Business Articles

Huawei's latest MateBook X Pro has debuted with the OEM's new Free Touch feature, which consists of a trackpad capable of responding to a variety of gestures, as some phones' screens might. It also offers the company's "finest display yet": a 14-inch 3K touch panel driven by Tiger Lake silicon.

The world's biggest electric car battery maker - CATL - may have become complacent when it comes to innovation, reports local media. It now has to fight to bring back NIO's business when it comes to the unique 600+ mile battery pack for its ET5 and ET7 sedans. NIO developed the 150 kWh "semi-solid state" battery with a nimbler competitor instead of with CATL, forcing it to go back to the negotiation table with a new "ultrahigh nickel" technology and a new EV battery chemistry offer.

The cryptocurrency regulation requirements will only grow with time, and there are now services like the Astra Protocol that are offering automated compliance layer over digital asset trades. To continue its development, Astra has raised US$9 million in a private token sale from notable investors like Republic, DAOMaker, Fundamental Labs, Faculty, Richard Dai, and Wave GP Cardano. The Astra regulatory layer has built-in Know-Your-Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money-Laundering (AML) compliance abilities.

RadioShack has been repurposed as a cryptocurrency platform by its owners. The company is joining forces with Atlas USV to create a system to swap cryptocurrencies into DeFi by leveraging Atlas USV's resources. RadioShack's new mission is to bring DeFi to the mainstream.

Twitch has strict community guidelines, and they seem to work better than the legislation of many countries in the world. The official Spanish-language Amazon Prime Video channel was suspended from Twitch (which is owned by Amazon) on Sunday, shortly after a presenter accidentally revealed her breast during a live show.

Sick of deals with just 8 GB of RAM? Lenovo has got you covered with a ThinkPad sporting 32 GB of RAM for under $1000 USD. The configuration also comes with the latest AMD processor and a bright 500-nit 1080p matte IPS display.

Asus has issued its invitations to its upcoming CES showcase, to start from January 4, 2022. It starts with the "Rise of Gamers" livestream direct from Las Vegas to introduce the new ROG line-up, and goes on with the productivity-focused presentation the following day.

Tesla plans to offset the galloping battery component prices by using the cheaper LFP chemistry in all of its standard range vehicles. Not only that, but it may have entered a U.S. factory agreement with Gotion, a big Chinese LFP battery cells supplier, which includes production on American soil. The potential deal that Gotion bragged about has it procuring the whopping 200 GWh in a 5-year period, an amount that makes Tesla the prime candidate to be that "large listed automobile company in the US" mentioned in the statement.

In a discussion that took place on a Discord server focused on SHIB, ShibaSwap developer Eric M said that Shibarium, Shiba Inu's Layer 2 scaling solution, will arrive "soon" but did not mention an accurate date. However, he revealed that Shiba does not have to wait for Ethereum 2.0's deployment to release Shibarium.

Parler, a social media platform that aims to serve as an alternative to platforms like Facebook, has announced its move into the NFT market. According to Parler's CEO George Farmer, the platform is looking to become an early-adopter of the Web 3.0 movement to break free from Big Tech's influence.

A report released by Meta reveals that several spy firms have targeted approximately 50,000 Facebook users to gain personal information, potentially for use in later phishing attacks. A total of seven surveillance companies were named in the report, including Black Cube.

LG has expanded its UltraFine OLED Pro series with the 27BP95E and 32BP95E. The pair offer native 4K resolutions, VESA DisplayHDR 400 True Black certification and excellent colour accuracy. A USB Type-C port with 90 W Power Delivery is available on both monitors, too.

Eurocom has launched another superlaptop onto the market in the form of the Nightsky ARX315. For US$2,099, buyers can expect a laptop with a powerful AMD Ryzen 7 5800X CPU, RTX 3070 GPU, and 16 GB RAM. However, it’s possible to configure the Eurocom Nightsky ARX315 to become a +US$15,000 powerhouse.

CD Projekt recently announced that it was settling a class-action lawsuit over Cyberpunk 2077's disastrous launch out of court. However, the paltry US$1.85 million settlement raises questions considering how the game has earned CD Projekt over US$500 million since 2020.

According to analyst firm Sigmaintell, Samsung sold 800,000 OLED notebook panels last year and plans to move 5 times as many in 2022. The report also highlighted that ASUS, with its premium OLED display ROG laptops, dominated the OLED notebook market this year.

