Joe DeMicco

A cheaper AI tool really only helps if the work it produces is accurate enough to use. And a more capable tool gives us more reason to check where it has access. Three November 5 announcements are worth a business owner’s attention: 1. OpenAI released GPT-6 Cyber to a limited group of vetted security customers. OpenAI says it can find and validate exploitable software flaws. For most businesses, the useful step is to ask your IT provider how quickly it can validate and deploy security fixes. Buying another AI subscription isn’t the first move. openai.com/index/introducing… 2. Google introduced Gemini Omni 1.2 Flash, with video clips up to 15 seconds and a 30% lower generation price. That could help with B2B marketing content. I’d test it against actual product details before using it in a customer-facing explanation. Lower production costs don’t help if the equipment is shown incorrectly. blog.google/innovation-and-a… 3. Box announced a document-retrieval engine with NVIDIA, scheduled for Enterprise Advanced customers early next year. It promises permission-aware access to company information. For teams working through specifications and supplier documents, accuracy and access controls deserve as much attention as speed. blog.box.com/box-partners-nv… I’d start with one workflow, measure the review time as well as the time saved, and expand only when the results hold up. #AI #B2B #BusinessAutomation #Manufacturing

Google is expanding ads in AI Mode, and in the US ads can now show on follow-up questions (Oct 28). Google also says AI Mode queries average three times longer than regular searches. Pick the longest question a customer asked you this month and make sure your site answers it. blog.google/products/ads-com… #AISearch #SEO

Google AI Mode can now book home services through Angi, Thumbtack, Housecall Pro, and Jobber in the U.S. (Robby Stein, Nov 4). If you're on Jobber, check that your Google Business Profile address matches Jobber and that a booking or request form is connected. Jobber says no lead fee. help.getjobber.com/en/articl… #LocalSEO #AISearch

I'm watching the gap between an impressive AI demonstration and a dependable business workflow. Three developments make that distinction useful today. 1. AI is taking on more engineering work. OpenAI's November 3 demonstration used Astra to design a device's enclosure, circuit board and software. The company also acknowledged repeated manufacturing reviews because the model missed production constraints. For industrial businesses, I see an opportunity to test drafting and design preparation while keeping qualified engineers responsible for approval. openai.com/index/acceleratin… 2. Claude's watermark expansion is now documented. Anthropic's November 3 release notes confirm text watermarking for Mythos 5, Opus 4.7 and Sonnet 4.6 on supported platforms, with a sampling-settings exception for Sonnet. This updates yesterday's unconfirmed watch item. For marketing teams, documented human review remains more useful than promises about whether AI assistance can be detected. platform.claude.com/docs/en/… 3. Customer-service integrations may need less custom code. In a November 2 update, AWS added external MCP tools to Amazon Connect flows. These can retrieve information or trigger actions through connected applications. For businesses already using Connect, that could simplify order-status or service workflows. Permissions, integration costs and escalation to a person still need attention. aws.amazon.com/about-aws/wha… My takeaway: measure the complete workflow, including review time, rework and operating costs, before calling a pilot a productivity gain. #AI #IndustrialAI #BusinessAutomation #B2B

Maya HTT, a Montreal engineering software company, launched an on-premises AI assistant yesterday called M-Bot. It answers questions from your own engineering and manufacturing files (Teamcenter, SharePoint, Confluence) and links each answer back to the source document. That part is useful. Treat the "60x faster" line as a vendor claim until you time it yourself. For any manufacturer looking at tools like this, hosting on your own servers answers where the data sits. It does not automatically answer who inside the company can read a summary of a restricted drawing. Before you buy, run a short demo with two logins: someone who should open a folder and someone who should not. The second login should get nothing from that folder. Source: prnewswire.com/news-releases… If this was useful, I write more of these at demicco.com/ #AI #Manufacturing #Engineering

BDC, Canada's business development bank, launched a program today called Mission AI. The headline on the release is "Less AI hype, more results." The plan is to have a panel of business owners test AI tools in their own companies and track things like time saved, then use what they learn to help more companies adopt the tools that work. The examples they give are everyday office work, like getting a quote out faster or spending fewer hours on invoices. That's a good model for any manufacturer or distributor, wherever you are. Pick one task your team repeats every week, write down how long it takes today, and test one tool against that number for a month. If the time doesn't come down, drop it. If it does, you have a real case for using it more. Source: bdc.ca/en/about/mediaroom/ne… #AI #SmallBusiness #Manufacturing

A 20-minute AI visibility test. Write four questions a buyer would ask, run them in ChatGPT and one other assistant, and note who gets named and what's wrong about you. Then open the sources it cites. That's usually the page to fix first.

