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SIGGRAPH 2026 Computer Animation Festival Celebrates Global Storytelling, Alongside a Blockbuster Production Sessions Lineup

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Newly Expanded to Include Films Longer Than 10 Minutes, the Computer Animation Festival Honors Three Winning Films From South Africa, the United States, and France

LOS ANGELES, June 19, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — SIGGRAPH 2026, the world’s premier conference on computer graphics and interactive techniques, is once again spotlighting the future of visual storytelling through two of its most anticipated programs: the Computer Animation Festival and Production Sessions. Taking place from 19–23 July 2026 at the Los Angeles Convention Center, this year’s conference once again puts the spotlight on a global slate of animated storytelling and the studios shaping today’s most ambitious productions.

The Computer Animation Festival, SIGGRAPH’s prestigious animation showcase and an Academy Award® Qualifying Festival for its “Best in Show” short film, expanded eligibility this year to include films longer than 10 minutes. This change broadened the range of stories and filmmakers it could feature, which, as Marina Antunes, SIGGRAPH 2026 Computer Animation Festival Director, explained, “helped us in reaching out to films and filmmakers that probably would not have submitted in previous years.”

The 2026 honorees represent three countries and a shared interest in how the past shapes the present and the future:

Best in Show: “Apart“
Pola Maneli, Social Popcorn Films (South Africa, United States)
In apartheid South Africa, a forbidden friendship between two boys is tested by a life-saving act that forces them to confront the hate dividing their world. Written by Spike Lee and brought to life by a team rooted in South African culture and history, the film blends four animation techniques — traditional 2D frame-to-frame, cut-out, 3D, and 2.5D — across roughly 18,000 frames crafted by a team of more than 250 creatives.

Best Student Project: “Beyond Words“
Antoine Barbannaud, Théo Merlet, Cyril Buisson, Damien Poncelet, Anthonin Haüy, Timothée Vergught, Mathis De Sauvecanne, Thémys Cheynel, Lilou Tiprez, Leandro Leijnen, and Romain Gueusset with Creative Seeds (France)
In a Viking world, a girl’s mother goes to battle following her husband’s death, and the emotions stemming from that distance haunt them as mysterious wolves appear. Built on the team’s proprietary “Hunter” pipeline with in-house motion capture, the student film delivered over 130 shots featuring fur and cloth simulation and complex facial animation across six hand-modeled characters.

Jury’s Choice: “18 Months“
Paulo Garcia and Natalia Gouvea (United States)
A true story about the unexpected paths to becoming a family: When Danny and Pete find a newborn in a subway station, their journey to adopt him is retold to mirror the stages of pregnancy, challenging traditional definitions of what it takes to build a family. The film was crafted with stop-motion animation, using handmade puppets and sets, with only minimal use of software for editing and cleanup.

“Stories about how the past shapes the present and our future were really at the forefront this year, with filmmakers exploring social justice, inclusivity, and environmental stories,” said Antunes. “They are using the past as a starting point, looking back not to forget what has come before, but to shape what is happening now and what is coming in the future. The Computer Animation Festival consistently sets the bar for where technology and creativity converge, so you are guaranteed to see the best of the best.”

The Computer Animation Festival includes screenings of the Electronic Theater and Animation Theater, giving attendees multiple ways to experience emerging trends in animation from across the globe. Several of the top films will also be featured in SIGGRAPH’s Computer Animation Festival Traveling Show, a touring collection that brings the Electronic Theater to campuses, festivals, and communities worldwide.

Complementing the creative showcase of the Computer Animation Festival, the Production Sessions program invites attendees behind the scenes of some of the world’s most ambitious productions, offering a rare look at the artistry and innovation of today’s blockbuster films, immersive experiences, and scientific visualization.

