Four new consumer AI agents hit the record today — three US retailers leaning on Google's Gemini, and one brokerage that skipped building its own chatbot entirely and just let Claude do the trading.

Questrade launches Canada's first AI-connected brokerage accounts via Anthropic's MCP

Canada's largest independent online brokerage.

Questrade launched an integration using Anthropic's Model Context Protocol (MCP) that lets clients connect Claude (via Claude Desktop or Claude Code) directly to their brokerage accounts to view and analyze holdings, research using live market data, and instruct the AI to place trades on their behalf — the first Canadian financial institution to offer this. Support for ChatGPT and Cursor is described as coming soon.

How to try it: In Questrade account settings, enable MCP access, then connect via Claude Desktop or Claude Code following the steps at questrade.com/learning/using-questrade/connect-questrade-to-your-ai-tool.

Sources: theglobeandmail.com, betakit.com

Kohl's debuts Gemini-powered AI shopping assistant for back-to-school

Major US department-store retail chain.

Kohl's launched a conversational AI shopping assistant built on Google Cloud's Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience, helping shoppers aggregate deals, get personalized recommendations, compare products, search by image, track orders, and get help with buy-online-pickup-in-store.

How to try it: Visit Kohls.com or open the Kohl's app and look for the AI shopping assistant entry point.

Sources: digitalcommerce360.com, retaildive.com

Kroger launches AI Shopping Assistant across all banners for meal planning

Largest pure grocery retailer in the United States.

Kroger rolled out an AI Shopping Assistant, also built on Google Cloud's Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience, across all of its grocery banners. It plans weekly meals, builds carts from photos of shopping lists or recipes or from pasted URLs, tailors suggestions to budget and dietary needs, and reorders past purchases.

How to try it: Visit Kroger.com or open the Kroger app and look for the AI Shopping Assistant entry point.

Sources: theshelbyreport.com, progressivegrocer.com

Michaels launches "Ask Mike" AI shopping assistant built on Google Gemini

Largest arts-and-crafts specialty retailer in the United States.

Michaels launched "Ask Mike," a conversational AI shopping assistant built on Google Cloud's Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience, giving shoppers personalized product recommendations and creative-project guidance based on a description of what they're making. The company cites roughly 75,000 conversations in the first weeks and more than double the conversion rate of standard browsing.

How to try it: Visit Michaels.com or open the Michaels app and look for the Ask Mike chat entry point.

Sources: googlecloudpresscorner.com, retaildive.com

Platform Watch

• OpenAI: a roughly one-hour global ChatGPT outage hit logins and chat history on Aug 19 (APIs stayed up), alongside pricing shake-ups (a new Business tier, Enterprise moving to usage-based billing) and reporting that Anthropic overtook OpenAI in verified business customers earlier this year, even as other coverage says OpenAI is closing that gap. (securitymagazine.com, techbuzz.ai)
• Mistral AI: ARR surged 20x year-over-year to a roughly $400M run-rate, and the company is reportedly raising about €3B at a roughly €20B valuation — though analysts flag the gap between that valuation and current revenue. Its consumer app Le Chat holds strong app-store ratings but user reviews knock a rough UX and a tight daily message cap. (mlq.ai, techcrunch.com)
• Meta Llama: downloads have passed 2 billion and Meta AI has hit roughly 1.5 billion monthly users, but the model is also facing a publisher copyright lawsuit (Elsevier, Hachette, Macmillan and others), a confirmed benchmark-manipulation admission from its departing AI chief, and reports Meta is pivoting away from open-source toward closed models going forward. (slashdot.org, thenewstack.io)
• Microsoft Azure OpenAI: Microsoft now counts 60,000+ AI customers with its AI business at a $37B annual run rate (+123% YoY), and passed through OpenAI's latest price cuts on Aug 1 — though the rollout brought some customer billing-page confusion. (alphastreet.com)
• OpenTable: its AI Concierge moved to the homepage and now answers about 80% of diner questions in-platform, and on Aug 26 the company shipped its largest-ever suite of 20+ AI/automation features for restaurants. (prnewswire.com)

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