Week ending November 1, 2026 The AI news I found most useful for owners this week was about checking the work. A few of the big tools added ways to see what AI is costing you, what it changed, and where its answers came from. 1) Anthropic added spend reports and team budgets to Claude Enterprise. Whatever tool you use, pick one workflow and track what it costs against what it produces. Source: claude.com/resources/article… 2) HubSpot's ChatGPT connector can now create and update CRM records, emails, and pages from a chat. HubSpot recommends setting the write tools to "Needs Approval" so nothing changes without a yes. Source: knowledge.hubspot.com/integr… 3) Fill with Gemini in Google Sheets now shows the web source behind each cell it fills. A cited source still isn't a verified one, so spot check a few before that data goes into a quote. Source: workspaceupdates.googleblog.… For next week, pick one AI tool your team already uses and check who can approve what it changes. I write more about this at demicco.com. #AI #SmallBusiness #Manufacturing

If you run a manufacturing or distribution website, there's a new robots.txt setting you'll hear about soon. Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Anthropic say they'll honor one shared signal in robots.txt that opts a site out of AI training across all of them, instead of setting it company by company. Anthropic already supports it. Google and Microsoft plan to start next year, and OpenAI says in the coming months. Before anyone turns it on, look at what it touches. Google says it will read the shared opt-out like a Google-Extended block, and it ties Gemini app answers to Google-Extended. Microsoft says blocking its AI answer setting means less brand visibility there. For most B2B companies, showing up when a buyer asks AI about your products matters a lot. Have whoever runs your site check what your robots.txt says today. More of this on LinkedIn if you'd like to follow along: linkedin.com/in/joedemicco/ Source: theverge.com/tech/1023763/op… #AI #SEO #Manufacturing

A few things to note in AI today — November 1, 2026 AI adoption is creating useful new capabilities, and new questions about security, data handling, and vendor resilience. Three items on my radar: 1. Attackers are using AI to prioritize stolen information. Cisco Talos reported on October 31 that VOLTA malware can use language models to assess victims and rank stolen assets by potential value. For businesses, incident response needs to cover stolen sessions and access tokens as well as passwords. blog.talosintelligence.com/a… 2. Google has expanded computer-use automation. Its October 30 release notes mark Computer Use as generally available. Separately, an October 26 change enables request storage by default for new paid Generate Content API projects. Existing projects retain their settings. Before connecting client workflows, review permissions, logging, and human approval points. ai.google.dev/gemini-api/doc… 3. AI funding deserves attention beyond the headlines. Reuters, citing the Financial Times, reported that OpenAI reduced its fundraising target to about $20 billion. These are reported plans, not a completed financing. For business buyers, the useful response is to evaluate provider dependence and preserve options. reuters.com/business/openai-… My takeaway: Build around a measurable business outcome, verify the operating details, and make sure the workflow can survive changes in tools, pricing, or availability. #ArtificialIntelligence #BusinessAutomation #Cybersecurity #B2B

If your team uses AI to fill in spreadsheet columns, Google just made it easier to check the work. Fill with Gemini in Google Sheets now shows the web sources it used for each cell it fills, and it can handle up to 3,000 cells in one request. It's rolling out now to Workspace Business Standard and Plus, Enterprise Standard and Plus, and Google AI Pro and Ultra. Business Starter isn't on the list. This is handy for the tedious research columns, like supplier locations or a prospect's industry. A cited source still isn't a verified one, though. Before that data goes into a quote or a customer email, have someone open a handful of the sources and confirm them. Source: workspaceupdates.googleblog.… #AI #GoogleSheets #SmallBusiness

HubSpot's ChatGPT connector can now create and update CRM records, marketing emails, blog posts, and pages from a chat. HubSpot recommends setting its write tools to "Needs Approval" in ChatGPT so nothing changes without a yes. Worth a five-minute check if your team uses it. If this was useful, follow me on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/joedemicco/ Source: knowledge.hubspot.com/integr… #HubSpot #CRM #AI

Four RFQs came in looking like good leads. The phone numbers and web addresses gave them away. Here’s what I’d check before your team spends real time on a new inquiry. #Manufacturing #LeadGen demicco.com/marketing/fake-r…

Simple question for any owner paying for AI tools: what did last month's spend actually produce? This week Anthropic added smart reports and pooled team budgets to Claude Enterprise. Reports group a team's AI work into workflows and show the spend and the sticking points for each one. Budgets send alerts at 50, 75, 95, and 100 percent. That's Anthropic's own feature pitch, and it's for Enterprise plans. The idea works on any plan, though. Pick one workflow, like quote follow-ups or order entry. Track what it costs each month and what came out of it, such as quotes sent or hours saved. If you can't name the output, hold off on adding seats. Source: claude.com/resources/article… #AI #SmallBusiness #Manufacturing

The AI tier you pick matters more than the logo on it. A 200-page RFQ and 40,000 SKU descriptions are different jobs and need different tiers. I'd also check the data-training defaults on any free account before a customer drawing goes in.