Tech news: Luca IQ launches with e-file approved tax engine for CPA firms

Payroll and HR platform Deel announced the availability of its services in the Microsoft Marketplace. Organizations that run their operations on Microsoft Azure and Microsoft 365 can now find and deploy Deel’s Employee of Record, Managed Payroll, and contractor hiring solutions directly through Microsoft Marketplace. They can further optimize cloud spend by applying Deel toward existing Azure Consumption Commitments (MACC). … Intuit has established multi-year partnerships with Anthropic and OpenAI to bring new, actionable sales invoicing, payroll, and lending intelligence in Claude and ChatGPT – moving beyond read-only access to user data. These features enable small business users to perform tasks like creating invoices, looking up payroll details, and accessing loan benchmarking through conversation. QuickBooks customers can continue to power their Claude and ChatGPT experiences. …  Value added reseller and managed services provider Net at Work announced the acquisition of Kinzit Technologies, a managed services provider (MSP) and cybersecurity firm. Kinzit’s employees will join Net at Work and continue to serve their existing clients while gaining expanded career growth opportunities. Kinzit clients will benefit from access to a broader suite of applications that will optimize workflows and support business growth. … LexisNexis® Legal & Professional and Neil Jesani Tax Advisors, a national full-service tax advisory firm, announced plans to collaborate on Tolley+™ with Protégé™ to advance tax advisory services for CPA firms. LexisNexis will support Neil Jesani Tax Advisors with access to authoritative tax content and AI-powered research tools. … Big Four firm E&Y announced an expanded alliance with SymphonyAI in manufacturing and supply chain, allowing more organizations to build AI operations from the ground up rather than bolting AI onto legacy structures. SymphonyAI’s industrial AI platform will be embedded into EY’s Order-to-Cash Master Value Blueprint, which helps EY clients scale AI across manufacturing and business operations. This expansion builds on EY and SymphonyAI’s original alliance, which focused on bringing GenAI applications to retail and financial services. The expanded alliance will bring services to EY clients in manufacturing-intensive industries including industrial products, consumer goods, life sciences and energy. … FreshBooks, a business management solutions provider, and Grasshopper, a client-first, full-service digital bank, announced a new strategic partnership. FreshBooks now brings Grasshopper transactions into one place, turns transactions into clear reports, pairs Grasshopper’s with FreshBooks’ invoices, online payments, and smart payment reminders, and enables users to scan receipts. …  Vena Solutions, a provider of financial and operational planning solutions, announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Morpheo AI, subject to customary closing conditions. Vena is acquiring Morpheo AI’s technology and the team behind it to advance Vena AI through Vena Omega™, a cumulative context engine designed to deepen organizational intelligence and enable company-specific AI capabilities. The acquisition also brings new capabilities to Acterys, transforming fragmented enterprise data into structured, enriched and continuously evolving context that AI can understand and act on.