IF / News

OPPO is allegedly working on 2 foldable smartphones to be launched internationally. These may be called Find N Fold and Find N Flip, as these names have recently been trademarked with the EU Intellectual Property Office. The upcoming foldable phones are likely to feature Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset. (GSM Arena, Twitter, Pricebaba)

LeTV has issue an open letter stating that CLP Panda Home Appliances produced 3 TVs for LeTV, and there were problems with horizontal lines, vertical lines and liquid leakage on the screen. The LCD screen yield rate of the two 43” TVs was close to 20%, which constituted a quality accident. LeTV has made a follow-up supplement on the cooperation with Nanjing Panda, saying that the cooperation between the two parties has been suspended, and pointed out that the last order of the three TV models mentioned in the “open letter” has been delivered in Mar 2022.(CN Beta, IT Home)

Due to low demand for TVs, display panel makers like CSOT, a subsidiary of TCL, are currently operating their factories at a low rate than usual. TCL chairman Li Dongsheng had asked South Korean display equipment makers for an understanding of the current delays in payments during his visit in Jul 2022. He has also asked for understanding from its South Korean partners for delayed payments and its spending plan being pushed back due to the overall downturn in the display panel market. Li has also told the equipment makers that some parts of the T5 project, CSOT’s Gen 6 liquid crystal display (LCD) line, will be pushed back to 2023. (Laoyaoba, The Elec)

SK Hynix is planning to select a site in the US for a future chip packaging plant and break ground as soon as 3Q23. The facility will have an estimated cost of several billions, and could be ready to enter mass production by 2025-2026. SK Group in Jul 2022 said it would spend USD22B on manufacturing, bio science research and green energy in the US. Of the investment, USD15B will go directly toward semiconductor R&D and the creation of the aforementioned advanced packaging facility.(Laoyaoba, Aljazeera, Reuters, Techspot)

Micron has announced its plans to invest USD40B through the end of the decade to build leading-edge memory manufacturing in multiple phases in the U.S. Micron expects to begin production in 2026-2030, ramping overall supply in line with industry demand trends. The company has said the additional capacity will bring the U.S. market share of memory chip production from 2% to 10%. (Laoyaoba, Electronic Design, Micron, Bloomberg)

To help reach the IKEA ambition to become a circular and climate positive business by 2030, IKEA U.S. has announced a collaboration with Electrify America and Electrify Commercial to bring ultra-fast public charging stations and delivery fleet electric vehicle (EV) charging to over 25 IKEA retail locations throughout the U.S. This joint effort will enable IKEA U.S. to quadruple its total number of EV chargers, which supports the goal of achieving zero-emission home deliveries by 2025 and halving relative emissions from customer and co-worker travel by 2030. (Engadget, Electrify)

BMW will start mass-producing and selling fuel cell vehicles developed jointly with Toyota Motor as early as 2025, according to the company sales chief Pieter Nota. BMW and Toyota have also jointly developed sports cars since partnering in 2013, released as the BMW Z4 and the Toyota Supra in 2019. BMW will also accelerate its shift toward electric vehicles. It currently aims for 50% of groupwide new sales – also including the Mini and Rolls-Royce brands – to be electrics by 2030. (Engadget, Autoblog, Asia Nikkei)

Ford has reached a deal with DTE Energy to power its electricity supply in Michigan with clean energy, a step toward its goal to become carbon neutral by 2050. Ford’s deal with DTE, Michigan’s largest producer of renewable energy, will add 650 megawatts of new solar energy capacity in the state by 2025, allowing the carmaker to assemble each vehicle it makes there with renewable energy. Ford has said the purchase will help it cut its carbon dioxide emissions by up to 600,000 tons. Overall, Ford’s arrangement with DTE will increase Michigan’s solar capacity by 70%. (TechCrunch, Ford, Electrek)

India might soon be adopting a policy similar to the European Union in terms of having a single common charging standard for mobile devices like smartphones, tablets, and certain other consumer electronic products. As per the PTI report, the government aims on holding a discussion to remove the use of different chargers. The primary intention behind this is to both reduce the burden on consumers and also prevent unnecessary electronic waste. (Gizmo China, News18)

According to TF Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, all the Apple AirPods models will come with a charging case having a USB Type-C for charging. So far, the company is offering its own proprietary Lightning port on the AirPods case. Apple is also expected to offer USB-C charging port on all the Apple iPhone models coming in 2023, along with all the iPad models. (Gizmo China, Twitter)

Amazon’ cloud division Amazon Web Services (AWS) has launched a new service designed to help companies deploy their own private 5G networks. AWS sought to demonstrate how easy it is for an enterprise to install, operate and scale their own private mobile network without any specialized expertise. The solution uses the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) General Authorized Access (GAA) spectrum tier and even though the specs for CBRS 5G are written, the equipment based on 5G is not ready for prime time, so it is initially using 4G LTE. (TechCrunch, Fierce Wireless, The Register, Amazon)

Google Fiber, the Alphabet division focused on offering high-speed internet access in the US, has ambitious plans to expand its fiber services in the next 3-5 years. It wants to launch fiber services in 5 new states, which include previously announced plans to enter Arizona and Colorado, as well as Nebraska, Nevada, and Idaho. In total, Google Fiber hopes to expand to 22 metro areas, from 17 today. (The Verge, Google, Reuters, XDA-Developers)

Samsung Electronics mobile head, Roh Tae-moon, has indicated that by 2025, foldable items will take up more than 50% of Samsung’s total premium smartphone shipments. He believes that foldables will become the new standard of smartphones. He has revealed that Samsung looks to target wider audiences with its Galaxy foldable phones in a bid to address the sluggish growth of its premium smartphones and macroeconomic headwinds.(Android Authority, Korea Herald)

