CampTech Friday Round Up – Google’s AI announcement and what drives AI adoption in Canadian business
Here are a few things we’ve found online that we hope you’ll enjoy or find useful.
What drives AI adoption in Canadian small businesses?
The Camp Tech team compiled our key learnings into a special report on what we learned teaching AI to SMEs from coast to coast to coast. We’re really proud of our work, and we’re really proud of this report.
https://keylearnings.camptech.ca/
Google’s I/O 2026 keynote this week was full of AI-related announcements including a new family of Gemini 3.5 AI models, new features for Search and Gmail, and updates about its Project Aura smart glasses. Read about The 13 biggest announcements at Google I/O 2026 in The Verge
Here are some of the most impactful changes in Google
One checkout for everything with Google’s universal cart
Google is launching a “Universal Cart” that users can add products to from YouTube, Search, Gemini, and Gmail. Google says this “intelligent shopping cart” works across different merchants and services, like Nike, Target, Walmart, Ulta Beauty, Sephora, Wayfair, and Shopify. So, you could add products from Nike and Target to your Universal Cart and check out from both at the same time.
According to Google, Universal Cart can spot potential issues with products in your cart, as well, like flagging incompatible parts for a gaming PC. It can also interpret perks and loyalty info from Google Wallet payment methods to help users find savings or earn points. Universal Cart is launching in Search and Gemini this summer, with YouTube and Gmail coming later.
Search your inbox with your voice using Gmail Live
Google is expanding Gmail’s already robust search tools with a version of the Gemini Live experience for your inbox. Clicking an icon in the search bar lets you ask questions by talking, and instead of having to wade through a list of relevant email chains, the Gmail Live interface will extract and deliver pertinent information based on your prompt. It could be a faster way to pull up a specific confirmation code for a hotel reservation, for example. Similar voice-driven AI features will also be coming to Google Docs and Keep and be able to pull in data from Google Drive and Gmail.
Google’s new Pics app edits AI images based on comments
Google Workspace is getting a new app called Pics designed to make it easier to apply iterative AI-generated updates to images. Pics is powered by Nano Banana 2 and Gemini and allows users to make changes by clicking on a specific part of an image and leaving a comment describing the edits, instead of having to write an entire prompt that includes the required updates. Eventually, Google plans to incorporate Pics’ capabilities into other Workspace apps to further streamline image editing.
Agents, generative UI, and mini apps in Search
Google is changing up the search box. Now it will expand to give users more space for longer queries and include AI-generated suggestions, similar to autocomplete. Users aren’t limited to searching with text, either — Google will now let you use text, images, files, videos, and even Chrome tabs as search input.
Search is also getting “information agents,” which can give you summarized updates on specific topics or questions, pulling from blogs, news, social media posts, and more. These agents will be launching this summer, starting with AI Pro and Ultra subscribers.
Google’s new “generative UI” feature can generate visuals in Search, like simulations or interactive tables and graphs. Search will also soon be able to generate “mini apps” for tasks or topics users search for multiple times, like a custom dashboard for planning an event.
There are 31 weeks until Christmas, and Pinterest
wants to remind you that it’s never too early to start planning your holiday advertising campaigns. According to their research, advertisers who run shopping campaigns for six months or more see around 33% higher ROAS (return on ad spend) than those who run them for fewer than three months. Just don’t break out the egg nog too early, okay?