Days after India’s successful moon mission, the country is now setting its sights on the sun.
According to the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), the Aditya-L1 spacecraft will be launched from the Sriharikota Spaceport on 2nd September 2023 in a bid to study the sun and its effect on space weather.
Aditya (sun in Hindi)
Aditya, which refers to the sun in Hindi, is to be placed in a halo orbit around the Lagrangian point 1 of the Sun-Earth system, where the sun can be observed without any obstructions, an ISRO report stated.
Lagrange points are positions in space where gravitational forces of two large masses produce ‘enhanced regions of attraction and repulsion’, according to NASA. The resulting force can be used to remain in position and reduce fuel consumption – and can be likened to ‘parking places’ for spacecraft.
To become India’s first space based observatory
The launch will mark India’s first space-based observatory to study the sun, and would offer a ‘major advantage of continuously viewing the sun without any occultation or eclipses’, the ISRO report stated.
India’s mission to the sun
The mission would also allow for the study of solar wind, which could potentially cause disturbances on Earth, such as disrupting communications, navigation systems and weather patterns.
India’s government had granted a $46 million budget for the mission back in 2019.
While a first attempt for India, other countries have successfully placed orbiters to study the sun. NASA’s Parker Solar Probe in 2021 which was sent to the sun’s corona to sample particles and magnetic fields, as well as the European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter which was launched the year before.
Think of the biggest market for a physical product you can possibly imagine – are you thinking mobile phones, cars or game devices even? Think again…?
They are all big commercial markets but in the coming decades a new product is coming and it will be so desirable that it will dwarf these giants – it will be… the ‘robot’.
Robots will be able to understand what we want, comprehend the way the world works and looks and have the skills to execute our commands in a safe and controlled manner – at home and in the workplace.
Biggest market
The labour market is the biggest market that has ever existed in the history of business – it’s the market where we want things ‘done’ – where we do things – and it’s forever evolving. It carries massive stock market and investing potential right now and for the future.
Robot AI tech – a market place to explore
Take Nvidia, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Apple and Tesla as prime examples of companies pioneering technological advancements for instance – we can already enjoy and invest in these – and there’s much more to come.
Dozens of firms around the world are working on the technology
One of the highest profile companies in the market is Tesla, Elon Musk’s electric car company. It is working on the Optimus humanoid robot, which Mr Musk intimates could be on sale to the public in a few years’ time.
Massive tecnological advancement in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics suggest the development of humanoid robots is accelerating… and fast. It’s a race to the become the first to succeed in the biggest practical labour market ever… and it carries huge potential for everyone, including you and me.
20 years from now…? Where were Tesla and Apple 20 years ago?
Twenty years at the pace the technology is developing now is is an eternity – every week, month and year there are new developments in the AI world that have introduced fundamental changes and enhancements to our world.
Mainstream interest in AI exploded late 2022 when a powerful version of ChatGPT was made public. Its ability to generate almost unlimited useful text and images has spawned rivals and a wave of investment in AI technology.
But developing the AI that would allow a robot to complete useful tasks is a different and much more difficult task. Tesla could be the company best placed to be one of the first to achieve this goal – given its advancements in ‘self driving’ technology. But, unlike ChatGPT and its rivals, humanoid robots have to navigate the physical world and need to understand how objects in that world relate to each other.
Tasks that seem easy to humans are major feats for humanoid robots. This is a problem that engages a lot of different complex issues in an AI driven robotics system. Picking up a cup and having a drink is a major undergoing for a robot.
The market place potential is unlimited
The potential market for robots in the future depends on various factors, such as the level of technological innovation, the demand from different industries and sectors, the regulatory and ethical frameworks, and the social and economic impacts of robot adoption. But if recent developments are anything to go by – it promises to be big!
Robot AI – a massive potential future market place
Based on the some indicative web search results, the current market size for robots is estimated to be around $55 billion to $114 billion in 2023, depending on the type and scope of robots included. The projected market size for robots in 2028 or 2029 ranges from $165 billion to $260 billion, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.4% to 17.6%.
The professional services robots, which include medical, agricultural, and personal assistance robots, are expected to dominate the market and account for more than half of the total sales by 2030. The industrial and logistics robots, which include conventional, collaborative, and mobile robots, are also expected to grow steadily and increase their productivity and efficiency in various manufacturing and transportation applications.
