Credit: StackCommerce TL;DR: Reachfast is a powerful B2B lead generation tool that lets you find verified business emails from LinkedIn URLs in under five minutes — now available for just $49.99 for lifetime access (reg. $720). Whether you’re building a sales pipeline, sourcing candidates, or scaling a startup, B2B outreach can feel like you’re wading through molasses. Endless LinkedIn browsing, clunky email guesswork, and dead-end CRM imports are all too familiar. That’s where Reachfast can help. Reachfast is a web-based platform designed to help professionals find direct business emails using just a LinkedIn profile URL. Behind its sleek interface is a triple-verification system that delivers accurate email addresses for over 385 million professionals across 190+ countries — from CEOs and CTOs to HR directors, marketers, and beyond. The process is simple but powerful. Upload a CSV of LinkedIn URLs or paste them in manually, and Reachfast gets to work. It will typically return verified results in under five minutes. If you’re working from the browser, its Chrome extension makes live email discovery from LinkedIn pages instant. There’s no second-guessing or API integrations — just verified contact info when and where you need it. What sets Reachfast apart from traditional tools is not just its speed or accuracy but the lifetime pricing model. For a one-time cost of $49.99, users get access to 1,000 verified email credits per month, with full access to the extension and bulk upload features. That’s a dramatic value leap compared to SaaS tools charging hundreds per year. Professionals in sales, recruiting, business development, or consulting will appreciate how Reachfast reduces prospecting from hours to minutes. There’s no need for complex CRM overlays or bloated platforms — just a clean, straightforward tool that connects you with the right people faster. Get this lifetime subscription to Reachfast for the one-time price of $49.99 while you still can.  Reachfast – B2B Lead Generation: Lifetime Subscription – $49.99 StackSocial prices subject to change. source

By Tom Zanki ( March 25, 2025, 8:44 PM EDT) — The U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee on Tuesday debated bills that would ease rules governing private and public securities offerings, marking Congress’ latest push to deregulate capital markets under President Donald Trump’s second term…. Law360 is on it, so you are, too. A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions. A Law360 subscription includes features such as Daily newsletters Expert analysis Mobile app Advanced search Judge information Real-time alerts 450K+ searchable archived articles And more! Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial. source

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More Groq and PlayAI announced a partnership today to bring Dialog, an advanced text-to-speech model, to market through Groq’s high-speed inference platform. The partnership combines PlayAI’s expertise in voice AI with Groq’s specialized processing infrastructure, creating what the companies claim is one of the most natural-sounding and responsive text-to-speech systems available. “Groq provides a complete, low latency system for automatic speech recognition (ASR), GenAI, and text-to-speech, all in one place,” said Ian Andrews, Chief Revenue Officer at Groq, in an exclusive interview with VentureBeat. “With Dialog now running on GroqCloud, this means customers won’t have to use multiple providers for a single use case — Groq is a one stop solution.” Groq powers first Arabic voice AI, expanding Middle East tech presence Dialog is notable for being available in both English and Arabic, with the Arabic version representing the first voice AI specifically designed for the Middle East region. The inclusion of Arabic as one of the initial offerings was strategic for both companies. “Arabic is the fourth most spoken language globally — by partnering with PlayAI to offer an Arabic TTS model, Groq is unlocking a key global market and enabling broader access to fast AI inference,” Andrews told VentureBeat. The companies claim their solution addresses key shortcomings in existing voice AI technologies, particularly around natural speech patterns and response speed. According to benchmark testing conducted by third-party evaluator Podonos, Dialog was preferred by users at a rate of 10:1 versus ElevenLabs v2.5 Turbo and over 3:1 against ElevenLabs Multilingual v2.0. Innovative ‘adaptive speech contextualizer’ transforms conversational AI What