Tuesday, September 29, 2020
Realme Narzo 20A to Go on Its First Sale Today via Flipkart, Realme.com
DivvyDose, an online pharmacy competing with Amazon's PillPack and Walmart's CareZone, is acquired by UnitedHealth; source says deal was worth $300M+ (Christina Farr/CNBC)
DivvyDose, an online pharmacy competing with Amazon's PillPack and Walmart's CareZone, is acquired by UnitedHealth; source says deal was worth $300M+ — - UnitedHealth Group has acquired DivvyDose, a competitor to Amazon-owned PillPack. — A spokesperson declined to comment.
Twitter hires Rinki Sethi as its new CISO following its July 15 hack; Sethi previously worked at cloud data management company Rubrik (Catalin Cimpanu/ZDNet)
Twitter hires Rinki Sethi as its new CISO following its July 15 hack; Sethi previously worked at cloud data management company Rubrik — Sethi previously served in security roles at Rubrik, IBM, Palo Alto Networks, Intuit, and eBay. — After leaving the position unfilled for months …
Prior to their Wednesday direct listing debuts, the NYSE set reference prices for Palantir at $7.25 and Asana at $21 per share (Wall Street Journal)
Prior to their Wednesday direct listing debuts, the NYSE set reference prices for Palantir at $7.25 and Asana at $21 per share — Both companies are poised to do direct listings on Wednesday; only two other notable companies have done them before — Data firm Palantir Technologies Inc …
Seattle unanimously approved new regulations that would ensure Uber and Lyft drivers earn minimum wage, the second US city to establish the standard after NYC (Monica Nickelsburg/GeekWire)
Seattle unanimously approved new regulations that would ensure Uber and Lyft drivers earn minimum wage, the second US city to establish the standard after NYC — Seattle became the second big city in the nation to establish a minimum wage standard for Uber and Lyft drivers on Tuesday.
Startups accuse 'gatekeeper' Google of not playing fair
Fundraising clocks fastest rebound in digital sector, says Avendus CEO
Monday, September 28, 2020
Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 5, Mi Watch Revolve and Mi Smart Speaker to launch in India today: Watch live stream here
The Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 5, Mi Watch Revolve and Mi Smart Speaker are set to launch in India in the next few hours during its Smarter Living 2021 event. Xiaomi launched the Mi Band 5 back in June while the Mi Watch Revolve was announced globally. While three products have been confirmed to launch, it is likely Xiaomi has more surprises for its fans.
The prices of the Mi Smart Band 5 and Mi Watch Revolve have been tipped previously. The Mi Smart Band 5 is expected to be priced starting at 2,999 while the Mi Watch Revolve is expected to be priced under Rs 9,999 in India.
Xiaomi Smarter Living 2021 event live stream: How to watchXiaomi Smarter Living 2021 event is scheduled to start from 12:00 PM IST and the event will be live-streamed on YouTube and official social media handles. The company has created a dedicated section on its website for the event where it is revealing some key features of the upcoming products. We have embedded the live stream link below and you can watch the launch right here when it starts from 12 PM.
Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 5 featuresThe Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 5 features a 1.1-inch AMOLED display which is 20% larger than the previous generation Mi Band 4. The fitness trackers come preloaded with more than 65 watch faces and can be paired with up six different coloured straps. The screen also has a one-touch button which can be used to wake up the screen, otherwise, it serves as the back button.
The Mi Smart Band 5 comes with a magnetic charging dock so users will no longer have to take out the tracker from the rubber straps to charge it up every time. The fitness tracker claims to provide 14-day battery life and can be recharged from 0-100% in under 2 hours. In battery saving mode, the tracker can last for upto 20 days on a single charge.
It features 11 professional sports modes including outdoor running, treadmill, cycling, walking, freestyle, pool swimming, elliptical, rowing machine, jump rope, indoor cycling and Yoga. The tracker is also able to monitor running and walking automatically along with data points on pacing, kilometres alerts and heart-rate alerts.
The Mi Smart Band 5 comes with a 5 ATM certification which means that it can survive 50 meters underwater for 10 minutes easily. The fitness tracker also supports 24-hour smart heart rate monitoring by up to 50% increased accuracy and also vibrates alerting wearer of irregular heart-rate.
The Mi Smart Band 5 also comes with 24-hour sleep monitoring which offers 40% improved accuracy over the Mi Band 4 and can monitor your sleeping patterns to create data points that will help you improve your sleeping habits. It can also come in handy for music playback, finding your phone, incoming calls, SMS alerts and more.
Xiaomi Mi Watch Revolve features
The Mi Watch Revolve has a stainless steel casing and features 1.39-inch AMOLED screen. The Watch Revolve is equipped with a heart-rate monitoring system, sleep tracking, air pressure sensor and is certified for use by upto 5ATM waterproof levels. It comes with a 420mAh battery that Xiaomi claims can provide a 14-day backup.
Xiaomi Mi Smart Speaker featuresXiaomi has teased the launch of Mi Smart Speaker during its Smarter Living 2021 event. The smart speaker can be controlled via voice commands and has physical buttons on the top. More details about the smart speaker will be revealed during the event.
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Amazon Prime Day Global Mega-Sale to Be Held on October 13-14
Russian surveillance tech startup NtechLab nets $13M from sovereign wealth funds
NtechLab, a startup that helps analyze footage captured by Moscow’s 100,000 surveillance cameras, just closed an investment of more than 1RUB billion ($13 million) to further global expansion.