Intel appears to have backtracked and delayed on a historic commitment to invest over US$200 billion in US and Europe-based silicon manufacturing facilities before the end of the year. As of now, the chipmaker has shifted the starting date on these plans to early 2022.

In the midst of a GPU supply crisis that's seen consumer GPU prices soar by 300 percent or more, crypto influencer @jaxson_davidson shared a video in which he shows off a mining farm with hundreds upon hundreds of GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition GPUs, all apparently sourced off-market, directly by him from NVIDIA, raising questions about the underlying reasons for today's GPU price inflation.

Counterpoint Research's latest report on the smartphone processor market shows that MediaTek has once again taken the lead in the latest complete quarter of 2021 (3Q2021). The three-month period has seen a number of intriguing changes, such as Unisoc taking a 10% share of shipments for the first time. Then again, Apple stayed more or less where it was and Qualcomm continues to lead the 5G baseband sector.

Crypto fans among gamers who like the STALKER franchise might be disappointed to hear that the developer studio behind the upcoming STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl edition has ditched the plans to introduce an NFT-driven "STALKER metaverse." Citing a backlash against the environmental impact of the blockchain technology, and accusations of profiteering from a fad, the Game World studio said it is abandoning the NFT plans, even though they considered them just a way for an independent game shop to stay afloat.

The first non-fungible token of the former first lady of the United States will go on sale this holiday season. Named Melania's Vision, it uses watercolor art by Marc-Antoine Coulon. Its goal is to embody the "cobalt blue eyes" of Mrs. Trump and to deliver "an amulet to inspire" the collector.

Lenovo has announced three new ThinkVision large format displays (LFDs) ahead of CES 2022 — the ThinkVision T65, ThinkVision T75, and the ThinkVision T86. All three LFDs sport fairly identical specifications including 4K, HDR10 support, plenty of wired and wireless connectivity options, enhanced privacy functions, and detachable 4K camera with AI-assisted voice and facial recognition.

Huawei has announced the launch of what is already being dubbed the "biggest upgrade" in MateBook history. It is to be a new X Pro model, which, according to its new teasers, may have a new feature in which the user can apparently control the laptop by waving their hands in front of the screen. The upcoming PC may also launch with improved cross-device integration.

Netflix has cut its prices across the board. Subscriptions now start at INR 199 (~US$2.60) across all devices and INR 149 (~US$2) if you only stream Netflix from your smartphone.

Lexus took the stage together with Toyota while the world's largest car maker was announcing its fleet electrification plans. Not only will there be a luxury Lexus sports car on battery power, but fans of the premium brand will be able to buy the first Lexus EV called the RZ 450e as soon as next year. Based on the joint Toyota-Subaru eZ4X platform, the new RZ may nevertheless offer more premium features, while Toyota also teased a full-size electric Lexus SUV for release at a later date.

DigiTimes' sources report that Intel and TSMC agreed to enter a partnership that could extend beyond 2025. Additionally, Intel is expected to become one of TSMC's major customers as soon as the N3 nodes go online in 2023.

EVGA has reportedly outed a firmware update for GeForce RTX 3080 Ti LHR models that addresses the "power lock" issue on these cards while mining. With the new firmware installed, miners found that their 3080 Ti LHR cards delivered up to 91 MH/s in Ethereum workloads.

Microsoft is offering pirates in certain countries a special discount to purchase an Office 365 subscription, instead of continuing to pirate Office software. The "limited time" offer delivers substantial savings, up to 50 percent off.

The 2021 Chinese International Public Security Expo will take place in late December. Huawei's HiSilicon division is slated to be headed to the event with its latest development: a new image-signalling processor (ISP). This new dedicated chipset is now said to stand out in its category with a new architecture.

XFX recently launched the BC-160, a cryptocurrency mining-oriented card built around the Navi 12 GPU. The BC-160 is currently available exclusively in China and delivers a hashrate of over 70 MH/s in Ethereum, thanks to its fast HBM2 memory.

Samsung and IBM have come to the ongoing IEDM 2021 International Electronic Components Conference to unveil the vertical transport field effect transistor (VTFET). It is a new property of potential next-gen chipsets that, as the two OEMs assert, might one day help build a smartphone that can last up to seven days on one charge.

