US to fund 1 billion more Covid-19 vaccines; ex-Googlers’ Arbo Works gets Sequoia funding; plus, Sri Ambati on his open-source AI movement

US President Joe Biden’s administration is offering funding to drug companies including Pfizer and Moderna to expand mRNA Covid-19 vaccine capacity by a billion doses by the second half of 2022, Bloomberg reports. Announced on Wednesday, the plan is also aimed at building the capacity to address any future pandemic, according to Bloomberg. Oxfam and others have accused the world’s biggest drug companies of profiteering by selling to rich countries as most people in low-income countries around the world haven’t been fully vaccinated. Arbo Works, a fintech company started by eight former Google executives, has found backing in Sequoia Capital India and 120 angel investors from among some serious practitioners of AI and top tech executives, Caesar Sengupta, who’s leading the startup, said in a blog post on Thursday. The value of the funding hasn’t been disclosed, but TechCrunch reports that it is an eight-figure investment. Sengupta previously led payments and the next billion users initiative at Google. His work included launching Google Pay in India. Arbo Works, based in San Francisco and Singapore, will be an AI-led fintech company. European nations are a step closer to agreeing on the Digital Markets Act. It is aimed at preventing big tech companies from abusing their dominant positions, Financial Times reports. The agreement, reached among the European Parliament’s main political parties, paves the way for a vote on the package next week. If the act became law, it could apply to companies including Apple, Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Netherland’s Booking and China’s Alibaba, according to the report. (2:21) Interview: Sri Satish Ambati, founder and CEO of H2O.ai, on his journey from math olympiads to one of the best known AI cloud platforms Sri Satish Ambati’s AI journey started in school with math olympiads. It culminated in the founding of one of the world’s best known AI cloud platforms. In today’s interview, Ambati talks about ‘explainability,’ bringing AI to the edge and the next steps at his company H2O.ai.