In the wake of criticism over the underwhelming performance of its AI products, especially in areas like notification summaries, Apple on Monday detailed how it is trying to improve its AI models by analyzing user data privately with the aid of synthetic data.

Using an approach called “differential privacy,” the company said it would first generate synthetic data and then poll users’ devices (provided they’ve opted-in to share device analytics with Apple) with snippets of the generated synthetic data to compare how accurate its models are, and subsequently improve them.

“Synthetic data are created to mimic the format and important properties of user data, but do not contain any actual user generated content,” the company wrote in a blog post. “To curate a representative set of synthetic emails, we start by creating a large set of synthetic messages on a variety of topics […] We then derive a representation, called an embedding, of each synthetic message that captures some of the key dimensions of the message like language, topic, and length.”

The company said these embeddings are then sent to a small number of user devices that have opted in to Device Analytics, and the devices then compare them with a sample of emails to tell Apple which embeddings are most accurate.

The company said it is using this approach to improve its Genmoji models, and would in the future use synthetic data for Image Playground, Image Wand, Memories Creation and Writing Tools as well as Visual Intelligence. Apple said it would also poll users who opt in to share device analytics with synthetic data to improve email summaries.

HR tech startup Rippling is trying to serve Deel CEO Alex Bouaziz with papers as part of a blockbuster lawsuit against its competitor. There’s just one problem: French bailiffs hired by Rippling can’t seem to find Bouaziz, Irish newspaper Business Post reports.

Rippling sued Deel earlier this year in Ireland alleging the company paid one of its employees to spy on them, according to the lawsuit that includes an affidavit from the alleged spy which reads like a movie. Deel denies all wrongdoing.

Rippling needs to serve Bouaziz papers for the case. But French bailiffs hired by Rippling have been unable to find Bouaziz, who is French, at his listed address in Paris. Rippling may need to apply to serve him via email, the Business Post reports.

Bouaziz is “highly nomadic” but remains “very attached to France,” French magazine Challenges reported. Bouaziz lists his location as Tel Aviv on LinkedIn, but New York on X. 

Deel, Rippling, and Bouaziz didn’t respond to requests for comment. 

According to Dealroom data cited by the Financial Times, British start-ups raised just £16.2 billion last year, far less than the more than £65 billion raised by their counterparts in Silicon Valley during the same period. In fact, the U.S. appears to be pulling further ahead each year. In 2024, 57% of global venture capital funding went to U.S. startups — the first time that share has exceeded 50% in over a decade, per Dealroom.

This widening gap is part of a years-long trend that U.K. founders have taken note of, the FT reports, and it’s prompting many to consider relocating abroad.

“Recognizing that most venture funding comes from the U.S., we set up as a Delaware corporation, the preferred and familiar structure for American investors,” said Mati Staniszewski, co-founder of the London-based AI company ElevenLabs, in an interview with the FT.

Barney Hussey-Yeo, founder and CEO of the AI start-up Cleo, told the FT that he already spends four months a year in San Francisco and is seriously considering a permanent move. “You get to a certain size where there is no capital in the U.K. And the problem is getting worse,” he said. “Honestly, the U.K. is kinda f***d if it doesn’t address [the problem].”