While its long-term momentum remains weak, Shiba Inu continues to climb in popularity thanks to its adoption as a payment option by Flexa. The services of this crypto payment company are supported by merchants like GameStop, Lowe's, Nordstrom, and more, with a total of over 40,000 stores across the US.

A mining farm was recently spotted on Flexpool that appears to incorporate GeForce RTX 4090 Ti and AMD Radeon RX 7000 GPUs. While there's no way to verify if the parts are indeed next-gen AMD and NVIDIA hardware, the farm's 4.3 TH/s hash rate suggests that high-performance parts are at work.

Realme has emerged as India's second-largest smartphone brand, capturing 17 percent market share in October 2021, according to a Counterpoint Research report. The budget smartphone maker overtook Samsung for second place, with over 9 million phones sold, just in October 2021.

According to a report in The Elec, Samsung is planning on launching a raft of MiniLED 8K TVs in 2022, using its "Neo QLED" technology. Samsung's 2022 flagship lineup will also feature new 4K OLED TVs, including some with panels sourced from LG.

AMD's next generation of EPYC processors, currently referred to as "Genoa", are tipped to support 12-channel memory. Now, it is also slated to support 1TB of DDR5 RAM via each of these channels, for a grand total of 12TB. Then again, it may be capable of doing so under certain server-grade conditions only.

Anker now reports that it became the "world's No.1 mobile charging brand" in 2020. It also marked its 10th anniversary as such a company in 2021, and attributes much of its success to becoming a leader in USB Power Delivery- (USB-PD) compatible accessories. It also now has a line in MagSafe-compatible products, as well as new type-C devices.

Amazon was penalized by Italy's antitrust authority (AGCM) for misusing its market dominance. The AGCM fined the company €1.1 billion and stated that Amazon coaxed Italian shops to use its shipping service by promising perks such as Prime label and participation in sale events such as Black Friday. Amazon stated that the company will appeal the ruling.

After releasing the Redmi Note 11 series in China, Xiaomi looks set to bring the phones to the global market. Thankfully, though, it appears the vanilla Redmi Note 11, at least, will make the trip without a MediaTek processor, with Xiaomi seemingly geared to exchange replace the Dimensity 810 on Chinese models with Qualcomm's 4G chipset, the Snapdragon 680.

Thanks to a strong Alder Lake launch, Intel's market share in terms of CPUs sold has climbed to around 30 percent, its highest ever for the year 2021. AMD still maintains a commanding lead, however, thanks to strong demand for midrange price-performance champs like the Ryzen 5 5600X.

Xiaomi has now announced the debut of its new battery technology. The company promises that the new high-silicon lithium batteries will deliver 10% more capacity at the same volumes as current lith-ion units. Mass production isn't that far off either.

Alesia Haas, the CEO of Coinbase Inc., is testifying before the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services alongside five other crypto exchange representatives for the first time. In prepared testimonies, the cryptocurrency platform execs urged Congress to be careful while regulating and taxing digital currency like any other asset, as they risk creating "unnecessarily onerous and chilling laws and regulations." The first Congressional hearing of crypto exchange execs is still ongoing, and you can watch the live stream here.

A major chunk of the Amazon Web Service (AWS) network is down, resulting in global internet issues. The issues are affecting Amazon’s in-house services like Alexa, as well as other sites like Facebook. Amazon says that it is working to get all the services back online.

An ex-SolarCity quality assurance employee has filed a lawsuit against Tesla Energy arguing criminal negligence regarding faulty solar roof installations that caused residential and commercial fires. In complaints filed before the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Consumer Product Safety Commission, he claims that Tesla management didn't take his fire hazard warnings seriously. The SEC probe into the reported Tesla Energy wrongdoing will determine if it communicated the fire risks from the faulty solar panel installations to shareholders or the public.

The World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization recently downgraded its prediction for global semiconductor revenue growth in 2022. This year, WSTS expects revenue to grow by just 8.8 percent, a far cry from 2021's 25 percent growth rate.

Sony has announced availability and pricing for the inaugural Airpeak drone. The S1 is rated as the "world's smallest" drone that can still carry a full-sized mirrorless Alpha-series camera. It is up for pre-order from now, to be shipped later in December 2021.

When is a monitor with a screen measuring less than 20 inches diagonally valued at just under US$15,000? According to Canon, it's when it is the first professional reference display from the brand to feature its exact dimensions at a 4K/UHD resolution. The DP-V1830 can also support a 4-way split-screen, enhanced blacks and improved viewing angles.