In a marquee session, Wētā FX and Lightstorm Entertainment present “Wētā FX Presents: Avatar: Fire and Ash“, a behind-the-scenes look at the 3,100+ shots that return audiences to Pandora. The Academy Award-winning team will detail how it blended extensive native stereo photography with fully digital, performance-captured characters and handcrafted every element of the world, from creatures and clans to the film’s titular fire, created in Kora, a new addition to Wētā FX’s global simulation framework, Loki. The team created over 2,500 facial motion shots for 30 speaking characters using a proprietary facial system built to preserve each actor’s performance.

Other highlights include:

“Visualizing the Moon for Artemis II” — NASA shows how cinematic scientific visualization, built from publicly available datasets and high-end 3D rendering, recreates the exact lighting astronauts will encounter on the far side of the Moon. The work has helped plan observations and train the crew for Artemis II, the first crewed flight to the Moon since Apollo 17.”We’re All In This Together: The Making of Disney and Pixar’s ‘Hoppers’” — Pixar Animation Studios reveals the cross-departmental pipeline that let physical simulation and artistically directed stylization coexist in every shot, balancing broad comedy, suspense, and the beauty of nature photography.”Bringing The Mandalorian and Grogu to Life: Virtual Production, Creatures, and VFX Innovations” — Industrial Light & Magic unpacks how real-time technology, virtual production workflows, and time-tested VFX techniques came together to bring the latest “Star Wars” feature to the big screen.“Dear Upstairs Neighbors”: Artist-Centered, AI-Assisted Expressionistic Animation — A hybrid team of animation veterans and researchers at Google DeepMind shares how artist-driven, AI-assisted workflows shaped an expressionistic, painterly short, with artists in control as both creators and co-designers at every step.

“Production Sessions cover the full production, from the very start of the concept art and the story all the way to the end, giving you a really great general view of the entire pipeline,” said Valerie Bernard, SIGGRAPH 2026 Production Sessions Chair. “We get to learn about so many creative challenges that teams had to solve by getting multiple departments to work together. They are for everyone. When I first started going to SIGGRAPH, I learned the most about production workflows from Production Sessions, and they are just as amazing for veterans of the industry who like to be reminded why we do this job.”

Together, the Computer Animation Festival and Production Sessions program demonstrate how SIGGRAPH continues to celebrate bold storytelling while advancing the future of computer graphics and interactive techniques. To explore this year’s conference and offerings, visit the website to see where animation and visual effects are headed, and register now to experience everything the Computer Animation Festival and Production Sessions have to offer at SIGGRAPH 2026.

About ACM, ACM SIGGRAPH, and SIGGRAPH 2026

ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, is the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society, uniting educators, researchers, and professionals to inspire dialogue, share resources, and address the field’s challenges. ACM SIGGRAPH is a special interest group within ACM that serves as an interdisciplinary community for members in research, technology, and applications in computer graphics and interactive techniques. The SIGGRAPH conference is the world’s leading annual interdisciplinary educational experience showcasing the latest in computer graphics and interactive techniques. SIGGRAPH 2026, the 53rd annual conference hosted by ACM SIGGRAPH, will take place live 19–23 July at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

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Bridge Alliance API Exchange (BAEx) Accelerates Regional Network API Adoption with Early Enterprise Customers and Market Expansion

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SINGAPORE, Nov. 3, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Bridge Alliance, the leading mobile alliance for operators globally, today announced the commercial realisation of regional network APIs through early enterprise customers via the Bridge Alliance API Exchange (BAEx). Companies from the cloud services, mobile gaming and fintech sectors are leveraging network APIs through BAEx to power diverse digital services, demonstrating the growing commercial potential of operator network capabilities across the region.

Number Verify is one of the first APIs adopted by the companies. Number Verify confirms that the phone number a user provides is the same one they are using to access an online service or app. With digital fraud and scams a growing concern in Asia-Pacific, silent network authentication APIs such as Number Verify could authenticate users and enable service providers to build greater consumer trust. These initial deployments are intended as a foundation: as the commercial pilots progress, several of the enterprise customers will evaluate additional BAEx APIs, built on GSMA Open Gateway and CAMARA standards, and telco signals for identity verification and fraud detection.

