Researchers from Across the World Convened in Queens to Discuss Digital Methods and Theories Impacting the World

QUEENS, N.Y., Oct. 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Vaughn College hosted the sixth annual International Conference on Digital Technologies and Applications (ICDTA) on Friday, October 9 and Saturday, October 10. The two-day hybrid conference focused on the intersection of digital technologies, soft computing and intelligent systems, and how it impacts the world. Serving as a bridge between high-level engineering and practical business applications, the conference drew researchers from across the world from more than 30 different countries, both in-person and online.

“Hosting the conference at Vaughn College significantly elevated the institution’s global academic presence while providing students with invaluable professional growth,” said Dr Sanaa Faquir, assistant professor in Vaughn’s engineering and technology department. “By bringing top researchers and industry pioneers directly to campus, the college established indexed publication ties and opened the door for future institutional partnerships and research grants.” Dr. Faquir, who served as a conference moderator, also helped organize the event.

Two plenary sessions made up the in-person section of the conference on October 9. The morning plenary session featured guest speakers Wayne J. Levin, president and chief executive officer of Predictum Inc., Canada, and Dr. Philip Ramsey, vice president of data science and training at Predictum discussing how bad research costs the United States economy several billion dollars every year and steps that can be taken to reverse the trend. The plenary session concluded with guest speaker Dr. Kaoutar El Maghraoui, principle research scientist at IBM, discussing efficient LLM inference—the process of using a trained large language model to generate output text, code or data from an input prompt without changing the model’s learned weights.

The afternoon plenary session began with guest speaker Dr. Lobna A. Said, professor at Nile University, discussing hardware-efficient FPGA accelerators—hardware circuits built on a field-programmable gate array that speeds up scientific computing tasks by executing them directly in parallel custom logic—for a machine learning-based time-series. The session concluded with Dr. Amir Toliyat, assistant professor of information systems and informatics at City University of New York City-College of Staten Island, speaking about responsible AI for marketing decision support.

Online participants heard both panels on October 9 and oral sessions on October 10 covering multiple topics regarding both AI and the digital transformation of the workplace, how AI is impacting healthcare, business, marketing, education, aviation and several other fields, and the digital transformation of supply chains, health, education, energy, power grids, government and power sectors.

VAUGHN COLLEGE: Founded in 1932, Vaughn College is a private, nonprofit four-year college that enrolls more than 1,600 students in master’s, bachelor’s and associate degree programs in engineering, technology, management and aviation on its main campus in New York City and online. The student-faculty ratio of 18 to 1 ensures a highly personalized learning environment. Ninety-five percent of Vaughn College graduates, 71 percent in their field of study, are employed in professional positions or choose to continue their education within one year of graduation. The institution serves many first-generation college students and is recognized by the US Department of Education as a Hispanic-Serving Institution. In a study conducted by The Equality of Opportunity Project, and reported in The New York Times, Vaughn was ranked number one in upward mobility nationwide. For more information on Vaughn College visit http://www.vaughn.edu.

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SOURCE Vaughn College of Aeronautics and Technology

New offering reflects RBC’s efforts to help drive inclusive economic prosperity, create positive social change and advance reconciliation

TORONTO, Oct. 13, 2026 /CNW/ — Royal Bank of Canada (“RBC”) announced today the issuance of its C$500-million four-year callable (4NC3) Fixed-to-Floating Rate Indigenous Bond, with proceeds intended to be allocated to loans supporting Indigenous communities and businesses across Canada.

“This social bond supports economic opportunities that matter to Indigenous communities,” said Sarah Thompson, Managing Director, Global Head of Sustainable Finance, RBC Capital Markets. “Investor demand demonstrates the potential to scale this type of financing structure over time, enabling sustainable finance to help advance economic reconciliation.”

RBC Capital Markets is acting as sole bookrunner and lead agent, and Cedar Leaf Capital, Canada’s first majority Indigenous-owned investment dealer, as co-lead agent. The offering is expected to close on October 16, 2026.

Aligning with global sustainable finance guidelines
The bond is issued pursuant to RBC’s Sustainable Bond Framework (the “Framework”)1, which provides the basis for RBC’s issuance of Green, Social, and Sustainability Bonds. The Framework defines Eligible use-of-proceeds Categories across green and social themes, including Affordable Basic Infrastructure, Access to Essential Services, Affordable Housing, Socioeconomic Advancement and Empowerment and Employment Generation. The Framework is aligned with the International Capital Market Association’s (“ICMA”) Green Bond Principles, Social Bond Principles, and Sustainability Bond Guidelines, and has received a Second Party Opinion from S&P Global Ratings.

Supporting Indigenous communities through strategic partnerships
“RBC has been working with Indigenous communities for decades to foster long-term relationships rooted in reconciliation,” said Brittanee Laverdure, Director, Truth and Reconciliation Office, RBC Origins. “This issuance demonstrates our commitment to advancing economic inclusion for First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities and businesses, helping to create lasting economic opportunities.”

In collaboration with RBC Origins and its Truth and Reconciliation Office, RBC’s approach to help create positive social change is grounded in both market opportunity and Indigenous community needs, reflecting the bank’s broader Reconciliation Action Plan.

RBC Capital Markets’ Indigenous Advisory & Finance Practice, established earlier this year, provides specialized advisory, financing and capacity-building support for Indigenous-owned major projects across Canada. This comes at a pivotal moment – with many major projects running through or near Indigenous territories, Indigenous partnership has become increasingly important to the country’s nation-building efforts. Governments, businesses and Indigenous communities are recognizing the value of this partnership, which can strengthen investor confidence across the country2.

