FILE PHOTO: Meta has signed a deal with generative AI lab Midjourney to license the startup’s “aesthetic technology” for the social media company’s future models and products.
| Photo Credit: Reuters
Meta has signed a deal with generative AI lab Midjourney to license the startup’s “aesthetic technology” for the social media company’s future models and products.
The technical collaboration will link the companies’ research teams, Alexandr Wang, the Facebook parent’s chief AI officer, said on Friday.
The move signals Meta’s push to differentiate its products on visual quality, as it looks to revitalize its artificial intelligence efforts amid heated competition with rivals, including ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and Google.
Midjourney, which generates images from text prompts, licenses its tools to users through a subscription model.
“We are incredibly impressed by Midjourney,” Wang said in a post on X, adding that to deliver best products, Meta is combining top talent, a strong compute roadmap and partnerships with leading industry players.
Meta and Midjourney did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
The startup’s image-generation prowess could help Meta accelerate creative features for users and marketers, potentially lowering content production costs and boosting engagement.
The deal comes at a time when Meta has reorganized its AI efforts under Superintelligence Labs, a high-stakes push that followed senior staff departures and lukewarm reception for its latest open-source Llama 4 model.
Austin, Sept. 04, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The AI in K-12 Education Market size was valued at USD 0.37 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach USD 5.24 billion by 2032, expanding at a CAGR of 39.29% over 2025-2032.
Growth is driven by the increasing adoption of AI-powered learning tools, personalized education platforms, and intelligent tutoring systems that enhance student engagement and learning outcomes. Schools are leveraging AI for real-time performance tracking, adaptive assessments, and administrative automation. Additionally, rising digital literacy, government initiatives promoting EdTech, and the integration of AI in online and hybrid learning environments are accelerating market expansion across the K-12 education segment globally.
In the U.S., the AI in K-12 Education Market was valued at USD 0.11 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach USD 1.51 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 39.05%. Growth is driven by rising EdTech investments, adoption of AI tutors, personalized learning solutions, and classroom analytics that enhance student engagement, learning outcomes, and operational efficiency in schools.
• By Component (Solution, Services) • By Deployment (Cloud, On-premises) • By Technology (Natural Language Processing (NLP), Machine Learning) • By Application (Learning Platform & Virtual Facilitators, Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS), Smart Content, Fraud and Risk Management, Others — Administrative automation, Special education support tools)
By Component, Solution Segment Leads AI in K–12 Education Market in 2024 with 71% Revenue Share
In 2024, the solution segment dominated the AI in K–12 Education Market, capturing 71% of revenue. Its leadership is fueled by extensive deployment of AI-enabled platforms, including intelligent tutoring systems, adaptive learning tools, and learning management systems (LMS). Continuous investment in digital curriculum and AI-based learning platforms ensures the solution segment remains the primary driver of market growth, supporting enhanced student engagement and personalized learning experiences.
By Deployment, Cloud Segment Leads AI in K–12 Education Market in 2024 with 69% Share
In 2024, the cloud segment dominated the AI in K–12 Education Market, capturing 69% of the share. Its leadership is driven by scalability, cost efficiency, and easy access across devices. The growing demand for centralized AI-integrated learning platforms and cloud-based learning management systems (LMS) further strengthens the cloud segment’s role in transforming digital education and enhancing personalized learning experiences.
By Technology, Machine Learning Segment Leads AI in K–12 Education Market in 2024
In 2024, the machine learning segment dominated the AI in K–12 Education Market with a significant revenue share. Its leadership is driven by extensive applications in adaptive learning, predictive analytics, and student performance tracking. The growing personalization of algorithms and automation of student progress monitoring reinforce machine learning’s central role in enhancing learning outcomes and educational efficiency.
By Application, Learning Platform & Virtual Facilitators Segment Leads AI in K–12 Education Market in 2024
In 2024, the learning platform & virtual facilitators segment dominated the AI in K–12 Education Market, capturing a major revenue share. Its growth is driven by widespread adoption of virtual assistants, learning management systems (LMS), and remote teaching platforms. The increasing use of hybrid learning environments and virtual classroom support tools further reinforces this segment’s position as the primary contributor to market expansion.
