The latest AI news from the entertainment industry, AI legislation from the EU and the U.S. administration, AI model updates from Google, Anthropic, DeepSeek, and OpenAI, and Microsoft pitches sovereign AI to Canada.
VOL. 12 DECEMBER 2025
INFO-TECH AI INSIGHTS
AI Transformation Brief
Featuring AI best practices and insights to enable our members to strategize, plan, develop, deploy, manage, and govern AI-based technologies and solutions.
In This Issue-> AI in the News | AI Research Highlights | Vendor Spotlight | Upcoming Events & Resources
AI IN THE NEWS
Disney and OpenAI reach landmark $1B agreement to allow Sora to generate Disney, Marvel, Star Wars, and Pixar characters
Read the Walt Disney announcement
- On December 10, Disney agreed to license OpenAI's Sora video generator access to 200+ of their characters starting in January 2026. Additional details include:
- A three-year term for the licensing agreement.
- Fan-created content using Sora (limited to 30 second videos) may be made accessible on the Disney+ streaming service.
- The use of actor's voices and their likenesses is excluded in this agreement.
- $1B represents an equity investment into OpenAI and Disney will receive warrants to purchase additional equity.
ANALYST ANALYSIS
The Walt Disney Company becomes the first major content licensing partner for OpenAI's Sora. On the same day of this announcement, Disney sent Google a cease-and-desist letter, demanding Google stop using Disney-branded content without permission.
The advantages for OpenAI's Sora are obvious – enabling Sora to have licensed access to official Disney characters gives Sora a competitive differentiator and adds to its credibility and branding as a credible creative platform.
For Disney, as well as for other major content providers, this landmark deal proposes a licensing framework for how major studios and AI developers can partner together instead of meeting in court to address litigation and copyright lawsuits.
Critics will argue that this landmark deal legitimizes the use of AI to be trained on and to generate creative content. This will lead to job displacement for the creative industry, which will include writers, artists, and animators.
The EU Digital Omnibus – A major update to the EU AI Act
Read the EU Digital Omnibus announcementOn November 19, 2025, the EU announced the Digital Omnibus, which focuses on simplifying compliance requirements and being more innovation-friendly. Changes include:
- Simplifying compliance by harmonizing overlapping digital laws from the EU AI Act, GDPR, ePrivacy, and Data Act.
- Revising deadlines until the EU AI Act's high-risk standards, guidelines, and support tools become available.
ANALYST ANALYSIS
The European Commission is positioning the innovation-friendly updates to the EU AI Act as a driver for European competitiveness and to save European organizations €5 billion in administrative costs by 2029.
In the pursuit of being more competitive, the Omnibus proposes changes to GDPR personal data definitions, the relaxation of rules for sensitive data, and the adjustment of reporting requirements for AI applications.
Critics of these changes view this as a rollback of EU digital protections and claim that the organizations benefiting from these changes will mainly be Big Tech vendors.
OpenAI GPT, Anthropic Claude, DeepSeek, and Google Gemini AI model announcements
Read the Google announcement
Read the Anthropic announcement
Read the DeepSeek announcement
Read the OpenAI announcement
Some of the more notable AI models announced recently include:
- Google Gemini 3 announced on November 18, 2025.
- Anthropic Claude Opus 4.5 announced on November 24, 2025.
- DeepSeek V3.2 announced on December 1, 2025.
- OpenAI GPT 5.2 announced on December 11, 2025.
ANALYST ANALYSIS
Google Gemini 3 received positive feedback with many organizations, positioning it as the top-performing AI model. Anthropic's latest Claude model continued to emphasize its coding capabilities as best-of-breed. The latest DeepSeek release continues to deliver innovate capabilities in the areas of compute resources required and unique new reasoning capabilities at a price that is far less expense than the closed models.
Finally, OpenAI declared a "Code Red" shortly after Gemini 3 was made available. OpenAI stakeholders communicated an urgent need to refocus the company's efforts to improve ChatGPT's performance. Other projects were delayed so they could accelerate the availability of GPT 5.2.
New US AI Executive Order attempts to restrict individual states from introducing new AI legislation
Read the AI executive order – Ensuring a National Policy Framework for AI
On December 11, 2025, the US administration introduced a new AI executive order. The goals of the latest executive order include:
- Creating a national AI framework for legislation.
- Restricting the states from introducing AI regulations.
- Creating a task force to review and challenge burdensome AI regulations introduced at the state-level.
ANALYST ANALYSIS
The argument the administration is proposing is that AI innovation should not be hampered by individual states with their own legislation and cites that the US must not fall behind China with respect to AI innovation.
Like the US, China has made AI a national priority, but it has also introduced AI regulations and controls, as have most other countries around the world. Examples of AI regulations and controls introduced include:
- Legislation making AI safety a national priority.
- Chatbots undergoing pre-deployment safety reviews.
- Thousands of noncompliant AI products being removed from the market.
Microsoft pledges to invest into Canada's infrastructure and a five-part plan to protect Canada's digital sovereignty
Read the Microsoft announcement
Watch the CBC interview with Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith
On November 9, 2025, Microsoft released a press release titled "Microsoft Deepens Its Commitment to Canada with Landmark $19B AI Investment." The press release also claims that a new company-wide five-part plan will be launched to protect Canada's digital sovereignty by defending Canada's cybersecurity, keeping Canadian data in Canada, ensuring privacy, supporting local AI developers, and ensuring continuity of cloud and AI services.
Note: most news agencies cite that the new investments into Canada is $7.5B over the next two years (this is actually less than what it has invested in the past two years).
ANALYST ANALYSIS
During the CBC interview, Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President of Microsoft, started the interview stating "We want Canada to know that despite whatever issues arise between our two governments, the Canadian people can depend on Microsoft."
The fist and most challenging question posed to Brad centered on how his company will be able to guarantee the digital sovereignty of Canada when his company needs to follow American legislation. His response: "What I can say is look at our track record." He then proceeded to cite how the company has sued the US government in the past to protect data.
This response shows no real change with respect to its current legal structure in Canada and is basically asking Canadian organizations to trust that Microsoft will fight the US administration in the courts, which are two entities that the company cannot control and that have produced mixed results with past engagements.
AI RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS
Info-Tech's Best of 2025: New!
Source: Info-Tech's Best of 2025
Info-Tech Research Group
AI Customer Experience Tools: Buyers Guide and Market Trends New!
Source: AI Customer Experience Tools: Buyers Guide and Market Trends
Info-Tech Research Group
VENDOR SPOTLIGHT:
AI Marketplace
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UPCOMING AND RECENT EVENTS
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Regina, Saskatchewan, April 8, 2026
Austin, Texas, May 14, 2026
AI AND DATA ANALYTICS SOLUTIONS – RESOURCES
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AI EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Bill Wong – Info-Tech AI Research Fellow
