SAN FRANCISCO: Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday defended massive spending on artificial intelligence that dragged down shares despite strong earnings boosted by the technology. The social networking colossus raised its capital expenditures for this year to a range of $125 billion to $145 billion without laying out exactly how that investment would translate into profit. &quot;The way to think about the investment is that we&#39;re making a bet (on) the individual things that people care about, and that people are going to be more important in the future,&quot; Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg said during an earnings call, as analysts pressed him about the company&#39;s heavy spending on AI. He gave the example of a hot trend in &quot;agentic&quot; AI in which digital assistants handle computer tasks independently at the behest of people. &quot;There are a lot of agents out there that people are building for different things, and there aren&#39;t that many that I would want to give to my mother,&quot; Zuckerberg said. &quot;I think getting to that quality bar is something that I care about more than hitting a specific week for launching (a new product) or something like that.&quot; Zuckerberg spotlighted a new Muse Spark AI model built by Meta&#39;s nascent &quot;Superintelligence Lab,&quot; saying its technology will be put to work in Meta&#39;s offerings such as smartglasses and its advertising system. &quot;We are trying novel things,&quot; Zuckerberg said. The AI investment from the company that owns Instagram and Facebook is not directly tied to a revenue stream as with Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, which sell their AI-powered cloud services to clients worldwide. Meta sent tremors on Wall Street by announcing in its earnings release that expenses at the tech giant notched up to $33.4 billion as it chases &quot;superintelligence&quot; through major infrastructure buys, and went on a hiring spree for top AI talent. Shares dropped more than 6 percent even though the company topped forecasts with a profit of $26.8 billion on revenue of $56.3 billion in the quarter. Headwinds and scrutinyAdding to investor unease about Meta, chief financial officer Susan Li told analysts Meta continues to monitor legal and regulatory &quot;headwinds&quot; in the US and Europe, including social media addiction lawsuits. &quot;We continue to see scrutiny on youth-related issues and have additional trials scheduled for this year in the US, which may ultimately result in a material loss,&quot; Li warned. A Los Angeles jury in March found Meta and YouTube liable for harming a young woman because of an addictive design of their social media platforms, ordering the companies to pay millions of dollars in damages. The verdict hands plaintiffs in more than a thousand similar pending cases significant leverage &mdash; and signals to the tech industry that juries are prepared to hold social media companies accountable for the mental health toll of their design choices.

Americas

The social networking colossus raised its capital expenditures for this year to a range of $125 billion to $145 billion without laying out exactly how that investment would translate into profit.

Meta chief Zuckerberg doubles down on AI spending 

Web Desk

ISLAMABAD:&nbsp;Pakistan Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication and tech giant Meta on Monday launched an Urdu version of Meta AI, said an official statement. Federal Minister of Information Technology and Telecommunication Shaza Fatima Khawaja, who inaugurated the event, said the initiative was part of the prime minister&rsquo;s &ldquo;Digital Nation Vision.&rdquo; The launch took place at the &ldquo;Future in Focus: AI and Innovation&rdquo; event in Islamabad, bringing together government officials, tech leaders, and academics to discuss how Pakistan can accelerate its digital evolution. The IT ministry stated the event was part of a broader push to expand artificial intelligence literacy and digital transformation in Pakistan. The highlight was ALIF: Meta&rsquo;s Urdu-language upgrade to its AI assistant, which will enable millions of Pakistanis to interact with Meta AI in their native language, aiming to make technology more inclusive and accessible nationwide. The IT minister described ALIF as &ldquo;a milestone in making technology more inclusive and ensuring that no one is left behind in Pakistan&rsquo;s digital transformation.&rdquo; The ministry also announced several collaborations with Meta to strengthen AI literacy and improve government digital capacity. This includes a program to train university faculty in AI fundamentals, helping prepare students for an increasingly automated economy. Meanwhile, Meta introduced a localized version of its &quot;Transforming Public Sector Innovation in Asia Pacific with Llama&quot; guide with the aim to help governments use Meta&rsquo;s open-source AI model, Llama, for smarter public services and data management. &ldquo;Meta is deeply committed to supporting Pakistan&rsquo;s vision for AI-driven growth,&rdquo; said Meta&rsquo;s Director of Public Policy for South and Central Asia, Sarim Aziz. &ldquo;With these new initiatives and the introduction of Urdu in Meta AI, we&rsquo;re opening new opportunities for local communities to engage with technology in their own language.&rdquo; The AI Literacy Program, launched earlier this year in partnership with Meta, the Higher Education Commission, and Atomcamp, aims to train non-computer-science faculty members across Pakistan. The effort is designed to integrate AI understanding across disciplines and prepare future graduates for a changing job market. &ldquo;By equipping non-technical faculty with AI knowledge, we&rsquo;re creating a ripple effect that will reach thousands of students,&rdquo; said the CEO of Atomcamp, Fizza Amjad. &ldquo;This is about building a truly AI-literate academic ecosystem.&rdquo;

Artificial Intelligence

Pakistan’s IT Ministry and Meta launched an Urdu version of Meta AI, marking a major step in digital inclusion. The initiative supports Pakistan’s 'Digital Nation Vision' and aims to expand AI literacy, accessibility, and public-sector innovation nationwide.

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Meta chief Zuckerberg doubles down on AI spending

Urdu version of Meta AI launched to boost Pakistan’s digital literacy