sets Dialog apart is its sophisticated approach to context. Rather than treating each vocalization as an isolated event, the system maintains awareness of the entire conversation flow. “We built a novel architecture that we call an ‘adaptive speech contextualizer‘ (ASC), which allows the model to use the full context and history of a conversation,” said Mahmoud Felfel, co-founder and CEO of PlayAI, in an interview with VentureBeat. “This means that every response isn’t just a standalone output; it’s enriched with appropriate prosody, tone, and emotion that reflect the flow of the conversation.” For enterprises looking to implement conversational AI, latency — the delay between request and response — has been a persistent challenge. Groq’s specialized Language Processing Units (LPUs) appear to provide a significant advantage in this area. “Based on initial internal testing, Groq is delivering up to 140 characters per second on PlayAI’s Dialog model, a significant boost compared to the same model running on GPUs at 86 characters per second,” explained Andrews. “That means that Dialog generates text up to 10 times faster than real-time.” Groq secures $1.5 billion Saudi investment to build world-class AI infrastructure The partnership comes at a time of significant expansion for Groq, which recently secured a $1.5 billion commitment from Saudi Arabia to fund additional infrastructure. The company has established a data center in Dammam, which it describes as “the region’s largest inference cluster.” “Partnering with Groq was a no-brainer; they’re the industry leader in advanced AI inference infrastructure,” said Felfel. “With TTS and agents, low latency is key. We’ve already optimized Dialog for these real-time applications, but partnering with Groq allows us to deliver the lowest latency voice model on the market.” The voice AI market has seen rapid growth as businesses look to automate customer interactions while maintaining a natural, human-like experience. Applications range from customer service and sales automation to voice-overs and accessibility features for the visually impaired. Enterprise applications extend beyond traditional customer service use cases “Beyond customer service, other enterprise use cases include automating sales and appointment scheduling, on-boarding and personal assistants, creating voice overs to existing content, translating English audio and video content into Arabic, increasing website and static content accessibility for the visually impaired, and more,” Andrews said. For PlayAI, which was founded by entrepreneurs from the Middle East and North Africa region, the inclusion of Arabic language capabilities was particularly meaningful. “As MENA founders, we know the region is heavily investing in AI capabilities and infrastructure as inflected in investments like Groq, but also world-leading adoption,” said Felfel. “Arabic is a global business language and one that we grew up speaking, so it was a natural choice as one of our core languages.” The companies have made the Dialog technology available through GroqCloud’s tiered service model, which includes both free and paid options. This approach allows developers to experiment with the technology before committing to larger implementations. “GroqCloud offers both free and paid plans. Anyone can create an account and create an API code for free,” Andrews explained. “Our paid Developer Tier is self-serve, meaning anyone with a credit card can sign up themselves.” As voice becomes an increasingly important interface for AI systems, this partnership positions both companies to capitalize on the growing demand for more natural and responsive conversational experiences. By addressing the technical challenges of latency and natural speech patterns, Groq and PlayAI may have removed significant barriers to wider adoption of voice AI in enterprise settings. source

多品牌策略餐飲集團叙福樓集團(01978)剛剛公布去年業績，由於環球經濟不穩導致本地消費能力疲弱，以及本地消費市場處於重大轉型期，收入按年減少約 17.3%至約 10.56 億港元;若撇除重大雜項項目，即就物業、廠房及設備、使 用權資產及無形資產計提的減值撥備約 3,687 萬港元後，年內業務產生的核心凈溢利約 481 萬港元；值得留意的是，單計下半年核心凈溢利約 1,215 萬港元，顯示集團去年下半年經營情況大幅改善。 集團一直沒有銀行借貸，手頭現金為其在巿場轉型過程提供充足的支持。伴隨經濟環境改善，本地消費市場有望逐步回暖，利率下調週期將緩解經營壓力，一簽多行政策重開及未來持續擴大，本地大量大型活動等，將有效刺激旅客來港及本地消費意欲。因此，集團開店未有停步：於去年底今年初短短一個月內，開設了十間新店舖及裝修後重開一間店舖，此創舉打破了集團的開店紀錄。 目前，集團於香港透過經營超過 15 個多樣化並具吸引力的品牌，合共營運 63 間餐廳，旗下品牌包括自有品牌「牛涮鍋」、「好鍋日子」、 「敘•小麵」、「好呷台灣火鍋」、「和平飯店」、「永華日常」、「煲仔王」及並與兩姊妹涼皮有限公司合作經營的「兩姊妹涼皮 x 株式會社」，以及自日本引入的人氣特許經營品牌「牛角」、「牛角 J」「牛角次男坊」、「温野菜」、「THE MATCHA TOKYO」及「挽肉と米」。 LinkedIn Email Facebook Twitter WhatsApp The post 叙福樓去年下半年營運情況明顯改善 appeared first on VeriMedia. source

