CommunityWFM, one of the premier contact center workforce management software solutions, announced the debut of their new AI driven automated forecasting solution. The latest release of the extensive capabilities utilizes AI to optimize the forecasting process even further, minimizing work and saving contact centers both time and resources. Also known as AI automated forecasting, this solution views historical data quickly and under an analytics lens to create recurring and optimized forecasts with minimal human involvement. With the first iteration based around call volume and average handle time forecasting, this solution involves only a singular set up experience for the end user. Once the initial configuration has been established, AI and machine learning are leveraged to automatically retrain the models and make predictions, then automatically generate staffing requirements and publish the results. With this technology, an end user of the CommunityWFM product could build a recurring forecast built to their desired parameters that will auto generate every other Friday. The end user only needs to complete the initial set up process and the forecast will be created automatically on their behalf moving forward. The date range can vary in many ways to meet the ever-changing demands of a contact center.
Zillow’s ‘Super app’ strategy of expanding into mortgage and rentals segments combined with for-sale strategy of connecting high-intent consumers with partner agents in enhanced markets leading to double-digit adoption rates help drive 15% revenue growth in Q2
Even with a slow housing market, Zillow posted double-digit revenue growth and a $2 million profit in Q2 2025 “As we work to streamline residential real estate transactions with our ‘Housing Super App,’ everything we build is designed to offer a benefit for both consumers and the industry,” Zillow CEO Jeremy Wacksman said. Zillow has gone all in on its “Super App” strategy, seeking to be a one-stop shop for home buyers and seller. In building out this plan, Zillow has expanded into mortgage, through Zillow Home Loans, and has grown its presence in rentals. During the quarter, revenue from its mortgage operation was up 41% annually to $48 million, while Zillow’s rental segment posted 36% year-over-year revenue growth to $159 million. The residential for-sale segment posted 9% annual revenue growth to $434 million. Zillow as a whole recorded quarterly revenue of $655 million, up 15% compared to the same period last year. During the first six months of 2025, Zillow has recorded total net income of $10 million, compared to its $40 million net loss during the first half of 2024. According to Wacksman, much of this growth and improvement for the company is being driven by Zillow’s successful execution of its for-sale strategy. Wacksman said Zillow is seeing this strategy come to life in its enhanced markets, where the company is working to connect high-intent consumers with Zillow partner agents. “In Q2, 27% of connections came through the enhanced market experience on our way to a long-term goal of at least 75% of connections,” he said. Wacksman added that other Zillow Group offerings — including Follow Up Boss and Zillow Home Loans — showed signs of strong adoption in these enhanced markets. Zillow Home Loans posted double-digit adoption rates in the enhanced markets. Wacksman also highlighted the growth of Zillow Rentals, which he said is “scaling rapidly.” “In Q2, Zillow Rentals had 2.4 million active rental listings, the most in the category. Multifamily properties are leading our rentals growth with multifamily revenue up 56% year over year and property count up 45% year over year to 64,000 at the end of Q2,” he said. According to Wacksman, this growth has led Zillow to claim the No. 1 position in rentals traffic, with 36 million average monthly rental unique visitors in Q2 2025. “We expect quarterly year-over-year rentals revenue growth to keep accelerating throughout 2025, with a clear path toward the billion-dollar-plus revenue opportunity in front of us,” he said.
