Category: 3. Business

TOKYO, Japan, October 15, 2025 – Honda Motor Co., Ltd. today announced that it has decided to make an additional investment in Helm.ai, a California-based startup, that has key strengths in AI technologies advanced through unsupervised learning^*1. As Helm.ai raises additional funds for its continued growth, Honda will make an additional investment to further enhance its development of next-generation end-to-end (E2E) autonomous driving (AD) and advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS).

Helm.ai is an AI software startup established in November 2016, and Honda and Helm.ai have been working in collaboration since 2019 through Honda Xcelerator^*2, a global open innovation program of Honda. Through the initial investment Honda made in 2022, the two companies have strengthened collaboration and accelerated research and development of unique solutions that integrate advanced AI technologies of Helm.ai and Honda technologies.

Moreover, in July 2025, the two companies signed a multi-year joint development agreement for the purpose of enhancing the development of next-generation AD/ADAS based on the E2E  AI architecture that controls everything from environmental perception to decision-making and vehicle actuation.

The additional investment announced today will further strengthen the relationship between the two companies under this overarching direction of the joint development agreement. By leveraging the original Deep Teaching™^*3 technology and generative AI of Helm.ai, Honda will accelerate its development of next-generation ADAS which will provide high-level driver assistance, including vehicle operations such as acceleration and steering, throughout the entire route to the destination, whether on expressways or surface roads. Honda is aiming to apply this new, next-generation ADAS to a broad range of key EV and HEV models Honda will launch in North America and Japan around 2027.

Going forward, Honda will continue to accelerate the development of its original next-generation AD/ADAS based on cutting-edge AI technologies including E2E AI, and swiftly deliver highly reliable autonomous driving technologies to customers around the world, which will accelerate Honda initiative to achieve zero fatalities from traffic collisions involving Honda motorcycles and automobiles.

A marketing authorization application (MAA) for the use of relacorilant in patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer has been submitted to the European Medicines Agency, according to an announcement from Corcept Therapeutics Incorporated.¹

The submission was supported by findings from the phase 3 ROSELLA study (GOG-3073/ENGOT ov72/APGOT-Ov10/LACOG-0223/ANZGOG-2221/2023; NCT05257408) and phase 2 studies, which showed that when the selective glucocorticoid receptor antagonist was paired with nab-paclitaxel (Abraxane), it improved progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) vs nab-paclitaxel alone. Relacorilant was also found to have favorable tolerability, in line with its known toxicity profile.

“Our MAA submission brings us a step closer to our goal of delivering relacorilant to patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer,” Joseph Belanoff, MD, chief executive officer of Corcept Therapeutics, stated in a news release. “Better treatment options are urgently needed. Relacorilant has the potential to redefine how platinum-resistant ovarian cancer is treated.”

Status of Relacorilant in Platinum-Resistant Ovarian Cancer: Top Takeaways

• Corcept Therapeutics has submitted a marketing authorization application to the EMA for relacorilant plus nab-paclitaxel in platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, following positive phase 3 ROSELLA and other phase 2 data.

• In ROSELLA, the combination improved median PFS to 6.54 months vs 5.52 months and OS to 15.97 months vs 11.50 months.

• Relacorilant showed a manageable safety profile, requires no biomarker testing, and is an oral agent that could be easily integrated into current treatment practice.

• A new drug application for relacorilant in this patient population is also under FDA review.

What Was the ROSELLA Study Schema?

The phase 3 trial enrolled patients (n = 381) with epithelial ovarian, primary peritoneal or fallopian tube cancer who experienced progression within 6 months after their last dose of platinum therapy.² Patients had an ECOG performance status of 0 or 1, had previously received 1 to 3 lines of therapy, and had prior exposure to bevacizumab (Avastin).

Participants were randomized 1:1 to receive 150 mg of relacorilant plus 80 mg/m² of nab-paclitaxel or 100 mg/m² (n = 188) of nab-paclitaxel alone (n = 193). Treatment continued until disease progression or intolerable toxicity. Stratification factors included prior lines of therapy (1 vs >1) and region (North America vs Europe vs Korea, Australia, and Latin America).

The dual primary end points of the study were PFS by blinded independent central review and RECIST 1.1 criteria and OS. Secondary end points included investigator-assessed PFS, objective response rate (ORR), duration of response, clinical benefit rate (CBR), response by CA-125 Gynecologic Cancer Intergroup (GCIG) criteria, combined response by GCIG and RECIST criteria, and safety.