Tesla’s sales in Europe have plummeted by 42% this year, according to the latest figures from the European Automobile Manufacturers Association. Tesla’s slip came despite total EV sales on the continent rising 28% over the same period. Analysts have linked the slump to Tesla’s aging model lineup and growing backlash against CEO Elon Musk’s increasingly polarising behaviour.   Whatever the reason, Andrew Fellows, an automotive and mobility expert at global tech consultancy Star, told TNW he thinks the recent sales slide has opened “a rare window of opportunity” for rival European carmakers to regain lost ground from Musk’s firm. Tesla’s Model Y has been the best-selling EV in Europe for two years in a row. But in February, both Volkswagen and the BMW Group (including Mini) overtook Tesla in total EV sales for the first time, according to data from Jato Dynamics.  Hugging Face, ASML, OpenAI, Monzo & Datasnipper Check out the NEW speakers for TNW Conference 2025 on June 19 & 20. VW’s sales were up 180%, with its ID.4 beating out the Model Y to become the best-selling EV in Europe last month. Sweden’s Polestar sold 2,000 cars, representing an 84% jump. The company has been actively targeting disgruntled Tesla owners with special offers on its EVs.  Tesla’s public image is suffering under Musk, whose role in the Trump administration and endorsement of Germany’s far-right AfD party have drawn widespread condemnation in Europe.  Tesla’s dealerships have been vandalised. Its cars have been set on fire. In one of the more dramatic expressions of outrage, political campaigners beamed an image of Musk making a Nazi-like salute alongside the word “Heil” onto Tesla’s gigafactory in Berlin. With Tesla fighting fires, now could be the opportune moment for European automakers to strike. However, they’ll need to move quickly because Chinese car companies are looming large.  The EV challengers to Tesla “Chinese EV brands are entering the European market at pace, offering strong performance, advanced software and aggressive pricing,” said Fellows. “While they still lack the branding power of their European rivals, they’re moving fast and learning quickly.” In February, BYD’s EV sales in Europe almost doubled from the same month last year. Combined, Chinese-owned brands, including BYD, Xpeng, and Leapmotor, sold more electric cars than Tesla, according to Jato Dynamics. Dr Henning Dransfeld, an Austrian automotive expert and a director at software firm Infor, told TNW that the rise of Chinese EVs presented a “fundamental threat” to European carmakers.  “While all eyes are on Tesla’s stumble, Chinese manufacturers are reshaping our industry’s competitive landscape,” he said.  Bolstered by strong state subsidies, Chinese automakers could surpass European brands, even with the EU’s proposed tariffs on Chinese-made EVs.  The only way for European carmakers to stay competitive, said Fellows, is to build better EVs and lower prices.  “European manufacturers [need to] respond with more affordable models, smarter branding, and better software,” he said. “If they hesitate, Chinese brands will seize the opportunity created by Tesla’s decline and Europe’s carmakers may find themselves chasing from behind once again.” source

According to Clas Artvin, the Swedish fuel company’s CIO, embracing digitalization isn’t only better for business, but essential to brand identity considering the massive shifts taking place in the industry. source

Google has unveiled Gemini 2.5 Pro, the first in its Gemini 2.5 family. This multimodal reasoning model outperforms competitors from OpenAI, Anthropic, and DeepSeek in key benchmarks related to coding, mathematics, and science. What are reasoning AI models? Reasoning AIs are designed to “think before they speak.” They evaluate context, process details methodically, and fact-check responses to ensure logical accuracy — though these capabilities demand more computing power and higher operational costs. OpenAI launched the first reasoning model last September with o1, a notable departure from the GPT series, which was largely focused on language generation. Since then, the major players in the AI race have responded: DeepSeek with R1, Anthropic with Claude Sonnet 3.7, and xAI’s with Grok 3. Evolving beyond ‘flash thinking’ Google previously launched its first reasoning AI model, Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking, in December. Marketed for its agentic capabilities, Flash Thinking was recently updated to allow file uploads and larger