Real estate agency is using AI to create 3-4 minutes custom audio clips ‘podcasts’ with descriptions of a property’s layout, standout features, renovation potential, and information about local amenities, delivering them automatically to individuals who attend viewings within hours of a visit
A United Kingdom-based real estate agency has introduced personalized audio summaries as a new way for prospective homebuyers to revisit property viewings. Plans are reportedly in the works for a U.S. release. Ashton Stripp, an agency based in Sussex, is now sending custom “podcasts” to individuals who attend viewings. The recordings are roughly three to four minutes in length. Dubbed HouseCast, the tool uses AI to create audio clips that are delivered automatically within hours of a visit. Clips include descriptions of a property’s layout, standout features, renovation potential, garden orientation, and information about local amenities such as schools and historical context. The system was developed by AI strategist Paul Hurley of TrainrAI — a technology consultancy based in Sussex. The software compiles internal notes, listing descriptions and public data into natural-sounding voice recordings. Housecast is simply the property world’s turn, and it shows how quickly fresh ideas can become real products. According to Ashton Stripp, early trials of the tool began with seller-oriented podcasts that summarize feedback on valuations. Since expanding the concept to buyers, the feedback has been largely positive. Several homebuyers have reported that the podcasts help them recall key details after viewing multiple homes in a day.
Thales enables SMEs to onboard customers faster by scanning 8,000 ID documents from around the world using a smartphone’s camera and NFC reader, matching them to the bearer’s face biometrics in real-time and cross-checking verifications against KYC and AML regulations
Thales is partnering with Goaco to provide biometric identity verification technology for an app designed for small and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs). The Goidentity app uses Thales technology to scan 8,000 ID documents from around the world using a smartphone’s camera and NFC reader, matching them to the bearer’s face biometrics. Thales’ passive liveness detection protects against spoof attacks, and the app cross-checks verifications against KYC and AML regulations to ensure compliance. Data is not stored on the user’s device or on the platform, ensuring compliance with privacy regulations like GDPR. The capabilities are provided as a cloud service, enabling real-time digital identity verification without an upfront infrastructure investment. Companies can integrate them with their web or mobile applications for Android or iOS through REST APIs and SDKs. Thales aims to make trust possible in an increasingly digital world for businesses of every size, extending the reach of their technology to meet the needs of underserved markets.
Pinterest repositions as an “AI-enabled shopping assistant” offering users personalized recommendations and visual and conversational search experiences and not an AI agent that shops on users’ behalf
Pinterest CEO Bill Ready said that it will be some time before consumers are ready to let AI agents do their shopping for them, but that Pinterest is providing AI-powered tools that will “meet the user where they are” in the meantime. In terms of AI agents buying things without the customer being involved, it’s going to be “a very, very long cycle for that to play out” because customers will have to get used to that idea. “But if we look at what’s happening on our platform already, we’re able to take the user much further down that shopping journey assisting them. Pinterest has “really made AI central to everything that we’re doing, “ Ready said. He pointed to the platform’s ability to make recommendations that align with each user’s taste and style, to effectively curate products for users based on very small signals, and to save users some of the time and work that goes into the shopping journey. “We see really great early signs of that,” Ready said. “And we think there’s a lot more that we’re going to be able to do there that we will focus on in a very user-centric way that meets the user where they are, but with AI and LLMs and agentic capabilities deeply embedded in the way that we’re doing that.” The company aims to use generative AI to keep discovery joyful and make shopping frictionless, Pinterest Vice President of Design Dana Cho told
Federal court ruling on debit card swipe fees cap to lower the amount banks can charge to food retailers and all other merchants by less than a third, reflecting the drop in banks’ average cost of processing a transaction by nearly 50% to 3.9 cents as of 2021
U.S. District Judge Daniel Traynor of the U.S. District Court for the District of North Dakota granted summary judgment in a federal lawsuit filed by truck stop and convenience store Corner Post in 2021 against the board of governors of the Federal Reserve System regarding Regulation II, the federal law governing debit card swipe fees. “Grocery customers and food retailers across the country won a critical victory in our fight against unreasonably high debit card swipe fees,” asserted Leslie G. Sarasin, president and CEO of FMI – The Food Industry Association. “The debit regulated rate was initially set by the Federal Reserve in 2011. Since then, the Fed’s own data has shown that banks’ costs to process debit card transactions have gone down dramatically but the rate charged to food retailers and all other merchants has not been adjusted.” Added Sarasin: “FMI remains hopeful that this ruling will spur the Fed to finalize its debit regulated rate rulemaking that lowers the rate and establishes a process for regular updates. Ensuring a ‘reasonable and proportional’ debit regulated rate, as required by law, is critically important to keeping prices low for customers in the slim-margined grocery industry.” “Doug Kantor, a member of the executive committee of the Merchants Payments Coalition (MPC) and general counsel for the National Association of Convenience Stores said “This case shows that banks have swiped a windfall of billions of dollars per year in debit fees from Main Street that go far beyond normal, competitive profit margins. The Federal Reserve should quickly rewrite its rules to cure this problem and reduce the inflationary pressure these fees impose on the entire US economy.” According to MPC, the proposal didn’t go far enough because it would lower the amount banks can charge by less than a third, even though banks’ average cost of processing a transaction has dropped by nearly 50%, from 7.7 cents just before the rate was set, to 3.9 cents as of 2021.