The median patient age was 61 years (range, 26-85) in the relacorilant arm and 62 years (range, 33-86) in the nab-paclitaxel–alone arm. Most patients were White (72.3% vs 69.9%), and slightly more than half were from Europe (56.9% vs 56.5%). About one-third had an ECOG performance status of 1 or 2 (28.2% vs 32.6%), and around 12% had BRCA1/2 mutations (12.2% vs 12.4%). In the experimental arm, 8.0%, 48.9%, and 43.1% of patients received 1, 2, or 3 prior lines of therapy, respectively; in the control arm, these respective rates were 9.3%, 46.1%, and 44.6%. In the experimental arm, 6.9% of patients were primary platinum refractory, 35.6% had received at least 1 prior line of therapy in the platinum-resistant setting, and 4.3% had prior taxane exposure in the platinum-resistant setting; in the control arm, these rates were 6.7%, 42.5%, and 3.6%. Prior therapies received in the combination and monotherapy arms were bevacizumab (100%; 100%), taxanes (99.5%; 99.5%), pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (64.4%; 64.8%), and PARP inhibition (60.6%; 62.2%).

What Were the Efficacy and Safety Data From ROSELLA?

The median PFS with relacorilant plus nab-paclitaxel was 6.54 months (95% CI, 5.55-7.43) vs 5.52 months (95% CI, 3.94-5.88) with nab-paclitaxel alone, translating to a 30% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death (HR, 0.70; 95% CI, 0.54-0.91; P = .0076). The hazard ratio for PFS per investigator assessment was 0.71 (P = .0030). The 6-month PFS rates in the respective arms were 52% and 42%; the 12-month PFS rates were 25% and 13%.

At the time of the interim analysis, which had a data maturity of 50%, the addition of relacorilant to nab-paclitaxel was also found to improve OS over nab-paclitaxel alone, at a median of 15.97 months (95% CI, 13.47-not reached) and 11.50 months (95% CI, 10.02-13.57), respectively (HR, 0.69; 95% CI, 0.52-0.92; nominal P = .0121). The 12-month OS rates in the respective arms were 60% and 49%.

The relacorilant combination elicited an ORR of 36.9% vs 30.1% with nab-paclitaxel monotherapy, translating to a 6.8% improvement (P = .17). The CBRs in the respective arms were 51.1% and 38.9%, translating to a 12.2% improvement (P = .016).

In terms of safety, ascites was found to be less common in those given relacorilant vs not, with unadjusted incidence rates of 5% and 11%, respectively, for all-grade ascites; for grade 3 or higher, the rates were 3% and 5%.

Treatment-emergent adverse effects (TEAEs) occurred in all patients who received the combination (n = 188) vs 99.5% of those who received the monotherapy (n = 190); they were grade 3 or higher for 74.5% and 59.5% of patients, respectively. Serious adverse effects (AEs) were reported in 35.1% of those in the combination arm and 23.7% of those in the monotherapy arm. AEs that resulted in treatment discontinuation for more than 2 patients were intestinal obstruction and paresthesia. No fatal AEs were tied to relacorilant.

What Is the Significance of Relacorilant in Platinum-Resistant Ovarian Cancer?

In a past interview with OncLive®, Domenica Lorusso, MD, PhD, of Humanitas Hospital San Pio X in Milan and Humanitas University in Rozzano, Italy, discussed the clinical implications of the ROSELLA data.³ “[Nab-paclitaxel plus relacorilant] can be easily considered a new standard of care for our patients with platinum-resistant and refractory ovarian cancer,” she said. “[What was interesting about] the trial is that the comparator arm was nab-paclitaxel. According to the indirect trial comparison data we have, [this is] as effective as weekly paclitaxel, [which] we consider [to be] the most effective drug in the platinum-resistant setting. What we demonstrate with the ROSELLA trial is that when we add relacorilant to the best drug in the platinum-resistant setting, we further increase PFS.”

WASHINGTON — Rocket Lab launched a spacecraft for one Japanese radar imaging company Oct. 14, just days after signing a contract for additional launches for another.

An Electron rocket lifted off from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand at 12:33 p.m. Eastern. The payload, a StriX synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging satellite for Synspective, deployed from the rocket’s kick stage about 50 minutes after liftoff. The satellite was placed into its intended orbit at an altitude of 583 kilometers and an inclination of 42 degrees.

The mission was Rocket Lab’s seventh launch for Synspective since 2020 but its first since December 2024. All of Synspective’s SAR satellites launched to date have flown on Electron.

Synspective said the spacecraft is the first of its third generation of satellites. “Building upon our accumulated operational experience and technological expertise, we have achieved significant advancements in observation performance, reliability and scalability,” Motoyuki Arai, Synspective’s founder and chief executive, said in a statement. The company did not disclose details about the improvements in the new generation.