prompts; however, with the introduction of Gemini 2.5 Pro, Google appears to be retiring the “Thinking” label altogether. According to Google’s announcement about Gemini 2.5, this is because reasoning capabilities will now be integrated natively across all future models. This shift marks a move toward a more unified AI architecture, rather than separating “thinking” features as standalone branding. The new experimental model combines “a significantly enhanced base model” with “improved post-training.” Google touts its performance at the top of the LMArena leaderboard, which ranks major large language models across various tasks. DOWNLOAD: How to Use AI in Business from TechRepublic Premium Benchmark leader in science, math, and code Gemini 2.5 Pro excels in academic reasoning benchmarks, scoring 86.7% on AIME 2025 (mathematics) and 84.0% on the GPQA diamond benchmark (science). On Humanity’s Last Exam — a broad test featuring thousands of questions across mathematics, science, and humanities —  the model leads with a score of 18.8%. Notably, these results were achieved without the use of expensive test-time techniques, which allow models like o1 and R1 to continue learning during evaluation. In software development benchmarks, Gemini 2.5 Pro performance is mixed. It scored 68.6% on the Aider Polyglot benchmark for code editing, outperforming most top-tier models. However, it scored 63.8% on SWE-bench Verified, placing second to Claude Sonnet 3.7 in broader programming tasks. Despite this, Google says Gemini 2.5 Pro “excels at creating visually compelling web apps and agentic code applications,” as evidenced by its ability to create a video game from a single prompt. The model supports a context window of one million tokens, meaning it can process the equivalent of a 750,000-word prompt, or the first six Harry Potter books. Google plans to increase this threshold to two million tokens in due course. Gemini 2.5 Pro is currently available through the Gemini Advanced app, which requires a $20-a-month subscription, and to developers and enterprises through Google AI Studio. In the coming weeks, Gemini 2.5 Pro will be made available on Vertex AI, Google’s machine-learning platform for developers, and pricing details for different rate limits will also be introduced. source

By Isaac Monterose ( March 27, 2025, 8:45 PM EDT) — The Federal Trade Commission settled its false advertisement suit in New York federal court against online cash advance company Cleo AI Inc. for $17 million, according to a proposed settlement order posted on the FTC’s website Thursday…. Law360 is on it, so you are, too. A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions. A Law360 subscription includes features such as Daily newsletters Expert analysis Mobile app Advanced search Judge information Real-time alerts 450K+ searchable archived articles And more! Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial. source

A long-dormant IT project that suddenly springs back to life can be both welcome and challenging. Teams must be reassembled, abandoned timelines reconfigured, and technologies and methodologies updated to reflect current practices and standards.  The best way to launch a project revival is to look backward. “Conduct a thorough project reassessment to identify the root causes of delays, then re-prioritize deliverables using a phased, agile-based approach,” suggests Karan Kumar Ratra, an engineering leader at Walmart specializing in e-commerce technology, leadership, and innovation. “Start with high-impact, manageable milestones to restore momentum and stakeholder confidence,” he advises in an online interview. “Clear communication, accountability, and aligning leadership with revised goals are critical.”  Shanna Rahming, senior vice president of managed services for SDI Presence, an IT consulting and managed services provider, and former CIO for the State of Nevada, agrees that it’s important to understand what actually caused the delay. Was it a lack of resources, such as funding, skills, tools, hardware, or staff? “After you know why it’s off track, you can then determine what needs to be done to get the project completed,” she advises in an online interview.  Related:Who Makes the Best Citizen Developers? Once the delay’s cause has been clearly defined, seek information and insights from the original team, Rahming advises. “Then the stakeholders and executives need to have that information communicated to them.”  