes. Litler, who has already trademarked his the nuke nickname in the United States, is seeking to prevent AI generated fake products and unauthorized use of his likeness. The move aims to protect his multi-million pound endorsement deals with brands like Xbox and KP Nuts. He follows in the footsteps of actor Matthew McConna and soccer player Cole Palmer as celebrities increasingly turn to trademark law as a new intellectual property strategy against deep fake exploitation. However, experts caution that trademark protection is limited to specific categories of goods and services and is not a silver bullet against deep fakes. Third, Palunteer Technologies and Moder have launched an AI powered mortgage operations platform with Freedom Mortgage as their first customer. Freedom Mortgage, the nation's eighth largest lender with a $642 billion servicing portfolio, has already deployed the platform on several key processes. The platform uses Palunteer's ontology technology to translate guidelines and policies into configurable auditable rules and orchestrate agentic AI workflows across existing systems of record. This marks Palunteer's significant push beyond its core defense and government business into highly regulated financial services, signaling the broader enterprise shift from AI pilots to full-scale operational platforms. But finally, the White House AI legislative framework released on March 20th, has drawn sharp criticism from the Electronic Privacy Information Center, known as EPIC, which says it protects AI companies, not people. The framework explicitly calls for Congress to preempt state AI laws, stating that states should not be permitted to regulate AI development. Fortune reports that the White House plan starts with keeping states out of AI regulation, aiming for a single minimally burdensome national standard instead of 50 separate ones. While the framework outlines six guiding principles, including child safety, intellectual property, and free speech, civil society groups argue it lacks concrete protections for individuals affected by AI systems. That's all for this AI news flashash.