Synspective plans to deploy a constellation of 30 satellites by 2030 to provide frequent global coverage. Most of those satellites will be launched by Electron through a backlog of 20 launches in the coming years, including a contract for 10 additional missions signed Sept. 30.

While Synspective has exclusively used Electron so far, it has signed with other launch providers for future missions. The company reached a contract earlier this year with SpaceX to launch two satellites on rideshare missions and in July signed a deal with launch services provider Exolaunch for 10 satellites starting in 2027.

The Synspective launch came a week after Rocket Lab signed a new launch contract with iQPS, another Japanese company developing a SAR constellation. The new contract covers three launches starting no earlier than 2026 and adds to an existing backlog of four missions.

Electron has launched five iQPS missions to date, the first in 2023. The other four took place between March and August this year as part of a pair of four-launch contracts between Rocket Lab and iQPS signed in February. Rocket Lab said its next iQPS launch is planned for November.

“In 2025, we successfully deployed four satellites, QPS-SAR-9 through QPS-SAR-12, into their planned orbits aboard Electron. This outcome was exactly as we had anticipated, and it further reaffirmed our confidence in the rocket’s reliability,” Shunsuke Onishi, iQPS chief executive, said in a statement about the new contract.

The Synspective launch was the 15th Electron mission of the year, all successful. That total includes two launches of its suborbital version of Electron, called HASTE, from Launch Complex 2 at Wallops Island, Virginia, which the company did not publicize. Rocket Lab has projected completing at least 20 Electron launches this year.

Related

OpenAI plans to allow a wider range of content, including erotica, on its popular chatbot ChatGPT as part of its push to “treat adult users like adults”, says its boss Sam Altman.

In a post on X on Tuesday, Mr Altman said upcoming versions of the popular chatbot would enable it to behave in a more human-like way – “but only if you want it, not because we are usage maxxing”.

The move, reminiscent of Elon Musk’s xAI recent introduction of two sexually explicit chatbots to Grok, could help OpenAI attract more paying subscribers.

It is also likely to intensify pressure on lawmakers to introduce tighter restrictions on chatbot companions.

OpenAI did not respond to the BBC’s requests for comment following Mr Altman’s post.

Changes announced by the company come after it was sued earlier this year by parents of a US teen who took his own life.

The lawsuit filed by Matt and Maria Raine, who are the parents of 16-year-old Adam Raine, was the first legal action accusing OpenAI of wrongful death.

The Californian couple criticised the company’s parental controls – which it said were designed to promote healthier use of its chatbot – saying they did not go far enough.

The family included chat logs between Adam, who died in April, and ChatGPT that show him explaining he has suicidal thoughts.

Altman said that OpenAI previously made ChatGPT “pretty restrictive to make sure we were being careful with mental health issues”.

“We realise this made it less useful/enjoyable to many users who had no mental health problems, but given the seriousness of the issue we wanted to get this right,” Mr Altman said.

He said the company has now been able to mitigate the serious mental health risks and have new tools allowing it to “safely relax the restrictions in most cases”.

“In December, as we roll out age-gating more fully and as part of our ‘treat adult users like adults’ principle, we will allow even more, like erotica for verified adults,” he said.

Critics say OpenAI’s decision to allow erotica on the platform shows the need for more regulation at the federal and state levels.

“How are they going to make sure that children are not able to access the portions of ChatGPT that are adult-only and provide erotica?” said Jenny Kim, a partner at the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner. “Open AI, like most of big tech in this space, is just using people like guinea pigs.”

Ms Kim is involved in a lawsuit against Meta that claims the company’s Instagram’s algorithm harms the mental health of teen users.

“We don’t even know if their age gating is going to work,” she said.

In April, TechCrunch reported that OpenAI was allowing accounts in which a user had registered as a minor to generate graphic erotica.

OpenAI said at the time that the company was rolling out a fix to limit such content.

A survey published this month by the nonprofit Centre for Democracy and Technology (CDT) found that one in five students report that they or someone they know has had a romantic relationship with AI.

On Monday, California Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill passed by the state legislature that would have blocked developers from offering AI chatbots companions to children unless the companies could guarantee the software wouldn’t breed harmful behaviour.

Newsom said it was “imperative that adolescents learn how to safely interact with AI systems” in a message that accompanied his veto.

At the nationwide level, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has launched an inquiry into how AI chatbots interact with children.

In the US Senate last month, bipartisan legislation was introduced that would classify AI chatbots as products. The law would allow users to file liability claims against chatbot developers.

Mr Altman’s announcement on Tuesday comes as sceptics have been questioning the rapid rise in the value of AI tech companies.

OpenAI’s revenue is growing, but it has never been profitable.

Tulane University business professor Rob Lalka, who authored the recent book The Venture Alchemists, said the major AI companies find themselves in a battle for market share.