The next step should be performing a root-cause analysis. “Identify whether the delay stemmed from unclear requirements, technical debt, resource gaps, or scope creep,” Ratra says. “Engage stakeholders, document findings, and reset priorities based on what delivers the most value in the shortest time.”  Team Rebuilding  It’s usually best to retain past core team members who understand the project’s history and complexities but augment the team with new expertise where gaps exist, Ratra says. “Fresh perspectives often drive innovation and problem-solving, while experienced team members ensure continuity.”  Recall past team members, yet supplement them with new members with similar skills and project experience, recommends Pundalika Shenoy, automation and modernization project manager at business consulting firm Smartbridge, via email. “Outside perspectives and expertise will help the team.”  While new team members should be welcomed, try to retain at least some past contributors to ensure project continuity, Rahming advises. Fresh ideas and insights may be what the legacy project needs to succeed but try to retain at least some past contributors to ensure project continuity, Rahming advises. “The new team members may well bring a sense of urgency, enthusiasm and skills … that weren’t present in the previous team at the time of the delay.”  Related:Quick Study: The Evolving Roles of CIOs and IT Leaders Avoiding Mistakes  The biggest mistake team leaders make is rushing into execution without first addressing root causes. “Restarting a project without fixing systemic issues, such as poor communication, unrealistic timelines, or unclear scope, can lead to repeated failures,” Ratra warns. IT leaders must also avoid setting overly ambitious goals. “Start small, show progress, and scale up.”  It’s easy to focus on simply catching up with deadlines or scrambling to get back on track, but if the underlying issues aren’t addressed, the same problems will likely surface again, cautions Anbang Xu, founder of JoggAI, an AI-based video platform provider. “IT leaders sometimes ignore team dynamics, communication issues, or technical debt in favor of focusing on just getting the project finished,” he explains in an email interview. “This can create a cycle of delay, further burnout and, ultimately, project failure.”  Related:How WFH and RTO Burnout Differ Shenoy says the two big mistakes he repeatedly sees are adding additional resources without understanding the real issues and overcommitting without team consensus.  Final Thoughts  Transparency and trust are essential for successful project recovery, Ratra says. “Leaders should foster an open culture of accountability and communicate realistic goals with stakeholders.” Leveraging automation tools and using AI-driven project monitoring can also help identify bottlenecks early, ensuring the team remains on track and responsive.  To keep the relaunched project on track, it’s important to establish and monitor a detailed communication plan that regularly shares critical information with team members, Rahming says. There should also be buy-in from technology and business stakeholders.  Build a unified staff culture that’s committed to succeeding or failing as a team, Shenoy says. “Encourage transparency and active collaboration across the team and stakeholders.”  Managing delayed projects requires a deep understanding of adaptability and resilience, Xu observes. “In a fast-moving field, like AI, setbacks are inevitable,” he notes. “But the ability to pivot, reassess, and lead your team with confidence makes all the difference.”  source

Across mostly middle-income survey countries, people say it’s ideal to be a spouse, parent and homeowner by 30, and to retire by 60 How we did this This Pew Research Center analysis examines what people see as the best age to get married, have a first child, buy a home and retire. It draws on nationally representative surveys of 23,022 adults across 18 countries: Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Tunisia and Turkey. The surveys were conducted face-to-face from Jan. 5 to May 22, 2024. To analyze the ages respondents provided, we first removed any values that were more than three standard deviations from the mean. This is a common way to remove outliers, which, in survey work that requires an interviewer to log responses on a tablet in the field, can sometimes be data entry errors. For each question, we averaged responses within each country (excluding outliers) and took an overall average based on these 18 values. To compare educational groups across countries, we standardize education levels