North America Leads AI in K–12 Education Market in 2024, Asia Pacific is Projected to Record the Fastest CAGR
In 2024, North America dominated the AI in K–12 Education Market, holding the highest revenue share. The region’s leadership is fueled by early adoption of EdTech solutions, strong funding support, high digital literacy, and widespread integration of AI-driven curricula across schools, establishing it as a benchmark in educational technology deployment.
The Asia Pacific region is expected to achieve the fastest growth in the AI in K–12 Education Market. Expansion is driven by government-led digital education programs, rising private sector investments, and increasing student populations. Countries including India, China, and Indonesia are adopting AI-powered, inclusive, and scalable education models, fueling rapid market adoption and digital transformation across the region.
Ensures AI tools meet data privacy and safety regulations for children, minimizing legal and reputational risks.
USP 7 – Future Trends & Innovation Roadmap
Prepares clients for emerging applications such as AI tutors, gamified learning, AR/VR classrooms, and real-time feedback systems.
About Us:
SNS Insider is one of the leading market research and consulting agencies that dominates the market research industry globally. Our company’s aim is to give clients the knowledge they require in order to function in changing circumstances. In order to give you current, accurate market data, consumer insights, and opinions so that you can make decisions with confidence, we employ a variety of techniques, including surveys, video talks, and focus groups around the world.
After the CZU fire devastated their community, a group of Boulder Creek residents, firefighters and engineers began meeting regularly to figure out how to better protect their homes and neighbors from future fires. Their solution, an AI-powered system of sensors, cameras and drones, joins a growing wave of technology aimed at taming California’s intensifying fire seasons.
What began as weekly meetings between Boulder Creek residents and local firefighters outside the Brookdale Lodge in the months following the CZU Lightning Complex Fire has evolved five years after the blaze into a pioneering wildfire detection system that could transform how communities respond to fire threats.
Their creation: a network of artificial intelligence-powered sensors that scan for smoke every minute and alert both residents and emergency services to the early signs of a blaze, paired with autonomous drones that can deliver fire suppressant to remote locations.
The startup behind this technology, Ember Flash Aerospace, emerged from conversations between Lee Kohlman, a NASA Ames Research Center employee who was living in Boulder Creek when the CZU fire hit, and Joseph Norris, a former Coast Guard member with experience in software and driverless cars, who traveled to Silicon Valley frequently for work. Along with local firefighters and tech-savvy neighbors, Kohlman and Norris identified a critical gap in wildfire response: the need for faster detection in those crucial first minutes when a small fire can still be contained.
The company’s Vigilant Raptor is an autonomous drone that can quickly navigate into hard-to-reach areas to dispense fire suppressant. Credit: Ember Flash
Ember Flash joins an increasingly crowded field of new technology that is reshaping the fight against wildfires. Researchers, governments and the private sector are racing to detect blazes earlier and stop them before they spread using tools like sensors, satellites and artificial intelligence to identify the lightning strikes most likely to ignite fires, or detect the earliest whispers of smoke. Private companies are also experimenting with autonomous helicopters, smart sprinkler systems and mobile water delivery to help battle blazes as hotter, drier conditions fuel larger fires.
The growing frequency and intensity of wildfires prompted XPrize — a nonprofit-run competition program that offers millions of dollars in prize money to entrepreneurs to solve big problems through technology — to launch a new challenge focused on wildfires in 2023.
“XPrize is a California-based organization and so many of our staff, sponsors, board members have experienced destructive wildfires so this was both a personal challenge for many as well as a global challenge,” said Andrea Santy, program director for the new XPrize Wildfire contest.
Ember Flash was named a semifinalist in the XPrize Wildfire competition. The winners stand to make as much as $3.5 million when they’re announced in 2026. Finals testing is scheduled for July of next year.
From the ashes of CZU
For Norris, Kohlman and their colleagues, pairing Silicon Valley technology with wildfire fighting seemed like a no-brainer.