The five-year-old company sells software that recognizes faces, silhouettes and actions on videos. It’s able to do so on a vast scale in real time, allowing clients to react promptly to situations It’s a key “differentiator” of the company, co-founder Artem Kukharenko told TechCrunch.
“There could be systems which can process, for example, 100 cameras. When there are a lot of cameras in a city, [these systems] connect 100 cameras from one part of the city, then disconnect them and connect another hundred cameras in another part of the city, so it’s not so interesting,” he suggested.
The latest round, financed by Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, the Russian Direct Investment Fund, and an undisclosed sovereign wealth fund from the Middle East, certainly carries more strategic than financial importance. The company broke even last year with revenue reaching $8 million, three times the number from the previous year, ane expects to finish 2020 at a similar growth pace.
Nonetheless, the new round will enable the startup to develop new capabilities such as automatic detection of aggressive behavior and vehicle recognition as it seeks new customers in its key markets of the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Latin America. City contracts have a major revenue driver for the firm, but it has plans to woo non-government clients, such as those in the entertainment industry, finance, trade and hospitality.
The company currently boasts clients in 30 cities across 15 countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) bloc, Middle East, Latin America, Southeast Asia and Europe.
These customers may procure from a variety of hardware vendors featuring different graphic processing units (GPUs) to carry out computer vision tasks. As such, NtechLab needs to ensure it’s constantly in tune with different GPU suppliers. Ten years ago, Nvidia was the go-to solution, recalled Kukharenko, but rivals such as Intel and Huawei have cropped up in recent times.
The Moscow-based startup began life as a consumer software that allowed users to find someone’s online profile by uploading a photo of the person. It later pivoted to video and has since attracted government clients keen to deploy facial recognition in law enforcement. For instance, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian government uses NtechLab’s system to monitor large gatherings and implement access control.
Around the world, authorities have rushed to implement similar forms of public health monitoring and tracking for virus control. While these projects are usually well-meaning, they inspire a much-needed debate around privacy, discrimination, and other consequences brought by the scramble for large-scale data solutions. NtechLab’s view is that when used properly, video surveillance generally does more good than harm.
“If you can monitor people quite [effectively], you don’t need to close all people in the city… The problem is people who don’t respect the laws. When you can monitor these people and [impose] a penalty on them, you can control the situation better,” argued Alexander Kabakov, the other co-founder of the company.
As it expands globally, NtechLab inevitably comes across customers who misuse or abuse its algorithms. While it claimed to keep all customer data private and have no control over how its software is used, the company strives to “create a process that can be in compliance with local laws,” said Kukharenko.
“We vet our partners so we can trust them, and we know that they will not use our technology for bad purposes.”
Exotec raises $90 million for its warehouse robots
French startup Exotec has raised a $90 million Series C round led by 83North, with existing investors Iris Capital and Breega also participating. Other existing investors include 360 Capital. The company has been working on semi-automated warehouses for e-commerce clients.
The system is based on tiny robots called Skypods. They roam the floor and go up and down racks to pick up standardized bins of products.
The company also provides logistics software to coordinate all those robots through the warehouse. As you scale, you can add more robots and more racks without any downtime.
It’s not going to replace humans altogether as you still have to pick up goods from the bin and pack stuff. But human operators can stay at a workstation while robots take care of all the roaming.
You can use a workstation to pick up goods but also to replenish bins. The idea is that you never have to enter the Exotec area. It’s a robot-only zone.
In addition to productivity gains, you can also increase your storage capacity by switching to Exotec thanks to tall racks and narrow aisles.
The company now has teams in Atlanta and Tokyo — it plans to produce 4,000 robots per year by 2021. Everything is manufactured in Lille, France in a 6,000 square-meter plant. The company currently has fourteen running systems around the world. Clients include Carrefour, Leclerc, Cdiscount and Fast Retailing (Uniqlo).
Exotec has previously raised $17.7 million in 2018 and $3.8 million (€3.3 million) in 2016.
Image Credits: Exotec
McAfee has filed for a Nasdaq IPO in a filing with the SEC, listing the size of the offering as $100M which is a placeholder likely to change (Bloomberg)
McAfee has filed for a Nasdaq IPO in a filing with the SEC, listing the size of the offering as $100M which is a placeholder likely to change — - McAfee adds to $12.8 billion software IPO rush in U.S. — TPG- and Thoma Bravo-backed firm swung to profit this year
Study says social groups still risky for children
CSC eStores post record sales riding on rural demand surge
Pew survey of 12K+ US adults: 26% said they get news from YouTube while only 23% of those said they "often" get news from channels of established news orgs (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)
Pew survey of 12K+ US adults: 26% said they get news from YouTube while only 23% of those said they “often” get news from channels of established news orgs — Around a quarter of U.S. adults, or roughly 26%, say they get news by watching YouTube videos, according to a new study …
Meta launches quote post controls for all Threads users, who can allow quotes from everyone on Threads, only the people they follow, or disable quote posts (Anthony Ha/TechCrunch)
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch : Meta launches quote post controls for all Threads users, who can allow quotes from everyone on Threads, only th...
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Jake Offenhartz / Gothamist : Since October, the NYPD has deployed a quadruped robot called Spot to a handful of crime scenes and hostage...
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Andrew Tarantola / Engadget : An adapted excerpt from the book “Your Computer Is on Fire”, on how voice assistants like Siri and Alexa al...
