SINGAPORE, June 8, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Today, Clear Robotics, a Singapore headquartered maritime technology company, announced that it closed a $1.75 million USD Pre-Series A funding round to scale its commercially proven fleet of AI-enabled autonomous vessels globally.

Led by maritime-focused Shipsfocus Ventures, the round signals strong industry validation and includes significant follow-on investments from Katapult Ocean, SGInnovate, M7 Holdings MGS Ventures, and other strategic partners.

The company operates a fleet of 26 all-electric, AI-optimized unmanned surface vessels (USVs) that solve critical maritime infrastructure challenges. By utilizing AI for autonomous navigation and data analytics, Clear Robotics ensures high operational efficiency without manual intervention.

The capital injection will accelerate Clear Robotics’ strategic expansion into Southeast Asia, India, and the Middle East. Funds will drive the development of larger unmanned vessels, advance R&D for automated port surveying, and scale proprietary commercial retrofit technology, preparing for open-ocean operations.

Clear Robotics has a strong track record and reputation in this sector- winning the Pier71 Smart Port Challenge in 2024 and the Captain’s Table in 2022. Over the past year they have expanded to keystone markets such as Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines – where President Marcos recently launched their pilot vessels for a major waterfront inauguration.

“This funding is a critical catalyst, accelerating our path toward becoming a comprehensive solution for operations and creating the world’s largest fleet of unmanned ships.” said Sidhant Gupta, Co-Founder and CEO of Clear Robotics.

“This new capital allows us to expand our engineering team, accelerate our R&D into automated port surveying, and build the next generation of larger vessel classes,” said Utkarsh Goel, Co-Founder and CTO of Clear Robotics.

“Clear Robotics is building a reliable, scalable operating system for the essential middle of the maritime sector. Sidhant and his team prioritize practical deployment over lab demos, iterating in real-world conditions. Execution is their true moat, and we led this round because they are building the infrastructure for the next era of maritime work,” said Chye Poh Chua, Managing Partner at Shipsfocus Ventures.

About CLEAR ROBOTICS 

Founded in 2020 by Sidhant Gupta and Utkarsh Goel, Clear Robotics is a Singapore headquartered maritime technology company pioneering integrated, all-electric unmanned vessel technology and autonomous retrofit solutions. They provide autonomous, zero-emission solutions for critical infrastructure needs—such as pollution recovery and marine surveillance, with advanced AI-driven surveying in development—to make autonomous shipping safe, sustainable, and commercially viable.

CONTACT: 
Samyuktha Sriram
contact@clearbot.org 
+852 5703 3106

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SOURCE Clear Robotics

STOCKHOLM, June 8, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The Board of Directors (the Board) of Sinch AB (publ) today announces the appointment of Jonas Dahlberg as acting Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective immediately. This appointment is part of the company’s ongoing leadership transition process.

As previously announced on May 7, Laurinda Pang has decided to step down as CEO of Sinch. Following continued discussions between the Board, Laurinda and Jonas, the Board determined that transitioning to an acting CEO is the right step to support Sinch’s next phase of execution and growth.

“Over the past several years, Sinch has transformed into a more profitable business, with an integrated customer offering, poised for growth. The Board believes this leadership transition will build on and accelerate that momentum and we are fully aligned with both Laurinda and Jonas on the path forward,” said Erik Fröberg, Chairman of the Board.

“Jonas has been deeply involved in the company’s transformation and strategy execution for the past year. He is an accomplished CEO with experience from leading large international organizations in tech enabled services. The Board has great confidence in his ability to lead Sinch during the next phase of development,” Erik Fröberg continued.

Jonas Dahlberg joined Sinch as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Apil 1, 2025. Prior to joining Sinch, he served as CEO and before that as CFO of Transcom, a global customer experience outsourcer. He also served in various executive positions at Sweco, the leading European Engineering Consultancy. Prior to Sweco, he was a consultant at McKinsey & Company. Jonas holds a M.Sc. degree in Applied Physics and B.Sc. in Business Administration.

“During the last few years, Sinch has developed into a leading global cloud communications platform under the leadership of Laurinda. We are now well positioned to accelerate growth as the customer communication infrastructure for the AI economy. I’m excited to continue working with our talented teams to execute on our priorities: deliver value to our customers, drive innovation and create value for our shareholders,” said Jonas Dahlberg.

“I’m incredibly proud of what we have accomplished as a team. We transformed from acquired stand-alone companies, into a more integrated company, strengthened profitability and reignited growth. Jonas is ideally positioned to lead Sinch into the future. I fully support this transition and the Board’s decision to accelerate the succession timeline as the company enters its next chapter,” said Laurinda Pang

As previously communicated, Laurinda Pang will continue to support the company until a permanent successor is appointed, however no later than 31 December 2026.