Kohlman and his wife had been living in Boulder Creek for about a year when the fire broke out. The couple had moved from Virginia to take jobs at the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford University and NASA’s Ames Research Center. When lightning storms happened on Aug. 16, 2020, Kohlman didn’t think much of it at first; as a Midwest native, he and his wife were used to it, even if it was a little abnormal for California. It wasn’t until the next day that they heard about a potential fire, but he wasn’t too worried. Then his wife received a notification on her phone and called him from work, and he stepped outside to look.
“I saw an orange glow to the northwest, just a couple of ridges over,” he recalled. “We had to quickly figure out what to do next.”
A sign points the way to Boulder Creek amid the CZU Lightning Complex wildfire in 2020. Credit: Kevin Painchaud / Lookout Santa Cruz
He gathered the couple’s two dogs and two cats and packed a few bags. He and his wife decamped for a short-term rental on Foster City, where they’d end up staying for six weeks. For an agonizingly long time, they weren’t sure if they’d have a home to return to. Their house survived the blaze, but they came back to a forever-changed community.
In those weeks and months after the fire, Kohlman spent a lot of time taking photographs of burnt buildings and trees to get a clearer picture of the fire’s extensive damage. He spoke with neighbors about their experiences with the CZU Lightning Complex, including those who’d lost their homes. He felt helpless and wanted to change that. So about six months after the fire, he put a call out on a Facebook page for Boulder Creek neighbors, looking for other people to discuss their experience and what had happened — everything from how they found out about the fire, to how they felt going through this experience, and what the rebuilding process would entail.
A group of residents, including several local firefighters, met up and then kept meeting weekly, with topics ranging from community recovery to how wildfires are fought. Kohlman invited his friend and former neighbor, Joseph Norris, to attend.
“We started having some little meetings,” said Norris. “Our first meeting was at the Brookdale Lodge at the picnic tables outside. We weren’t thinking about much more than what could be done, ‘How can we help others do more?’”
For Norris, who started his career in the Coast Guard, emergency response had long been an interest. He’d been a volunteer firefighter in his younger years before getting into software, working for companies focused on everything from software for nonprofit organizations to artificial intelligence and driverless cars. He and Kohlman befriended each other when they were both living in Virginia, and the pair had long talked about possible business ideas.
“There were a lot of people in Boulder Creek who had a lot of skills and wanted to do something [in the wake of the fire],” said Norris. “We felt like we were way too close to Silicon Valley to not be using a little technology for this.”
As the group discussed barriers to response, such as being located in rural areas where homes are farther apart, and current firefighting approaches, a key challenge emerged: the need to speed up wildfire detection.
“Those first few minutes are really important, when [a fire is] small, just ignited,” said Norris. “If you can get to those quickly and put them out, you can stop a wildfire.”
‘New era in megafires’
Fighting fires in rural, often rugged terrain is complicated and becoming harder. Fires like the CZU Lightning Complex are fast-moving and can leap from one place to another, faster than a car can drive, wildfire experts say.
California has been in a “new era of megafires” for about a decade, driven by factors including climate change, buildup of dry brush and dead leaves, and the fact that more people now live in wildfire-prone areas, said Chris Field, a professor at Stanford University whose research focuses on climate change and the impacts of wildfires.
Even for experienced firefighters, these blazes are incredibly challenging.
“California has some of the most sophisticated and well-trained firefighters,” Field said. “It’s not that we don’t have the people [with skills] – it’s that these fires are getting more intense and harder to fight, which is where new technologies can come in.”
Earlier notifications could also help residents make better preparations in the event of a fire, such as asking a neighbor to pick up your pets for you rather than driving back to Boulder Creek from your job in Santa Cruz, said Norris.
Statewide, California’s evacuation alert systems came under scrutiny following fires throughout the summer of 2020. As the Associated Press reported, notifications were sometimes spotty or slow, and some residents said they never received them. Santa Cruz County leaders launched a new and improved alert and warning system, CruzAware, in 2023, driven in part by the lessons learned from the CZU Lightning Complex Fire.
Even with upgraded warning systems, gaps remain; systems vary by region, phone alerts can be ignored as robocalls, and sometimes alerts still come too late for residents to return home to gather their belongings before evacuating.
