Welcome back. A decade ago, most companies saw the cloud as a place to park stores of accumulated data, as more business-line systems adopted digital tools. Early cloud providers, like Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp., offered a less-expensive alternative to costly on-premise data centers, renting out space in their own systems as needed.  

But rather than just store data in the cloud, companiesnow want to put that data to work, driving real-world business decisions via analytics and, more recently, artificial intelligence.

Amazon Web Services, the undisputed frontrunner in the global cloud market, has long focused on the cloud infrastructure that it pioneered, leaving cloud-based software to Microsoft and Alphabet Inc.’s Google. That may have been a mistake, AWS boss Adam Selipsky acknowledges, as rivals steadily chip away at its lead.

What's certain is that in the world of AI, the dynamics of a cloud market that once seemed set in stone are changing fast.

Adam Selipsky, chief executive of Amazon.com Inc.’s AWS cloud-computing unit, says he plans to offer customers more advanced software tools, as cloud-market rivals Microsoft Corp. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google challenge its dominance with AI and other popular applications, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Gaining ground. Though far behind Amazon’s commanding 40% share of the global cloud market, Microsoft and Google are making steady gains by attracting enterprise users with an array of AI-powered business software and platforms.

Catching up. AWS has already developed a cloud tool that uses AI to digitize and categorize physical documents, and another that monitors the health of the expensive equipment used in the agriculture and energy industries.

Three years after abandoning its bid for a massive cloud-computing contract with the Department of Defense, in the face of employee protests of the federal government’s use of the company’s AI capabilities, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian last week met with Pentagon officials to discuss the bidding process for a similar contract called the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Familiar rivals. Officials expect cloud-industry leaders Amazon and Microsoft to bid on the contract, as well as other qualified bidders such as Oracle Corp. and International Business Machines Corp.

Embattled SoftBank Group Corp., which lost more than $50 billion following China’s tech-sector crackdown, said the nation’s prowess in AI continues to be a major draw for the company and other investors, The Wall Street Journal reports. 

Not deterred. After SofrBank disclosed the losses, CEO Masayoshi Son said that China remains a world leader in AI and that he plans to go ahead with an investment in another Chinese startup.

More cautious. Mr. Son also stressed that only about one in five of the giant fund’s dollars is tied up in China. “I am not worried because we are going to make investments with a smaller amount in healthy companies,” he said.

The bright side? Pointing to its recent investment successes, like DoorDash Inc., Mr. Son said there is only so much damage turmoil in China can do.

Venture-capital firms are investing in startups offering tech-savvy ways to make sure more food is eaten, not thrown away, including tools that leverage AI and other advanced capabilities aimed at reducing the 30% to 40% of food wasted in the U.S. every year, The Wall Street Journal reports. 

Speaking up. Mentions of “food waste” on corporate earnings calls have tripled between the second quarter of 2016 and this year’s second quarter, according to a report published this year by analytics company CB Insights.

Former Uber executive Raquel Urtasun this year launched autonomous-truck startup Waabi, aiming to use computer simulations instead of real-world driving conditions to solve challenges faced by driverless vehicles. She recently spoke with The Wall Street Journal about efforts to steer the autonomous-vehicle industry in the right direction. Edited excerpts below:  

• Why focus on driverless trucking? Long-haul trucking is where we will first see this technology really making an impact. There is a current shortage of drivers. At the same time, to be a truck driver is one of the most dangerous professions in North America. From a self-driving technology perspective, driving on highways, although very difficult, is much easier than driving in cities.
• How do you want to see autonomous technology progress? I would love to see this thing get to scale everywhere. Meaning providing the mobility in our cities, particularly to people that don’t have the ability to move now. I think the model of owning a car will disappear with this technology. I live in downtown Toronto and I hope to see much more green spaces in the future.
• When will driverless vehicles hit the road? I don’t think there will be adoption very quickly. Deploying this technology at the scale and scaling up is going to take quite a bit of time.
• How much time? The $1 billion question, I guess. I don’t know. What is clear is that I definitely want to see this technology scale when I can profit from it.

Facebook shuts down facial-recognition system. The social-media giant says it is scrapping an AI-powered facial-recognition tool meant to help users find and share online photos, after growing concerns among privacy advocates and regulators. (The Wall Street Journal) 

Google invests $1 billion in CME.  Under the terms of the deal, the Alphabet Inc. unit plans to move the futures-exchange giant CME Group Inc.’s  core trading systems to the cloud, aiming to bring on new users faster, streamline operations and develop new artificial-intelligence software for monitoring market risks, among other moves. (The Wall Street Journal)

Drugmaker snares $40 million. In its latest funding round, DeepCure Inc., a three-year-old Boston-based startup that uses AI software to accelerate the drug-discovery process, brings its total amount raised since inception to $47 million. (The Wall Street Journal) 

• Google launches drug-discovery lab. Based in the London, Isomorphic Labs will operate under AI developer DeepMind, which Google parent Alphabet Inc. acquired in 2014. (CNBC) 

Lemonade to roll out auto-insurance unit. Insurance-technology upstart Lemonade Inc., a six-year-old New York-based venture that uses AI to rapidly underwrite and pay claims via its popular smartphone app, says it plans to add auto insurance to its renters, home, pet and life-insurance services. (The Wall Street Journal) 

Landing AI lands $57 million. Launched four years ago by former Google and Baidu AI leader Andrew Ng, Landing AI says its latest funding round will go toward building more tools aimed at enabling manufacturers to build and deploy AI systems. (TechCrunch) 

Henry Kissinger warns of “epoch-making” impact. The 98-year-old former secretary of state, along with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Daniel Huttenlocher, dean of the MIT Schwarzman College of Computing, says in a new book that AI “augurs a revolution in human affairs” that threatens to send human history in a dangerous direction. (Time) 

Australian lender acquires stake in H2O. The Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the nation’s biggest lender, has taken a minority stake in Silicon Valley-based AI startup H2O.ai Inc, in a bid to develop smarter and more personalized services, the bank said. (Reuters) 

Early AI chronicler dies at 80. Pamela McCorduck, who compiled a history of the early days of AI from interviews with prominent scientists and engineers in the 1960s and 1970s, died at her home in Walnut Creek, Calif., last month. (The New York Times) 

Robinhood Markets Inc. said an intruder gained access to its systems last week and made off with the personal information of millions of its users. (The Wall Street Journal)

McAfee Corp. said it would be acquired by an investor group for around $12 billion, about a year after the security-software company went public. (The Wall Street Journal)

China Evergrande Group raised around $145 million in recent days by selling a chunk of its shares in a film production and internet-media company, scraping together more cash as additional bond-payment deadlines loom. (The Wall Street Journal) 

Write to Enterprise Technology Editor Steven Rosenbush and Pro AI newsletter author Angus Loten.

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