Firstup extends AI leadership with award-winning AI Search, Copilot and ChatGPT integrations, and ISO/IEC 42001:2023 Certification for Responsible AI Governance. Sep 02, 2026, 09:01 ET Firstup's latest release pairs independently certified AI governance with new Model Context Protocol (MCP) capabilities that bring workforce communications directly into the AI assistants employees already use - extending a year of innovation that has the company on pace to deliver 60% more capability than in 2025 SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 2, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - Firstup, the pioneer of intelligent communication and engagement platforms for the workforce, today introduced its latest platform release, following a first half of award-winning AI innovation that puts the company on track to deliver 60% more capability to customers in 2026 than in 2025. The release meets employees in the tools they already use, connects Firstup to the enterprise systems they rely on, and sharpens the everyday employee experience. Many of the headline release features were drawn directly from Firstup's customer Idea Portal, a reflection of the company's commitment to customer-centricity. "While much of our industry slows down for the summer, we've increased our pace of innovation," said Bill Schuh, CEO of Firstup. "Through 1H, we delivered 60% more capability than a year ago, including significant advances in AI backed by enterprise-grade quality, availability, and security. Our Q3 release enhances our ability to deliver the right message with the right role-relevant context to the right person at the right place and time - so employees can act on it. That's how communication drives measurable business impact." ISO/IEC 42001:2023 Certification for Responsible AI Governance In August, Firstup achieved ISO/IEC 42001:2023 certification for its Artificial Intelligence Management System (AIMS), following an independent audit of the company's approach to governing AI-related activities. The certification reflects Firstup's structured approach to AI governance, including risk assessment, defined accountability, operational controls, and ongoing monitoring and improvement. "As AI rapidly evolves, enterprises need credible assurance that the systems they rely on are governed responsibly," said Vinod Malhotra, Chief Technology Officer of Firstup. "ISO/IEC 42001 certification independently validates Firstup's disciplined approach to AI governance, including human oversight, privacy and data protection, transparency, accountability, and continuous improvement. It reinforces our commitment to building AI solutions that are not only powerful, but also secure, trustworthy, and designed to scale responsibly." Firstup Content Inside Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT Using Model Context Protocol (MCP), employees can search their organization's Firstup communications, topics, and people directly inside Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT - asking questions such as, "Did we announce anything about open enrollment?" and getting the actual company communication, cited, instead of a guess. Every answer is securely scoped to content that the employee already has permission to access in Firstup, preserving existing access controls when Firstup content is surfaced through external AI assistants. Organizations connect Firstup to the enterprise Copilot or ChatGPT they already use, so there is no new tool to roll out. Fully Connected to Your Systems The release also delivers efficiency and productivity gains by connecting Firstup to the enterprise systems employees rely on daily, so basic tasks get done in seconds instead of requiring separate logins: * SAP SuccessFactors Integration - Employees and managers can complete HR tasks inside Firstup, such as submitting time off, approving requests and updating personal details, with every change saved back to SAP automatically * Dayforce Integration - Employees can view payslips, time-off requests and balances from Dayforce right inside Firstup on web or mobile, delivering a more seamless experience A Smarter, More Trusted Experience Rounding out the release are enhancements that personalize, measure, and secure every interaction across the platform: * Custom Homepage Enhancements - Employees set their own shortcuts, admins keep critical links pinned, and a refreshed layout keeps high-value content above the fold * AI Search Enhancements - Chat history for employees and a real-time AI Usage Report that gives leaders greater visibility into AI adoption and usage, extending Firstup's award-winning AI Search * Alias Commenting - Enables users to comment as the brand, a team, or persona with full admin accountability behind the scenes * Email Reachability Management - A new Email Management page that shows exactly who is unsubscribed and why, with one-click bulk resubscribe "Employees shouldn't have to hunt through apps to find an answer or finish a task," said Cheryl Chavez, Chief Product Officer of Firstup. "With this release, trusted company content shows up right inside Copilot and ChatGPT, and employees can complete HR tasks like submitting time off without ever leaving Firstup. That's communication that gets things done, in the places people already work." Co-Designing the Future With Customers Firstup also announced its Customer Innovation Program, a partnership with key customers to co-design new platform capabilities. The program pairs Firstup product teams directly with enterprise leaders in communications, HR, and IT to shape important new products from concept through release, building on the customer-driven roadmap that powered the first half of 2026. Recent Recognitions The release caps a first half of sustained momentum and industry recognition for Firstup's AI-driven innovation: * Forrester's Total Economic Impact(TM) study found Firstup's intelligent workforce communications platform delivered $8.9 million in benefits and 398% ROI for a composite organization representative of interviewed customers with experience using Firstup * Firstup AI Search was named "Overall AI Search Platform of the Year" in the 2026 AI Breakthrough Awards program * Firstup was named a finalist in The 2026 SaaS Awards in the "Most Innovative SaaS Solution" category * Firstup won the Lighthouse Tech Award for Employee Experience Platform Innovation That momentum is matched by scale. Firstup reaches millions of employees across more than 180 countries. All Q3 features are available today. For more information, visit our blog. About Firstup Firstup is the leading platform for intelligent communication and engagement that powers meaningful business outcomes. As a true "mission control" for workforce communications, Firstup is built for organizations with critically important frontline employees, delivering the right message to the right person at the right time. The platform enables hyper-personalized, data-driven journeys across channels (email, mobile, intranet, digital signage and more), bringing alignment, clarity and engagement to every level of the organization. With integrations to core HR, IT and business systems, Firstup reduces digital noise, surfaces actionable insights, strengthens employee experience and helps clients maximize productivity and retention. Trusted by large enterprises worldwide, Firstup transforms internal communication into measurable impact. Learn more at www.firstup.io. SOURCE Firstup