For more information on RBC’s reconciliation efforts and Indigenous initiatives, please visit: rbc.com/indigenous/.

Caution regarding forward-looking statements and important notice regarding this press release
The information in this press release is provided for information purposes only. This press release may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of certain securities laws. Information on this press release is or may be based on assumptions, estimates and judgements. For cautionary statements relating to the information on this press release, refer to the “Caution regarding forward-looking statements” and the “Important notice regarding this document” appendices in our latest Sustainability Report, available at www.rbc.com/sustainabilityreporting. Except as required by law, none of RBC nor any of its affiliates undertake to update any information in this webpage. The content of any websites referred to in this press release including via website link, and any other websites they refer to are not incorporated by reference in, and do not form part of, this press release.

About RBC
Royal Bank of Canada is a global financial institution with a purpose-driven, principles-led approach to delivering leading performance. Our success comes from the 105,000+ employees who leverage their imaginations and insights to bring our vision, values and strategy to life so we can help our clients thrive and communities prosper. As Canada’s biggest bank and one of the largest in the world, based on market capitalization, we have a diversified business model with a focus on innovation and providing exceptional experiences to our more than 19 million clients in Canada, the U.S. and 27 other countries. Learn more at rbc.com.‎

We are proud to support a broad range of community initiatives through donations, community investments and employee volunteer activities. See how at rbc.com/peopleandplanet.

For more information, please contact:
Maggie Cheung, RBC Capital Markets, maggiepc.cheung@rbccm.com

SOURCE RBC Capital Markets

Deeper integration with Xplan as part of latest evolution of FAYBL agentic platform 

Highlights

AI financial advisory platform FAYBL appoints Xplan co-founder and former Iress Chief Executive Andrew Walsh as President (International) of FAYBLFAYBL is rolling out a deeper integration with Iress’ XplanRollout of FAYBL platform update – v2.5 – underway, with additional 6 firms onboarding

SYDNEY, Oct. 14, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — FAYBL, the agentic AI platform for financial advisers, today announced the appointment of experienced financial industry executive Andrew Walsh as the company’s President (International).

The appointment comes as FAYBL delivers deeper and richer integration with Iress’ Xplan as part of the latest evolution of its platform.

Mr Walsh is the co-founder of Xplan, the advice platform used by financial advisory practices across Australia, the UK, New Zealand and other markets, and led Iress as Chief Executive for 13 years.

As President (International) of FAYBL, Mr Walsh will lead its work with licensees, platforms and advice firms as the company moves to firm-wide rollouts in Australia and internationally.

Speaking about his appointment, Mr Walsh said: “I’ve spent much of my career building the systems advisers rely on every day. What’s changed now is that software can do more than store the work – it can help do it. FAYBL offers the capability to drive the adviser’s existing systems, safely and with the adviser in control, thereby unlocking the scaling potential of practices.”

Rollout of FAYBL V2.5 underway

Mr Walsh’s appointment comes as FAYBL commences the rollout of its latest platform update, FAYBL v2.5.

As part of the update, FAYBL’s AI agent (Faybl) now has the capability to work across client records, documents and file notes, tasks and workflow, the diary, portfolio, and modelling information.

Purpose-built for the highly regulated, high-trust environment of advice, Faybl integrates directly into existing software systems while maintaining strict guardrails that keep advisers and licensees in control. Moving beyond merely describing workflows to actively executing them, Faybl prepares models strategies, drafts documents, raises tasks, and records completed actions, with every action submitted for approval before any data is written back to other systems.

Chris Holmes of Wealth Laboratory said: “Faybl has brought the joy back to financial planning. The days of being weighed down by endless administration are gone, allowing me to focus on what I enjoy most – meeting with clients and developing meaningful strategies to help them achieve their goals. If the growing administrative and compliance burden is taking you away from your clients, I cannot recommend Faybl highly enough.”

While basic AI is now common in financial advice, it is used mostly for meeting notes and simple tasks, and leaves the adviser’s day largely unchanged.

By contrast, FAYBL V2.5 is an agent that effectively works with the adviser throughout the day. It will prepare client files before reviews, draft advice documents from the firm’s own templates, pre-fill fact-finds and flag what it couldn’t verify, and run the firm’s processes the same way for every adviser.

“I’m excited to have Andrew join our leadership team,” said Steven Goh, co-founder and CEO of FAYBL. “An AI agentic experience can transform the professional experience and economics of advice for the better. Andrew joining and V2.5 are big steps towards that.”

FAYBL V2.5 is available now to Profile Financial Services, Financial Advice Matters, Transition Wealth, Knight Group, Obra Wealth, Wealth Laboratory and many others. Further firm launches will be announced in November. Advisers at Count.ed 2026 can see Faybl working with Xplan at the FAYBL stand.

About FAYBL

FAYBL (YBL.ai Inc.) builds Faybl, an agentic AI platform for financial advisers and their teams. Fay works inside the systems advisers already use, including Iress’ Xplan, to carry out client and practice work under the adviser’s direction and approval. FAYBL is led by co-founder and CEO Steven Goh, President (International) Andrew Walsh and President (Americas) Doug Bewsher. It serves advice practices in Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom. www.faybl.com

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SOURCE FAYBL