Mr Loo Boon Chee, CEO of Bridge Alliance, said, “We warmly welcome our new BAEx customers and partners!  There has been a lot of pent-up demand and clear use cases for APIs among enterprises. We’ve worked hard to bring API capabilities together in a single platform that enables them consistent access, backed by our commercial model packaged and priced to market needs. BAEx has thus turned network API potential into a commercial reality, closing the network API demand and supply gap. We look forward to having more enterprise customers on board as we continue to add to the APIs available on BAEx.”

Mr Max Wang, Head of Cloud Communication International Business Operations, Alibaba Cloud, said, “In the era of AI, secure identity is paramount. Just as Alibaba Cloud championed Number Verify in China, Bridge Alliance now leads its adoption across APAC. As one of the original signatories with GSMA to champion this technology, we firmly believe it will eliminate mobile authentication friction and combat artificially inflated SMS traffic. By advancing Number Verify and the broader CAMARA framework, we empower enterprises to deliver seamless, trusted, and efficient digital services.”

New channel partners on board

Meanwhile, Bridge Alliance has inked strategic partnership agreements with new BAEx partners MX Labs, SBTS and TMT ID. These channel partners will connect more enterprise customers to BAEx in the coming months. MX Labs, a Singapore-based messaging infrastructure provider, brings an established enterprise base ready to move beyond SMS-based verification. SBTS, a SoftBank subsidiary, brings extensive identity and fraud detection capabilities. TMT ID, a specialist in network intelligence, uses network APIs to support identity verification and frictionless onboarding.

Mr Xinkai Chua, Managing Director of MX Labs, said, “BAEx gives us a single integration into Bridge Alliance’s member operators, so we can bring network-based number verification to our customers across Asia without building market by market. Silent verification over the mobile network cuts sign-up friction and fraud, and reduces reliance on SMS one-time passwords. We look forward to growing with BAEx as more markets and APIs come live.”

Mr John Tolton, Senior Vice President, Strategic Business Development, SBTS, said, “At SBTS, our ambition is to bring the value of the network closer to the enterprise, turning network intelligence into solutions that address real challenges in identity, trust and fraud prevention. BAEx brings us closer to that goal, creating a path to scale these solutions and make network intelligence an integral part of the digital customer journey.”

Mr Fergal Parkinson, CMO and Co-Founder of TMT ID, said: “We are delighted to collaborate with Bridge Alliance, which provides us the regional infrastructure to scale, ensuring our clients can verify genuine users and block high-risk interactions in milliseconds. By joining forces, we are expanding our operational footprint across Asia, enabling us to deliver secure, frictionless identity verification to enterprises, developers, and leading social media platforms in the region.”

BAEx Partner Programme welcomes Proximus Global

Bridge Alliance also welcomes Proximus Global, a subsidiary of Proximus, to the BAEx Partner Programme. Drawing on its distinct international experience, Proximus Global will share valuable lessons and expertise with fellow participants in technical workstreams. The Programme’s continued expansion and valuable insights from a wide spectrum of members and markets supports greater API innovation, development and standardisation, and market readiness across the region.

New markets, new APIs, new possibilities

BAEx is now expanding its presence to India and the Philippines, in addition to Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand which Bridge Alliance lighted up in November 2025. API availability in these two new markets will enable proofs of concept and the development of new digital services in the coming months. Singapore and Vietnam will follow in the first quarter of 2027, extending BAEx coverage across most of Southeast Asia.

Meanwhile, Bridge Alliance’s collaboration with Aduna Global is also accelerating  global access to APIs. The combined coverage of BAEx and Aduna enables both organisations’ partners across North America, Europe and Asia to consume network APIs with ease.  Bridge Alliance and Aduna are jointly organising the inaugural Global API Forum in Singapore on 3 November 2026. The event brings together over 300 operators, developers, solution providers, and enterprise customers to discuss the challenges, opportunities, and real-world applications of API adoption.