Algebrik AI’s integration of Open Lending’s auto loan decisioning capabilities within its LOS to enable credit unions to evaluate near- and non-prime applicants, receive real-time decisions and automatically surface stipulations tied to counter-offers
Algebrik AI announced an integration with Open Lending Corporation, an industry trailblazer in automotive lending enablement and risk analytics solutions for financial institutions. This collaboration aims to strengthen auto loan decisioning capabilities within Algebrik’s cloud-native, AI-powered LOS—part of the Algebrik One lending suite—enabling credit unions and community lenders to confidently extend credit to near- and non-prime borrowers while minimizing risk and streamlining workflows. Open Lending’s Lenders Protection™ platform empowers financial institutions to safely approve near- and non-prime auto loans by combining real-time risk modeling, pricing optimization, and insurance-backed loan protection. Through this partnership, Algebrik’s Loan Origination System, part of Algebrik One, Algebrik’s agentic AI-powered lending suite, now offers built-in access to the Lenders Protection™ platform, allowing credit unions to: Evaluate near- and non-prime applicants using Open Lending’s advanced decisioning engine; Receive real-time decisions (approved, counteroffer, or denied), including APR, terms, stipulations, and certificate numbers; Automatically surface stipulations tied to counter-offers (e.g., vehicle details, income verification) within the lending workflow of Algebrik’s Loan Origination System; Leverage Open Lending’s insured, risk-based decisioning directly within Algebrik’s LOS- no external systems needed.
Productivity app Ocean works with Gmail or Google Workspace accounts allowing users to turn their emails into tasks and action items and helps triage inbox by letting users filter emails by categories like first-timers, persistent pingers, and emails from contacts
A new personal productivity app called Ocean is launching to help you triage your overloaded inbox, take action on your emails by turning them into tasks, and share your availability for meetings with others, all in one app. The app works with Gmail or Google Workspace accounts, allowing users to turn their emails into tasks and action items so they’re not forgotten. To make this work, the app includes its own Task Manager that has access to the user’s email. That means you don’t have to copy or paste information into an external to-do app while instead gaining access to features that go beyond what Google’s task manager offers Gmail users. With Ocean, you can create tasks using rich formatting, set due dates, organize tasks into folders, and link emails to your task’s notes. It can also automatically pull out action items from longer emails for you. You can choose to manage the emails you mean to reply to later by creating a task as well, instead of leaving them unread or applying a label of some sort. For inbox zero enthusiasts, the killer feature will be Ocean’s inbox triage tools. The app lets you filter emails by categories like first-timers, persistent pingers, and emails from your contacts. It can even surface emails that are marked as spam but might belong in your inbox, so you don’t miss anything important. Ocean also offers subscription management tools in addition to the baseline email functions of composing, replying, flagging, archiving, and deleting email. Plus, Ocean offers built-in meeting scheduling tools that let you set your availability based on your pending and booked events. Here, you can set your open times and block others from booking those meetings at the last minute, which is a handy trick. You can also send an automated email invite to meeting recipients, confirm meeting proposals from a web interface, and automatically add confirmed meetings to your calendar.