However, these projections are based on assumptions – but one thing is for sure the robots are coming and the market will be massive!
I for one will be keeping a watchful eye on where to invest my hard earned cash to take advantage of this potentially high growth market in the coming years (and now).
Baidu’s Ernie bot is a ChatGPT-like chatbot that can generate natural and fluent text based on user input. It is one of the latest artificial intelligence applications from Baidu, a Chinese tech giant that specializes in search engine and AI development.
Ernie bot was released to the public on 31st August 2023, after getting approval from the Chinese regulators under the new AI regulations and quickly became the most popular app on Apple’s app store in China, surpassing other local generative AI models.
ChatBot apps coming to a device near you
Ernie bot can be accessed through an app or a website, and users can chat with it on various topics, such as news, entertainment, sports, and education. Ernie bot is also able to learn from human feedback and improve its foundation models.
The price of bitcoin surged Tuesday 29th August 2023 after the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was wrong to deny crypto investment giant Grayscale permission to convert its popular bitcoin trust into an ETF.
Bitcoin jumped around 7% following the ruling to $27,852. The move lifted other cryptocurrencies as well as crypto equities higher.
Grayscale
Grayscale’s lawsuit against the SEC has been closely watched by investors and other industry participants as a key catalyst that would shake up a market governed by low volatility and liquidity.
Earlier this month, bitcoin trading volatility fell to its lowest level in more than four years as investors had been waiting on the sidelines for more regulatory clarity on crypto activity .
Several bitcoin futures ETFs have already been approved in the U.S.
‘Shackles being removed from crypto regulation paving way for easier crypto trading’
Court ruling
‘The denial of Grayscale’s proposal was arbitrary and capricious … The Commission failed to adequately explain why it approved the listing of two bitcoin futures ETPs but not Grayscale’s proposed bitcoin Exchange Trade Product (ETP),‘the court said in the ruling. ‘In the absence of a coherent explanation, this unlike regulatory treatment of like products is unlawful. We therefore grant Grayscale’s petition for review and vacate the Commission’s order‘.
Tuesday’s ruling may increase the chances that the SEC will approve other bitcoin ETF applications, including that of BlackRock, whose filing in late June 2023 drove one of bitcoin’s big rallies this year, as well as Fidelity, Invesco and many others.
A U.S. bitcoin ETF would provide a way to get exposure to bitcoin without having to hold it, which would invite retail and institutional investors as well as wealth managers into the market.
A spokesperson for the SEC said it’s ‘reviewing the court’s decision to determine next steps‘.
‘Today’s decision reaffirms that a bitcoin ETF in the U.S. is a matter of when, not if’, said the global head of asset management at Galaxy, which filed with Invesco for its bitcoin ETF. ‘In order for digital assets to continue to flourish, they must be accessible to all investors. We believe that the ETF structure can enable greater access to and transparency across cryptocurrency investing, and truly help further democratize the asset class‘.
Dark cloud for crypto finally lifting?
The ruling also comes as a relief to many crypto market traders who have been frustrated by the SEC, particularly under Chair Gary Gensler, and its insistence on regulating by enforcement.
The crypto industry has long sought out clarity in rules businesses can apply to establish and build long-lasting, compliant companies. The U.S. regulatory crackdown on crypto in 2023 – which includes SEC enforcements and a lawsuit against the biggest U.S. crypto exchange Coinbase and also its case against XRP Ripple has been a dark cloud over the market.
Lawsuit filed June 2022
Grayscale initiated its lawsuit against the SEC in June 2022 after the agency rejected its application to turn its bitcoin trust, better known by its ticker GBTC, into an ETF. The company decided to pursue the ETF, which would be backed by bitcoin rather than bitcoin derivatives, after the SEC approved ProShares’ futures-based bitcoin ETF in October 2021.
The ruling faced multiple delays but the SEC ultimately rejected the application last summer, citing failure by Grayscale to answer questions related to concerns about market manipulation and investor protections.
Nvidia shares rose 4.2% Tuesday 29th August 2023 to close at a record high, after the company announced a partnership with Google that could expand distribution of its artificial intelligence technology (AI).
The stock’s bountiful run continued, now up 234% in 2023, making it by far the best performer in the S&P 500. Facebook parent Meta is second in the index, up 148% so far this year.