BAEx already offers silent network authentication APIs such as Number Verify and SIM Swap, which enable secure and seamless verification. By 4Q2026, BAEx will add Know-Your-Customer (KYC) APIs to its portfolio, including KYC Match, KYC Age, KYC Tenure and Number Recycling, which verify user details against operator records. These APIs will add trust and security to digital transactions, helping enterprises prevent mule accounts and seamlessly verify delivery and marketing data.

Enterprises interested to learn more about BAEx can contact Bridge Alliance here: https://www.bridgealliance.com/how_we_help/baex-enterprises/

About Bridge Alliance

Bridge Alliance is the global collective of premier mobile operators, representing nearly 2 billion customers across the world’s most dynamic markets. Founded in 2004, we drive deep strategic collaboration between leading operators and technology partners to unlock enterprise growth. By leveraging group economies and shared innovation, we empower our ecosystem to lead, scale, and thrive in the digital and AI era. 

Visit www.bridgealliance.com for more information. 

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XTransfer and Bank of China (Hong Kong) Announce Partnership at Hong Kong FinTech Week

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Empowering Global Collections and Payments for Foreign Trade Enterprises

HONG KONG, Nov. 3, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — XTransfer, the world’s leading B2B cross-border trade payment platform, and Bank of China (Hong Kong) (“BOCHK”) are pleased to announce the signing of a cooperation agreement. The two parties will work together to expand their international business, providing one-stop cross-border financial services, including global collections, payments, and foreign exchange, for enterprises engaged in international trade in Hong Kong and around the world.

Coinciding with Hong Kong FinTech Week 2026, Mr Martin Liu, Vice President of XTransfer and Ms Winnie Fan, Deputy General Manager of the Global Corporate Banking Department of BOCHK, officially signed the cooperation agreement at the XTransfer booth, witnessed by Mr Bill Deng, Founder and CEO of XTransfer and Mr Liu Chao, General Manager of the Global Corporate Banking Department of BOCHK, marking a new stage in the partnership between the two parties.

Under this cooperation, XTransfer and BOCHK will collaborate in depth across business areas including global collections, payments, and foreign exchange. Leveraging BOCHK’s professional capabilities in cross-border settlement and foreign exchange trading, as well as its unique position as the RMB clearing bank in Hong Kong, combined with XTransfer’s self-built globally unified B2B cross-border settlement network and risk management system, the two parties will jointly create an efficient, lower-cost, and compliant fund collection, payment, and currency exchange experience for foreign trade enterprises. Under this cooperation model, XTransfer is the first corporate partner of BOCHK.

As the cooperation progresses, foreign trade enterprises in Hong Kong and around the world will be able to access global cross-border collection, payment, and foreign exchange services more conveniently, meeting their multi-currency transaction and settlement needs across different markets. Both parties expect that by reducing the handover points in cross-border transaction processes, they can enhance the service experience and capital turnover efficiency, helping enterprises seize global trade opportunities more flexibly.

This cooperation also reflects XTransfer’s continuously deepening Financial Institution Partnership Model. Financial institution partners can act as “Co-builders”, providing cross-border collection, payment, and foreign exchange capabilities; at the same time, through XTransfer’s network covering over one million business customers, they can reach more enterprise customer segments with cross-border financial service needs, achieving complementary capabilities and shared strengths.

Mr Bill Deng, Founder and CEO of XTransfer, said, “We are very honored to sign the cooperation agreement with BOCHK during Hong Kong FinTech Week. BOCHK is one of Hong Kong’s most representative banks, with deep expertise in cross-border settlement and foreign exchange services. This cooperation combines the strengths of both parties, enabling SMEs to enjoy cross-border financial services of the same standard as large multinational corporations. Going forward, we will continue to refine our compliance and risk control capabilities and work with more financial institution partners to build trustworthy cross-border financial infrastructure.

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PATEO Advances In-Vehicle AI with NVIDIA Nemotron and ByteDance Doubao on its AI Box built on NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Thor

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SHANGHAI, Nov. 3, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — PATEO is advancing in-vehicle AI by deploying NVIDIA Nemotron and the 35-billion-parameter ByteDance Doubao language model in its AI Box, built on NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Thor. The solution combines local AI inference with PATEO’s AI Agent platform to support multilingual interaction, understand cabin context and coordinate vehicle functions.