Reach further, act faster, prove more: what's new in Q2 2026. May 18, 2026 Last quarter, Firstup, Inc. shipped Custom Homepage and Focused Content, expanding personalization across the employee experience. Instead of one-size-fits-all communications, organizations could create tailored experiences for different audiences within a single platform. This quarter, Firstup, Inc. is expanding what's possible by extending your reach across every corner of the organization, giving employees self-service capabilities without leaving Firstup, and surfacing the data leadership needs to make real decisions. When these capabilities work together, engagement goes up, HR inquiries go down, and leadership conversations shift from 'Firstup, Inc. think it's working' to 'here's the data.' Here's what's new. Reach further. Expanding who you can reach means solving for identity complexity, ensuring critical content can't be ignored, and automating the touchpoints that matter most. Multiple SSO. Every employee who can't access the platform is a message that doesn't land, an initiative that stalls, and engagement that never happens. Large enterprises rarely have simple authentication. Acquisitions, subsidiaries, and decentralized IT create complexity that traditional single SSO can't handle. Multiple SSO allows organizations to connect multiple identity providers simultaneously within a single Firstup instance. Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, Ping, Google Workspace, and any SAML 2.0 provider all work together so that every employee gets a consistent login experience, so no corner of your organization is left out of critical communications. The business value: broader reach across your entire workforce, smoother employee experience, and confidence that your most important initiatives can actually reach the people who need to act on them. Mandatory Auto-Follow. When safety alerts and compliance updates go unread, people get hurt, and your organization faces real risk. Some communications aren't optional, but until now, employees could unsubscribe from anything, including the content that carries the highest stakes. Mandatory Auto-Follow adds a new toggle in Studio that locks subscriptions for targeted audiences on Topics and Knowledge Hubs. Critical communications can no longer be manually unfollowed, giving you enforceable governance for the messages that matter most. The business value: 100% confidence that safety protocols, compliance deadlines, and crisis communications reached the audiences they were built for. Static List Audiences. Your most important audiences often can't be reached because they don't fit neatly into HR categories. Union members, event attendees, project teams - these groups are business-critical but can't be queried from your system. The current workaround involves copying emails into spreadsheets, building complex formulas, and pasting queries into the advanced builder. Static List Audiences replaces that entire process. Upload a CSV directly, create reusable audiences that work across programs, and reduce audience build time by 95%. Sometimes HRIS data doesn't fit dynamic categories, and this makes targeting those groups simple. The business value: critical initiatives stop stalling while you manually build lists, and the right people get the right message regardless of how their data is structured. Journey Frequency Settings. Missed birthdays, forgotten work anniversaries, and late compliance training don't just frustrate employees - they erode the culture and compliance standards you're working to build. Recurring employee moments shouldn't require annual manual rebuilds. Journey Frequency Settings automates recurring Journeys with flexible weekly, monthly, and annual triggers that require no maintenance after setup. Work anniversaries, compliance training, and routine reminders run automatically, so critical touchpoints never fall through the cracks. The business value: communicators get time back for strategic work, and employees receive consistent touchpoints that strengthen culture and compliance without manual intervention. Act faster. When employees can get things done directly in Firstup, they stay engaged with the platform where your most important communications live. Enhanced productivity integrations. App switching and re-authentication friction doesn't just annoy employees - it pulls them away from the communications platform you need them engaged with. Q2 enhances Workday and UKG Pro integrations to handle key HR tasks directly within Firstup. Employees can now submit time-off requests in Workday without leaving Firstup and check UKG attendance points in real time without switching apps. When paired with AI Search, employees can access the productivity enhancements and more, like payslips, time-off balances, all through natural language in just seconds. The business value: higher process adoption, reduced HR ticket volume, and stronger employee engagement with the platform where your most critical communications live. Prove more. Leadership needs proof that your communications program drives real business impact. Q2 gives you unified reporting and the analytics tools to tell that story. Enhanced Developer API reporting. If you've built custom intranet experiences on Firstup's Developer APIs, a meaningful portion of your content engagement has been invisible to leadership, making it impossible to show the full impact of your program. Developer API-generated engagement - comments, shares, bookmarks - now appears in Campaign Results and Standard Reporting alongside native channel performance. Plus, a new secure REST API lets data teams retrieve engagement data for Power BI, Tableau, and internal data lakes without managing SFTP infrastructure. No lag, just your data, where your team can combine it with HRIS and business metrics. The business value: unified reporting that reflects the full scope of your program, and the ability to correlate communication engagement with business outcomes in the analytics tools leadership already trusts. What's next. Firstup, Inc. is continuing to expand what's possible with enterprise employee communication. When every employee can be reached, when employees can get things done without friction, and when leadership can see clear proof of impact, everything else gets easier. That's the foundation Firstup, Inc. is building toward. Want to learn more about what's new in Q2? Reach out to your Firstup account team or visit firstup.io.