Ember Flash is combining cameras and AI technology to create special sensors that can detect wildfire smoke and issue alerts for residents and emergency services. Credit: Ember Flash Aerospace
To help solve these problems, Ember Flash developed Vigilant Detect, which essentially involves special sensors that combine advanced cameras and AI. The cameras can capture images every minute and the system then uses AI to analyze those images in real time for early signs of wildfire smoke. The idea is that these monitors could be installed in neighborhoods and Firewise communities, groups of neighbors who’ve come together to reduce wildfire risks in the community. Property owners and emergency service agencies could then receive notifications through an app when the system detects a wildfire.
The company is currently doing pilot programs in a few sites in Santa Cruz County and other fire-prone areas, including residential neighborhoods, municipalities and local vineyards, Norris said. The Ember Flash team works on site to identify the best locations for the sensors and ensure everything runs smoothly. These tests help the company refine its detection algorithms, test the durability of the hardware and the product design in real-world conditions while also collecting feedback about the user experience. Ember Flash is looking for more property owners interested in joining its pilot program.
Norris said the company expects to be able to start selling their products to neighborhood associations and fire protection districts next year.
Vigilant Detect isn’t the only project the company’s working on. It’s also working with Dutch company Kitepower to mount Ember Flash’s AI-powered smoke-sensing devices on Kitepower’s high-tech kites that generate energy from wind. The idea there is that these kites could be flown into remote, windy places to detect wildfires while they’re still just wisps of smoke.
Another effort is using drone technology for both gathering real-time data about existing fires and rapidly helping to put them out. The company’s Vigilant Raptor is an autonomous drone that can quickly navigate into hard-to-reach areas to dispense fire suppressant. These could be owned and used by private citizens, but Norris said the company envisions fire protection districts (the local government entities responsible for fire prevention and suppression in a specific geographic area) as the primary customers for these devices.
“Our goal is to make them inexpensive, make them smart and make them fast,” Norris said of the company’s products.
Eyes on the XPrize
The company’s Vigilant Raptor is currently a semifinalist in the XPrize Wildfire competition, in which teams around the world are competing in two different tracks to transform how wildfires are detected, managed and fought.
The competition is divided into two tracks, space-based detection and intelligence and autonomous wildfire response, according to Santy. From more than 150 submissions, 49 teams were selected to advance and in 2025, semifinals testing began.
Ember Flash was one of 15 semifinalists in the intelligence and autonomous wildfire response category and it now moves on to finals testing, which is slated for July 2026. The company will have to demonstrate to the contest’s judges that within 10 minutes, it can autonomously detect and suppress a high-risk fire in a 621-square-mile, environmentally challenging area.
“The competition kind of kicked us into a slightly different route,” Norris said. “It kicked our suppression efforts into high gear.”
While the Kohlmans have since moved back to their native Ohio, Ember Flash Aerospace remains firmly rooted in Boulder Creek. Its local team members include Zach Ackemann, a former Felton firefighter who now runs the company’s business operations, and Steve Lindsey-Guerrero, a deputy fire chief in Palo Alto who serves as a technical expert. In addition to the San Lorenzo Valley, the company also has an engineering team in Oklahoma.
So far, Ember Flash has been funded by investments from its founding team and early employees, but company leaders said they’re also looking for investors and funding to help them scale.
For Kohlman and Norris, Ember Flash is now their full-time job, and both spend a lot of time in Santa Cruz County as testing, prototyping and development continue, with pilot programs underway. Involving community members to test out their products is a key part of the company’s efforts and harkens back to the conversations that inspired Ember Flash in the first place – giving residents a way to help out with efforts to improve wildfire notification and response.
“We really want to empower them to be part of the solution,” Kohlman said of community members and non-firefighters. “People want to help. If a lot of people do a lot of small things, it can make a big difference.”
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.
AI is a board-level mandate. Boards must go beyond ROI and ask if the organization is strategically, technically and culturally ready for AI at scale.
Strategy, tech and culture matter equally. Customer experience leaders need forward-looking bets, the right tools and ownership and a workforce empowered to adapt.