At Auto China 2026 in Beijing, PATEO announced joint development of the solution with ByteDance and a leading new energy vehicle automaker. PATEO has also secured a project nomination for a new-generation vehicle from a leading new energy vehicle automaker, with mass production for that program expected in the second quarter of 2027.

In-vehicle local inference with Nemotron and Doubao

PATEO has integrated NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 ASR for speech recognition into its in-vehicle model suite. In collaboration with ByteDance, PATEO has also integrated Doubao, a 35-billion-parameter mixture-of-experts language model. The suite includes text-to-speech synthesis and a 2-billion-parameter language model for semantic classification and request rejection.

The integrated suite can run inference locally without a cloud connection, supporting multilingual voice interaction and real-time streaming speech recognition. This enables core AI functions to remain available when connectivity is limited, while connected services and cloud updates extend the system’s capabilities.

The PATEO AI Agent platform combines voice, visual and sensor inputs to interpret user requests and cabin conditions. Within vehicle safety permissions, it can invoke cabin controls and online services, coordinate concurrent tasks and manage longer-running requests. With user authorization, it can remember preferences and habits to personalize future interactions.

AI Box Brings Proactive Intelligence to the Cockpit

PATEO’s AI Box supports practical scenarios throughout the driving experience. Sentinel AI can identify and issue alerts for risks such as parking violations, flooding and fire. On hot commutes, occupants can independently adjust driver and passenger climate settings through voice commands or gestures. During extended highway driving, the AI agent can detect driver fatigue and ask whether the driver would like to open a window or activate seat massage. In areas with poor air quality, it can suggest closing windows and switching to recirculation based on location and learned driving habits.

Built on NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Thor, the AI Box connects perception, reasoning, execution and learning. Sustaining these experiences requires memory bandwidth alongside peak compute measured in TOPS. As context accumulates across conversation turns and agent actions during a trip, the model’s key-value (KV) cache grows, increasing demands on memory capacity and bandwidth. Thor’s accelerated compute and high memory bandwidth help support responsive local inference. Within automotive safety permissions, the AI Box coordinates cockpit controls, connected services and concurrent or longer-running tasks. With user authorization, it remembers preferences and habits, while cloud updates help refine its capabilities.

The AI Box’s modular software architecture and integration with in-vehicle systems and NVIDIA’s edge and cloud AI ecosystem support model deployment, tuning and customization across vehicle programs. By adding dedicated AI computing capacity without replacing the original main control chip, it also offers an upgrade path for existing vehicles whose processors cannot support larger models, concurrent multimodal interactions and proactive agents through software updates alone.

Expanding Beyond Hardware with Tokenomics and Physical AI

PATEO is building on the AI Box to expand from one-time hardware delivery into ongoing AI services and operations. Its in-vehicle Tokenomics strategy aims to create recurring revenue around the deployment and use of AI capabilities, extending the business opportunity beyond the initial hardware sale.

In June 2026, PATEO formed partnerships with Mininglamp Technology, Xunce Technology and Saimo Technology to jointly develop a token-based physical AI world model and TokenOS. The collaboration brings together on-device hardware, simulation testing, data infrastructure, creating a foundation for delivering and operating AI services.

Built on NVIDIA DRIVE AGX Thor, the AI Box provides a reusable platform that PATEO can adapt to different automakers and vehicle programs. The company is also extending its expertise in intelligent interaction and hardware engineering into robotics. PATEO reports a project nomination from a leading domestic robotics computing provider, opening an opportunity to apply its platform capabilities to physical AI applications beyond vehicles.

As on-device models and AI agents move toward broader automotive deployment, PATEO is combining NVIDIA accelerated computing with its cockpit software and hardware expertise to support that transition. Its focus on reusable technology, deployment across vehicle programs and ongoing AI services supports its evolution from a smart cockpit supplier into an AI platform company, with opportunities for growth across automotive and broader physical AI markets.

 

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