Apple expects strong iPhones in 2023 despite the economic downturn. Apple has ordered its assemblers to stick to a 90M target for the iPhone 14, which is the same as iPhone 13. The company is also expected to make 220M devices planned until the end of 2022, the same number as it did in 2021. Apple is confident it will weather the economic challenges other makers are experienced in a market that declined 9% in 2Q22 and with a projected 3.5% decline for 2022. (Phone Arena, Bloomberg, Live Mint, CN Beta, GizChina, GSM Arena, Yahoo)

BLU, a smartphone manufacturer based in Miami, has announced it has revived its BOLD brand, a spin-off exclusively dedicated to premium flagship and “flagship-like” smartphones. The BOLD line provides impressive design features and specs at unbeatable pricing. (Phone Arena, PR Newswire)

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology of India has not considered such proposals of restricting Chinese smartphone vendors from selling smartphones below INR12,000 (USD150). Redmi, realme, OPPO, vivo, Tecno and Infinix, combined, have an even larger share of about 80% in the budget smartphone segment under INR12,000 in India. (IT Home, GizChina, Hindustan Times, MySmartPrice)

The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) has levied a USD40M fine on Google, after Google was found to have misled Android users over location tracking. The ACCC’s investigation was begun 2019 — as Google implemented improved location options — and concluded in 2021. The ACCC concluded that Google had misled Android users between Jan 2017 and Dec 2018. Google was in violation of Australia’s Consumer Law when it appeared to offer a single “Location History” setting that users could choose to switch off. (Apple Insider, Yahoo, TechCrunch)

VR training sim developer FundamentalVR has raised USD20M in series B funding. FundamentalVR’s medical simulation platform, Fundamental Surgery, is an interesting approach to medical training. Using HacpticVR, their patented haptic simulation technology, the program mimics the physical feel of performing medical procedures. With this program, doctors can train from anywhere in the world and give students the real feeling of performing surgery. This latest investment will go to further development, machine learning data insights, and expansion throughout the United States.(CN Beta, VentureBeat)

MGM Television, which is acquired and owned by Amazon since Mar 2022 for USD8.2B, is creating a show that will feature lighthearted viral content captured on Ring cameras, such as “neighbors saving neighbors, marriage proposals, military reunions and silly animals”. These types of videos frequently go viral online, but hardly represent the reality of what Ring is used for. Besides home surveillance, Ring is a source of surveillance video for police departments in the U.S. and abroad.(CN Beta, Engadget, Vice.com, The Verge, Deadline)

EV freight technology company Einride has announced it will provide sustainable, plant-based meat company Beyond Meat, with a number of electric freight vehicles to support its shipping network as part of a 5-year plan to scale the sustainable operations across Beyond Meat’s entire US operations. Einride is a freight technology company founded in Sweden in 2016 that develops electrified commercial mobility solutions and fully-autonomous Class 8 trucks. (CN Beta, Electrek)

Hyundai Motor Group has announced the launch of Boston Dynamics AI Institute, with the goal of making fundamental advances in artificial intelligence (AI), robotics and intelligent machines. Hyundai and Boston Dynamics will make an initial investment of more than USD400M in the new Institute. The institute will work on four technical areas: Cognitive AI, Athletic AI, organic hardware design, as well as ethics and policy. In addition to developing technology with its own staff, the institute plans to partner with universities and corporate research labs.(TechCrunch, The Robot Report, PR Newswire)

Xiaomi has unveiled its first full-size humanoid robot, CyberOne. CyberOne is a full-scale humanoid bionic robot that is 177cm tall and weighs 52kg. It has been nicknamed “Metal bro” and somehow it also has been given a zodiac sign, Leo. The robot’s face is made of a curved OLED panel and it can see the world in 3D. For hearing, it has two microphones. It is equipped with Xiaomi’s self-developed whole-body control algorithm, which can coordinate the movement of 21 joints. Further, the humanoid robot can interpret 45 human semantic emotions and distinguish 85 environmental semantics. The robot is claimed to learn new skills each day. The CyberOne humanoid robot, according to Xiaomi, combines sophisticated mechatronics and artificial intelligence created by the company’s specialized Robot Labs.(Gizmo China, IT Home, 163)

Walmart is reportedly evaluating the situation of building its own streaming service. It is in contact with some major content providers over the types of content it can show on Walmart Plus. Walmart is reportedly in negotiation with Paramount, Disney, and Comcast. This is not the first time Walmart tries to build a streaming service. The company acquired the American streaming service Vudu in 2010, but it could not do anything with that and eventually sold it to Fandango in 2020. (Android Headlines, The Verge, NY Times)

Pinata, a nonfungible token content delivery network, has raised USD21.5M in funding to build an ultra-fast, reliable platform for delivering the media represented by NFTs such as images, video and apps. Nonfungible tokens are crypto assets built on blockchain technology that represent the ownership of digital media such as art, music, video, memes, video game items and even apps. They can be created, bought and sold, creating large-scale economies. Since they can represent digital media, that media needs to be stored and displayed to users. (CN Beta, NFT Culture, TechCrunch, Silicon Angle, Pinata)

India’s anti-money laundering agency Enforcement Directorate has frozen assets worth INR370 crore (USD46.4M) of cryptocurrency exchange Vauld. Flipvolt Technologies, the India registered entity of Singapore-headquartered Vauld, was used to deposit INR3.7B by 23 entities, including non-banking financial companies and fintech firms, into the wallets controlled by Yellow Tune Technologies. (TechCrunch, CoinDesk, India Today, Enforcement Directorate)