AI sucks in the beta, I'm sure they're aware of it. They probably just want to get everything working before fixing the AI, otherwise new changes might break it all over again.

New techs and ships have been introduced into the beta. I am quite sure that the developers have yet to find the best way to program the AI to take full advantage of this new content. I have had no experience creating an AI for a game, but I would think that it can be a living nightmare.

I just had the 14 or 15, something like that Cap ship fleet & it kept  constantly going back and forth from the GW I was in & another GW. Like it was shitting itself, making a run for it, then being ordered straight back into battle. All I had to do was build a SB within range of where it was jumping back and forth, shift some ships within range and sit back and watch as 1 by 1 all the caps destroyed themselves. I didn't lose a thing not even a corvett.

And I think the fleets are ending up like that with the Rebels because there is no enough time to build much before the pirate AI gives you a fleet, using up all the fleet points. or there needs to be a chance for accepting or declining pirate fleets on offer or something like that.