“No company has ever had the kind of adoption that OpenAI saw with ChatGPT,” Lalka told the BBC.

“They needed to continue to push along that exponential growth curve, achieving market domination as much as they can.”

Unit 42 recently assisted a prominent manufacturer who experienced a severe ransomware attack orchestrated by Ignoble Scorpius, the group that distributes BlackSuit ransomware. This incident serves as a reminder of how a seemingly minor issue — in this case, a single set of compromised VPN credentials — can lead to a full-scale corporate crisis with tremendous impact to the bottom line.

The Attack: A Combination of Reconnaissance and Ransomware

The Ignoble Scorpius attack began with a voice phishing (vishing) call. The attacker impersonated the company’s IT help desk and tricked an employee into entering their legitimate VPN credentials on a phishing site.

With these credentials, the threat actor gained initial network access and immediately escalated their privileges. They executed a DCSync attack on a domain controller to steal highly privileged credentials, including a key service account. Using these compromised credentials, they moved laterally across the network using RDP and SMB, employing tools like Advanced IP Scanner and SMBExec to map the network and identify high-value targets.

The attackers established persistence by deploying AnyDesk and a custom RAT on a domain controller, configured as a scheduled task to survive reboots. (It is important to note that threat actors often abuse and take advantage of legitimate products like AnyDesk for malicious purposes. We are not implying that the legitimate product is flawed.)

The attackers then compromised a second domain controller, extracting the NTDS.dit database containing all user password hashes, and exfiltrated over 400 GB of data using a renamed rclone utility. To cover their tracks, the threat actors deployed CCleaner to erase forensic evidence before unleashing the final blow: BlackSuit ransomware, orchestrated through Ansible, simultaneously encrypted hundreds of virtual machines across approximately 60 VMware ESXi hosts, disrupting operations across the entire infrastructure.

How Unit 42 Helped

When Unit 42 was engaged, we helped the client expand their Cortex XDR deployment from 250 to over 17,000 endpoints, providing enterprise-wide visibility to track the attacker’s every move. We also leveraged Cortex XSOAR to automate containment actions, stopping the attack from spreading further.

Our investigation identified the full attack path and led to some critical recommendations including:

• Network Security: Replace end-of-life Cisco ASA firewalls with Next-Generation Firewalls (NGFW), implement network segmentation, and restrict administrative access to critical systems (like DCs and ESXi hosts) to dedicated management VLANs.
• Identity and Access Management: Enforce MFA for all remote access, disable NTLM or require EPA, rotate all credentials, and restrict service accounts from being used for interactive logons like RDP.
• Endpoint and Server Hardening: Block EFSRPC using RPC filters to prevent PetitPotam/DCSync attacks, deploy and maintain a fully patched XDR solution on all endpoints, and have a strict policy for removing EOL systems.
• Logging and Monitoring: Enhance log retention to 90-plus days for critical sources (ESXi, firewalls, Nasuni), ensure logs are properly parsed for effective analysis, and enable features like AWS CloudTrail log validation.

The Outcome

The client was able to achieve several key outcomes:

• Financial demand negated: We successfully negated the $20 million ransom demand, ensuring the client paid no ransom.
• Expanded visibility: The engagement expanded the client’s endpoint visibility from 250 to over 17,000, creating a robust foundation for future security operations.
• Strategic guidance: We provided bespoke, strategic after-incident guidance, helping the client fortify their defenses and prevent future attacks.
• Continuous monitoring: Following the incident, the client onboarded Unit 42 Managed Detection and Response (MDR) services for continuous monitoring, ensuring they are better prepared to handle future threats.

The Takeaway

This attack serves as a stark reminder that even a single compromised credential can create a domino effect, leading to a catastrophic security breach. The swift and sophisticated tactics of threat actors like Ignoble Scorpius and their use of BlackSuit ransomware demonstrate the critical need for a proactive and multi-layered defense strategy.

By implementing MFA on all remote access points, and integrating robust endpoint visibility, automated containment, and expert guidance, organizations can not only disrupt an attack in progress but also shore up their defenses to prevent future incidents. Most importantly, investments in proactive security assessments have shown to pay dividends that far outweigh the costs of operational and financial impact of a full-scale ransomware attack.

Interested in learning more about the latest attack trends? If so, take a look at our 2025 Unit 42 Global Incident Response Report, which distills the most critical findings based on our direct experience responding to real-world cyberattacks at over 500 organizations across 38 countries.

Additional Resources

About Unit 42

Unit 42 strengthens your team with the tools and expertise needed to stay ahead of threats like BlackSuit ransomware and protect your business. With our proven strategies and insights from thousands of engagements, we’ll help your team handle the toughest situations with confidence.