February 18, 2026

The robots who predict the future

To be human is, fundamentally, to be a forecaster. Occasionally a pretty good one. Trying to see the future, whether through the lens of past experience or the logic of cause and effect, has helped us hunt, avoid being hunted, plant crops, forge social bonds, and in general survive in a world that does not…

Micromax, smartphone sales stalled, eyes a steer into electric vehicles

August 9, 2023
Micromax Informatics once had a firm grip on the local mobile phone market in India, for a time passing stalwarts like Samsung, icons like Apple and many more to be the biggest handset maker of them all. But a mix of stronger (and cheaper) competition, coupled with the rapid pace of technology development and the […]

Zoom knots itself a legal tangle over use of customer data for training AI models

August 9, 2023
Three years ago Zoom settled with the FTC over a claim of deceptive marketing around security claims, having been accused of overstating the strength of the encryption it offered. Now the videoconferencing platform could be headed for a similar tangle in Europe in relation to its privacy small print. The recent terms & conditions controversy […]

BlueJeans folds

August 9, 2023
Verizon dropped hundreds on millions on BlueJeans at the height of pandemic lockdowns. Three years and some change later, the lesser-known video-conferencing app is done for, the telecom giant told users today. In a mass email, Verizon wrote that it “made the difficult decision to sunset our suite of BlueJeans products.” 9to5Google first reported the […]

Singapore wealth management platform Endowus raises $35M

August 8, 2023
Back in 2021 and early 2022, there was a flurry of VC interest in Southeast Asian investment apps. One of them was Singapore-based Endowus, which raised two rounds in rapid succession: a Series A in June 2021 followed just seven months later by $25.6 million in follow-on funding. Now two years later, despite a much […]

Lyft wants to kill surge pricing

August 8, 2023
Lyft has been cutting fares in order to secure more riders, and it’s working. Bu that success has come with a (literal) cost. The ride-hail company reported Tuesday during its second quarter 2023 earnings an increase in riders and decrease in revenue per active rider. That discrepancy was fueled by a decision by the company to […]

Human toddlers are inspiring new approaches to robot learning

August 8, 2023
It’s an exciting time for robotic learning. Organizations have spent decades building complex datasets and pioneering different ways to teach systems to perform new tasks. It seems we’re on the cusp of some real breakthroughs when it comes to deploying technology that can adapt and learn on the fly. The past year, we’ve seen a […]