based on the United Nations’ International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED). Here are the questions used for the report, along with responses, and the survey methodology. When is the right time in life to get married or have a child? What is the best age to buy a home? Is there an ideal age for retirement? We asked adults in 18 mostly middle-income countries what they think is the best age to reach these life milestones. Overall, there is a lot of agreement around the world. On average across the countries surveyed, people say it is best to get married and have a first child around 26 years old. They place the best age for buying a home at just under 30 and the ideal age for retirement at around 58. And for each of these milestones, the average ages suggested by country are generally no more than a decade apart. For example, country averages for the ideal retirement age range from early 50s to early 60s – that is, 52.1 in Colombia to 62.7 in Nigeria. These averages give us a broad view of differences between countries, but we’re also able to take a closer look within each country at the much wider range of responses people provide. Countries included in this analysis We asked these questions about the ideal timing of life events in 18 countries where we conduct our surveys face-to-face: Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Tunisia and Turkey. In-person interviewing generally allows for greater rapport between the interviewer and respondent, and people are often more comfortable taking longer surveys in this setting. The countries where we survey face-to-face are generally less wealthy than other nations. The World Bank classifies all countries included in this report (except Chile) as middle-income countries, while the United Nations classifies all 18 as developing economies. The middle-income nations we survey also tend to have younger populations than high-income nations, with a lower median age and life expectancy. Across the 18 countries in this analysis, the median age is 31.2 years, with a median life expectancy of 74.8 years. Best age to get married Generally, people across the 18 countries surveyed think it’s best to get married in one’s mid-20s. Average ideal ages range from 21.2 in Bangladesh to 28.9 in Argentina. More than three-quarters of adults in Bangladesh say the best age for marriage is under 25. India is the only other country where a majority think the best age is under 25. By contrast, in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Peru, South Africa and Tunisia, roughly 10% of adults or more say the ideal age for marriage is 35 or older – the highest shares to say this among the countries surveyed. And 10% in Tunisia, 11% in Argentina and 16% in Chile say there is no best age for getting married. People in the countries surveyed, on average, actually do get married in their 20s, according to data from the United Nations. But there is a gender gap, with women typically marrying at a younger age than men. Our survey finds a similar gender gap in views of the ideal age for marriage: In 14 of 18 countries, women say the best age to get married is slightly earlier in life, compared with men. Read more in Chapter 1: What is the best age to get married? And jump to Appendix A for the actual ages at which people around the world marry, have their first child and become eligible for retirement benefits.  Best age to become a parent People across the 18 countries surveyed also largely agree that the best time to have a first child is in one’s mid-20s. Averages range from 23.5 years old in Bangladesh to 29.8 in Tunisia. A third of adults or more in Bangladesh, India, Kenya and South Africa say it is ideal to have a first child before age 25. Similar shares in Argentina, Chile, Peru, Thailand and Tunisia say the best age to become a parent is 30 or older. Though people in our survey overall place the best age for having a child at 26.1, women tend to give birth for the first time a little later than that, according to UN data. In most countries polled, the typical woman is about 28 or older when she has her first child. Read more in Chapter 2: What is the best age to have a first child? Best age to buy a home There is a little less agreement about what age is best to become a homeowner. Average ideal ages for buying a home range from 24.9 in Brazil to 36.3 in Ghana. Roughly 20% of adults or more in South Africa, Sri Lanka and across Latin America say the best time to reach this milestone is before age 25. And in 11 countries, at