The day in tech.

Flex, an AI-native private banking fintech, raised $70 million in Series B1 funding at a $1.2 billion valuation. The round was led by Halo, an investment firm founded by Qualtrics founder Ryan Smith and Accel general partner Ryan Sweeney. Total equity raised reaches $180 million, plus $300 million in debt financing.

Oracle is leading the race to sell air-gapped cloud services to Japan, which the US says are key to secure intelligence sharing between Tokyo and its allies. Larry Ellison's group proposes an air-gapped network as the US pressures Tokyo to tighten security of sensitive data.

Neko Health raised $700 million in a Series C funding round, giving the health-scanning startup a $7 billion valuation. The company operates a refurbished first clinic in Stockholm and is led by CEO Hjalmar Nilsonne.

DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng now has an estimated net worth of $36 billion, more than double his previous $16.7 billion, making him the wealthiest founder among AI model companies. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index revalued his stake after DeepSeek's $7.4 billion funding round in June lifted its valuation to roughly $50 billion.

OpenAI is developing a portable, screenless smart speaker with a camera and sensors, aiming for a 2027 launch. The device, described as a humanlike AI companion, will feature moving mechanical elements and run on GPT-Live. Apple recently sued OpenAI, alleging trade secret theft, but OpenAI believes its product differs significantly from Apple's offerings.

Samsung will no longer offer free double storage upgrades for pre-orders of the Galaxy Z Flip 8, Galaxy Z Fold 8, and Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra. Instead, the company will cover only 50% of the upgrade cost. The change is due to rising memory chip prices and a global RAM and storage shortage.

DeepSeek plans to raise $1.5 billion in a new funding round that values the company at $71 billion. The AI firm also targets an initial public offering in 2027.

Hadrius raised $22 million in a Series A funding round for its AI-powered compliance tools. The company develops software that automates regulatory compliance processes for financial services firms. The funding will support product development and expansion of the platform's capabilities.

Twenty-six anonymous Meta employees are suing the company, claiming it used AI systems including Metamate to score and rank workers in a May layoff that cut 8,000 employees. The lawsuit alleges the systems discriminated against employees on protected leave, including those on maternity leave. Meta called the claims meritless.

Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis proposed creating a U.S.-led AI standards body modeled after FINRA. The organization would create quarterly-updated benchmarks for frontier models, evaluating risks in cybersecurity, biology, and deceptive AI. Hassabis hopes to launch the body by year's end after talks with the White House, European officials, and AI labs.