SEC wants to supercharge super-apps, by allowing investors to access a wide array of assets and financial services in one place with clear guidelines on how to categorize crypto assets Paul Atkins, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), has announced several new initiatives under Project Crypto to modernize rules and regulations. One part of his vision is the development of super-apps that allow investors to access a wide array of assets and financial services in one place. Under Project Crypto, the SEC will issue clear guidelines on how to categorize crypto assets, including what is and is not a security. Super-apps would serve as a one-stop shop where investors could access various digital trading and asset management services, such as buying or selling cryptocurrencies alongside traditional securities within the same account. If this comes to fruition, a brokerage account could give customers more access to digital assets and banking services. There’s nothing in current securities laws to stop SEC-registered trading platforms from listing non-securities. Super-apps have taken off in parts of Asia, such as China’s WeChat, but attempts to replicate the service in North America or Europe have not been successful due to regulatory, cultural, and competition from existing players. If the super-app market can establish itself, several existing crypto exchanges and brokerages could be well positioned to capitalize on shifts in consumer behavior. It may also serve to open decentralized finance (DeFi) applications to more investors. Major cryptocurrency platforms like Coinbase and brokerages like Robinhood are already positioning themselves as super-app market leaders, potentially securing a first-mover advantage. However, the changing digital asset landscape in the U.S. could bring opportunities for investors, such as earning staking rewards, but also raises concerns about increased fraud, theft, and data-protection laws. Investors must do considerable due diligence on both the platform they use and the assets they buy.
Paul Atkins, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), has announced several new initiatives under Project Crypto to modernize rules and regulations. One part of his vision is the development of super-apps that allow investors to access a wide array of assets and financial services in one place. Under Project Crypto, the SEC will issue clear guidelines on how to categorize crypto assets, including what is and is not a security. Super-apps would serve as a one-stop shop where investors could access various digital trading and asset management services, such as buying or selling cryptocurrencies alongside traditional securities within the same account. If this comes to fruition, a brokerage account could give customers more access to digital assets and banking services. There’s nothing in current securities laws to stop SEC-registered trading platforms from listing non-securities. Super-apps have taken off in parts of Asia, such as China’s WeChat, but attempts to replicate the service in North America or Europe have not been successful due to regulatory, cultural, and competition from existing players. If the super-app market can establish itself, several existing crypto exchanges and brokerages could be well positioned to capitalize on shifts in consumer behavior. It may also serve to open decentralized finance (DeFi) applications to more investors. Major cryptocurrency platforms like Coinbase and brokerages like Robinhood are already positioning themselves as super-app market leaders, potentially securing a first-mover advantage. However, the changing digital asset landscape in the U.S. could bring opportunities for investors, such as earning staking rewards, but also raises concerns about increased fraud, theft, and data-protection laws. Investors must do considerable due diligence on both the platform they use and the assets they buy.
Furniture.com delivers seamless shopping across multiple brand with agentic AI enabling a single checkout across multiple brands
Furniture.com operates as an omnichannel “one-stop shop” by integrating store location and inventory data within its search engine to enable customers to explore, test and purchase furniture items either digitally or in person. Now, the company is partnering with agentic AI embedded checkout infrastructure provider Firmly to enable shoppers to browse, compare, and check out across multiple furniture brands in a single, unified experience without opening another tab or jumping between retailer sites. Features of the new seamless shopping experience include: One checkout across multiple brands; Real-time inventory and delivery estimates; Secure payments with traditional cards; Fully protected retailer data and brand identity; Instant plug-in for participating retailers. “Furniture.com’s features aim to simplify and consolidate this process, and Firmly’s checkout enablement removes the last major friction point—and helps people finish the journey they started,” said Alex Seaman, founder and senior VP at Furniture.com