WAN-IFRA and Open AI build on the success of the 2024-2025 Newsroom AI Catalyst, which already helps 128 news organisations across Europe, Asia, South Asia, and Latin America.
In its latest development, the Catalyst will feature two additional cohorts, open to twenty-four editorial teams, and will expand to new regions, including Australia and New Zealand, where the programme will be available in the coming months.
A Commitment to Responsible AI-Driven Journalism
Helping the industry embrace new AI capabilities is a priority development area for WAN-IFRA, and the Newsroom AI Catalyst programme is a key part of its portfolio of services for members.
For news professionals, AI presents opportunities to reshape professional journalism across multiple dimensions, from advanced content discovery to creating new dynamic storytelling, breaking away from traditional fixed formats. It promises productivity gains in workflows that unleash the creative power of editorial teams.
AI has become a utility in record time, reshaping the web and changing digital culture. It brings challenges that the profession must anticipate and respond to with new working methods, tools and organisations. The effective response to these challenges will depend to a large extent on experimentation and the sharing of best practices, which are at the core of the AI Newsroom Catalyst project.
“The launch of two new cohorts and the expansion of the programme to Australia and New Zealand marks an important milestone in the programme’s development, which has met with great success since its launch at the end of 2024. Together with our recently launched Prototype Development Fund, this is the next level of WAN-IFRA’s commitment to supporting publishers on their way to sustainability and responsible technological advancement,” said Vincent Peyrègne, WAN-IFRA CEO.
“Since our partnership with WAN-IFRA was announced a year ago, we’re seen countless news publishers successfully deploy AI to benefit their operations and their audiences. We’re excited to extend the breadth and reach of that effort as part of OpenAI’s commitment to support quality journalism worldwide. Every participant leaves this program with a tailored AI roadmap, and we’re looking forward to seeing the new ways that journalists and publishers put AI tools to work in creative, impactful ways,” said Tom Rubin, OpenAI’s Chief of Intellectual Property and Content.
Program Highlights
Advanced Global Cohort Accelerator
Two and a half years after the groundbreaking launch of ChatGPT3, most news organisations have started to implement AI in their daily work and have prototyped new effective tools and formats. WAN-IFRA’s Newsroom AI Catalyst will help them take these efforts to the next level with the “Advanced Global Cohort Accelerator”. The new programme is designed for leading media organisations with pre-existing AI deployment. It will provide advanced tools, deep-dive sessions and peer-to-peer exchanges designed for expert practitioners. 12 publishers will join the programme by invitation.
Newsroom AI Catalyst now open to Australia and New Zealand
In a further step, WAN-IFRA is expanding the Catalyst programme to Australia and New Zealand. It will offer a first Catalyst cohort, including a three-month programme to support 12 newsrooms with capacity building and hands-on AI implementation. Applications will open in June 2025.
Contact and Inquiries
For more information, please contact Rocio Valderrábano, Programme Manager at WAN-IFRA mailto:rocio.valderrabano@wan-ifra.org
For more details, visit wan-ifra.org/ai-accelerator
About
The Newsroom AI Catalyst is an accelerator programme open to 128 newsrooms across Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America and South Asia. It combines expert guidance with hands-on experience, equipping newsroom stakeholders with the knowledge and tools to drive strategic AI initiatives. On completion, participants will leave the programme with a prototype and a roadmap to scale up their artificial intelligence operations in the newsroom.
WAN-IFRA, the World Association of News Publishers, is the global organisation of the world’s press, comprising 3,000 news publishers and technology companies and 40 national publishers’ associations representing 18,000 publications in 120 countries. With a mission to protect the rights of journalists and publishers around the world to operate independent media, WAN-IFRA provides its members with expertise and services to innovate and prosper in a digital world and perform their crucial role in society. The World Editors Forum is its network for editors. wan-ifra.org
OpenAI is a leading AI research and deployment company headquartered in San Francisco, California. Its mission is to develop safe and beneficial artificial general intelligence (AGI). OpenAI is best known for its GPT series of language models, DALL-E for image generation, and Sora for text-to-video AI. openai.com