Techpresso daily tech news digest

Read online Tuesday 27 October 2026 | Join Free | Upgrade Together with Hi there, this is your daily ☕️ Techpresso. In today's newsletter: 💻 Apple adds M6 chip to iMac and MacBook Pro 🔬 OpenAI claims three new AI breakthroughs 💼 Microsoft offers voluntary buyouts to 60,000 employees 📹 Instagram is trying out 90-minute videos 🕵️ Alibaba's AI tried to send data to China 📱 Apple to replace cracked iPhone Duo screens Plus: 🎁 13 more stories you might like, 🧰 6 tools, and 📚 5 papers. FROM OUR PARTNER From Equity to Possibility: Plan Beyond the IPO Your financial life can change quickly, bringing new possibilities and decisions, often while you're still focused on the work that got you here. Together, we can: • Inventory what you own and the key dates ahead • Plan for cash needs • Think through diversification over time • Align your choices to what matters most Partner with J.P. Morgan Private Bank and move forward with clarity. Talk to J.P. Morgan Private Bank 💻 Apple adds M6 chip to iMac and MacBook Pro LINK Apple has put its M6 chip in a new 24-inch iMac and the entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro, the main upgrade in both machines, while the designs, displays, ports, and cameras stay exactly the same. The iMac jumps from the M4 and skips the M5, gaining up to a 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU, a Dual 16-core Neural Engine, and faster memory, with Apple claiming up to five times the on-device AI speed. The M6 iMac starts at $1,499, and the 14-inch MacBook Pro at $1,999; pre-orders open tomorrow before shipping on November 6, though memory shortages could delay higher-storage setups. 🔬 OpenAI claims three new AI breakthroughs LINK OpenAI says its AI models produced three new research results spanning mathematics, physics, and computer science, including a claim that would overturn a long-held assumption about how hard certain computing problems are to solve. The computer science result claims an algorithm that counts solutions to fixed-width logic formulas faster than expected, which for 3-SAT would disprove the Exponential Time Hypothesis, a 1999 idea long used to set limits on problem-solving. OpenAI brought in named academics to check the computer science and quantum physics claims, drawing criticism from its own advisory panel, which warned against giving select researchers privileged early access to unverified AI-generated work. 💼 Microsoft offers voluntary buyouts to 60,000 employees LINK Microsoft said yesterday it will offer voluntary buyouts to about 60,000 workers, roughly a quarter of its global staff, calling the package a chance for people already weighing a move outside the company. The voluntary exit offer covers qualifying employees in the United States, India, Canada, and the United Kingdom who sit at level 70 or below, which includes principal, partner, and distinguished roles under Microsoft's internal rankings. This is Microsoft's second voluntary workforce cut in 2026, following an April retirement offer to 8,750 US employees, of whom about 30 percent accepted, easing the need for planned layoffs, according to Chief People Officer Amy Coleman. 📹 Instagram is trying out 90-minute videos LINK Instagram has started testing "Features," a new upload format that lets creators post videos running up to 90 minutes, a sharp turn away from the short, vertical clips that have dominated the platform. Head Adam Mosseri, who long resisted long-form video, said Instagram pays creators mainly through brands and runs only a small performance-based program, but Meta hinted it may add ads and new ways to earn money over time. The company is trying "Features" and a companion tool called "Clips as Reels," which turns long videos into linking Reels, first in Brazil and now in a small US test, alongside work on Live discovery and episodic Reels. 🕵️ Alibaba's AI tried to send data to China LINK Cohere said on Monday that Alibaba's new Qwen3.8-Flash-Next model tried to upload a file to a ser