Readiness defines leadership. True AI advantage comes from holistic readiness, not isolated pilots—boards that wait risk narrowing their opportunity.
AI is now central to strategy, not just operations. But many boards still lack a clear lens to evaluate its impact? And as AI adoption accelerates, boards and executive teams are grappling with an essential question: how do we know it’s working?
Evaluating AI impact isn’t just about tracking ROI or measuring model accuracy. It’s about understanding whether the organization is truly ready — strategically, technically and culturally — to embrace AI at scale. The real opportunity lies in turning AI from isolated pilots into a sustained source of advantage.
So where should business leaders start? Let’s break it down across three critical areas: strategic awareness, technical aptitude and cultural readiness.
Table of Contents
Strategic Awareness: Are You Seeing the Big Picture – and Acting on It?
To lead with AI, boards should first ask: do we have a forward-looking, competitively informed view of how AI is reshaping our industry? If the answer is unclear, it may be time to revisit strategic priorities.
High-performing organizations place bold, forward-looking bets. That might mean investing in customer experience transformation, rethinking core product offerings or experimenting with entirely new business models enabled by AI.
Importantly, this isn’t a one-time strategy session. Many leading organizations systematically monitor AI moves by competitors, startups and emerging players. They use AI to help set strategy and envision opportunities, along with keeping an eye on how hyperscalers, research labs and ecosystem partners are evolving and act accordingly.
Technical Aptitude: Do You Have the Tools, Talent and Infrastructure to Execute?
Even the best AI strategy can stall if the technical foundation isn’t there. Boards should assess: does our organization have the infrastructure, data, and leadership to build and scale AI responsibly?
This isn’t just about hiring more data scientists. It’s about aligning cloud, data and app platforms to support real-time decision-making, automation and agent-based systems. It means building AI capabilities that are unified, governed and reusable – think modular pipelines, agents and APIs that scale across use cases.
Another key question: Who owns AI execution?
In top-performing companies, AI is not confined to an innovation lab. Ownership is shared across business and technology functions. And more importantly, those leaders are technically fluent in the sense that they understand how AI works and feel empowered to act.
A final, often overlooked question: what’s our plan to manage technical debt?
Legacy systems, siloed data and outdated workflows can quietly sabotage AI progress. Modernization efforts should run in parallel with AI deployment, otherwise, progress often stalls before it scales.
Cultural Readiness: Is the Organization Willing – and Able – to Change?
Perhaps one of the most underestimated components of AI success is culture. While AI requires new tools, it also demands a completely new mindset. One that encourages exploration, experimentation and rapid iteration.
Boards should ask: is our leadership and workforce ready to continuously adapt and adopt AI?
An innovative culture isn’t built overnight. It requires visible AI champions who are credible, resourced and empowered to lead. It also means investing in AI literacy across all levels of the business, not just in data teams.
Even more than upskilling, this is about embedding AI understanding into fundamental decision-making, operations and even customer conversations. Everyone, from frontline employees to the C-suite, should have a baseline understanding of what AI is and what it’s not.
Finally, cultural readiness means staying connected to the broader ecosystem, which includes startups, venture capital firms, academia and research communities. This is because no single company can build the future of AI alone.
A framework for AI readiness in the boardroom emphasizes strategy, technology, and culture, highlighting six core elements leaders must align to scale AI responsibly.Simpler Media Group
A New Mandate for AI Leadership
The boardroom conversation around AI is shifting. It’s no longer just about “should we invest?” but instead, it’s about “are we investing wisely – and are we ready for what’s next?”
Learning Opportunities
True AI leadership often means looking beyond isolated use cases to evaluate readiness holistically. It requires clarity of vision, alignment across the enterprise and the ability to act with urgency and intent. That means treating AI as a business-wide transformation and making sure the organization is structurally and culturally prepared to lead.
In a world increasingly shaped by intelligent systems, boards have a unique and timely opportunity to define how their companies lead. Wait too long, and the opportunity narrows. Asking the relevant questions is where companies should start, but it’s the actions that follow that can define their true AI leadership.
Learn how you can 