For further information, please contact
Fredrik Hallstan
Director, Corporate Communications
Mobile: +46 761 15 38 30
E-mail: fredrik.hallstan@sinch.com

Mia Nordlander
SVP Investor Relations & Sustainability
Mobile: +46 73 511 53 95
E-mail: mia.nordlander@sinch.com

Note: This information is such that Sinch AB (publ) is required to make public pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation. The information was submitted for publication at 07:30 CEST on June 8, 2026 through the agency of the contact person set out above.

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Increased AI deployment results in an aggregated net hiring effect of +27% expected in 2026, while upskilling internal talent emerges as the primary strategy for European full-stack readiness

BRUSSELS, June 8, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, today released its first ever 2026 State of Tech Talent Europe report, created in partnership with LF Research. Key findings show that AI contributes to hiring growth, security and privacy are significant AI inhibitors, and upskilling outperforms hiring for addressing talent gaps in Europe.

Despite uncertainty around AI-related job loss, AI is actually a net driver of job creation in IT. European organizations anticipate a positive net hiring effect of +27% in 2026 and +17% in 2027. However, realizing the full value of AI is hindered by a severe full-stack readiness problem, with security and privacy concerns jumping to the top barrier for new technology adoption in 2026 at 51% and 44% respectively.

To combat severe understaffing in critical areas like cybersecurity and AI operations, European organizations are turning inward. Upskilling existing staff is now the primary response to talent gaps, heavily favored over external hiring due to the irreplaceable value of institutional knowledge, team cohesion, and cost efficiency. Furthermore, organizations are looking toward open source technology and communities to implement AI and build sovereign, secure capabilities.

“There can be no digital sovereignty without local tech talent,” said Thierry Carrez, General Manager of Linux Foundation Europe. “AI is disrupting everything. Models continue to grow in their abilities, and their impact on the tech talent market needs to be properly assessed. The 2026 State of Tech Talent Europe report thoroughly explores that dimension. It delivers an analysis of that impact, with multiple reasons to hope for positive overall outcomes.”

Positive Hiring Trends and Technical Job Growth Created by AI
While recent layoffs have dominated headlines, the report found that this is primarily concentrated in large enterprises, while smaller organizations report strong positive net hiring effects. The data indicates that AI is a catalyst for job growth rather than widespread displacement.

The report found:

AI is not taking all IT jobs, as only the largest organizations are reporting a negative net hiring effect (-15%).Demand is particularly high for AI-specific roles in Europe, with a net hiring effect of +64% compared to +58% across the rest of the world.The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025 projects similar growth, forecasting a net global increase of 78 million jobs by 2030, with 170 million new roles created against 92 million displaced.

Full-Stack Readiness and Security Concerns are the True Barriers to AI Value
The primary inhibitor of AI success is not the technology itself, but the foundational capabilities needed to deploy it safely.

The report found:

Security concerns (51%) and lack of skills (44%) are the leading barriers to adopting AI technologies.Understaffing is severe in European cybersecurity roles (48%), which is 14 percentage points higher than in the rest of the world.AI security and risk management capability gaps persist across the globe, with 61% of organizations affected.

Upskilling Over Hiring and the Institutional Knowledge Advantage
In light of capability gaps, organizations are prioritizing internal development and open source engagement to build operational and secure full-stack competencies.

The report found:

Upskilling existing staff (63%) is the primary response to talent gaps, ahead of external hiring (59%), and is rated important by 94% of organizations.Organizations are 3.7x more likely to upskill than to hire across strategic technological domains.Upskilling is favored over hiring for understanding business context (7.9x), team cohesion (6.3x), total cost (5.8x), and staff retention (5.6x).Open source is the top strategy for implementing AI and creating sovereign technological capabilities among European organizations (54%), as it reduces licensing costs and vendor lock-in risks.

Explore the full 2026 State of Tech Talent Europe report findings here.

About Linux Foundation Research
Founded in 2021, Linux Foundation Research explores the growing scale of open source collaboration, providing insight into emerging technology trends, best practices, and the global impact of open source projects. By leveraging project databases and networks and committing to best practices in quantitative and qualitative methodologies, Linux Foundation Research is creating the go-to library for open source insights for the benefit of organizations worldwide.

About Linux Foundation Europe and the Linux Foundation
Linux Foundation Europe is the Brussels-based European chapter of the Linux Foundation. The Linux Foundation is the world’s leading home for collaboration on open source software, hardware, standards, and data. Linux Foundation projects, including Linux, Kubernetes, Model Context Protocol (MCP), OpenChain, OpenSearch, OpenSSF, OpenStack, PyTorch, Ray, RISC-V, SPDX and Zephyr, provide the foundation for global infrastructure. The Linux Foundation is focused on leveraging best practices and addressing the needs of contributors, users, and solution providers to create sustainable models for open collaboration. For more information, please visit us at linuxfoundation.org.

The Linux Foundation has registered trademarks and uses trademarks. For a list of trademarks of The Linux Foundation, please see its trademark usage page: www.linuxfoundation.org/trademark-usage. Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.

Media Contact
The Linux Foundation
pr@linuxfoundation.org

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SOURCE The Linux Foundation