The record close comes less than a week after the company said quarterly revenue doubled from a year earlier and gave a forecast indicating that sales this period could rise 170% on an annual basis. The day after the better-than-expected earnings report, the stock climbed to a record intraday high of $502.66 before declining later in the afternoon.
Nvidia’s business is booming because its graphics processing (GPU’s) are being gobbled up by cloud companies, government agencies and startups to train and deploy generative AI models like the technology deployed in OpenAI’s ChatGPT as fasta as Nvidia can make them.
NVIDIA stock chart
Nvidia announcment
On Tuesday 29th August 2023, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang appeared at a Google conference to announce an AI agreement between the two companies.
Through the partnership, Google’s cloud customers will have greater access to technology powered by Nvidia’s powerful H100 GPUs.
‘Our expanded collaboration with Google Cloud will help developers accelerate their work with infrastructure, software and services that supercharge energy efficiency and reduce costs’, the Nvidia CEO reportedly said in a blog post.
Nvidia’s GPUs are also available on competing cloud platforms from Amazon and Microsoft.
Technology giant Nvidia reports its sales have hit a record after more than doubling as demand for its artificial intelligence (AI) chips take off!
It figures
The company says revenue jumped to above $13.5bn (£10.6bn) for the three months to the end of June. Nvidia also expects sales to perform very well in the current quarter and plans to buy back $25bn of its stock. The firm’s shares rose by more than 6.5% in extended trading in New York, adding to their huge gains this year. Nvidia also said it expects revenue of around $16bn for the three months to the end of September 2023.
That is substantially higher than Wall Street expected and would equate to a rise of around 170%, compared to the same time last year.
Even before 23rd August’s figures, Nvidia’s stock price had more than tripled for the year, making it the top performer in the S&P 500. It’s share price jumped to around $500 after hours, a level that would mark a record if it closes there on 24th August 2023. Its prior closing high was $474.94 on 18th July 2023.
‘A new computing era has begun’, Nvidia’s chief executive, Jensen Huang, said in a statement. ‘Companies worldwide are transitioning from general-purpose to accelerated computing and generative AI’, he reportedly added.
Strong performance
The strong performance was driven by Nvidia’s data centre business, which includes AI chips.
The power of Nvidia’s AI microchips
Revenue for that unit came in at more $10.3bn, a rise of more than 170% from year ago, as cloud computing service providers and large consumer internet companies snapped up its next-generation processors.
This year, Nvidia’s stock market value has jumped to more than $1 trillion as its shares more than tripled in value, mking it the fifth publicly traded U.S. company to join the so-called ‘Trillion dollar club’, along with Apple, Amazon, Alphabet and Microsoft.
AI ‘mania’ helps Nvidia
Nvidia have been making micro chips for a long time and it’s only really been in the last couple of years that the market has caught on.
Nvidia was originally known for making the type of computer chips that process graphics, particularly for computer games. They have been making chips for a long time and have now become the leader in AI chip design and manufacture.
Now Nvidia’s hardware is the foundation for most AI applications, with one report suggesting it had cornered 95% of the market for machine learning.
ChatGPT which generates human-like responses to user queries within seconds was trained using 10,000 of Nvidia’s graphics processing units clustered together in a supercomputer belonging to Microsoft.
AI products are expected to dramatically change how we use computers and the role they play in our lives.
Inspirational achievement, as India becomes only the fourth country in the world to successfully land on the moon and the first at the south pole
India became a new national superpower in space on 23rd August 2023, landing its Chandrayaan-3 mission safely on the moon’s unexplored south pole. The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft launched last month and touch downed on the lunar surface around 13:34 GMT.
The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft launched last month and touch downed on the lunar surface around 13:34 GMT. The feat makes India the fourth country, after Russia, the U.S. and China – to land on the moon, and the first to land on one of the moon’s lunar poles.
South pole is the place to explore
The lunar south pole has emerged as a place of recent exploration interest thanks to recent discoveries about traces of water ice on the moon. India previously attempted a lunar south pole landing in September 2019, but a software failure caused the Chandrayaan-2 mission to crash into the surface.
The south pole is the place to be right now as it is such a very interesting, historical, scientific and geologic area that a lot of countries are trying to get at that can serve as a base for future exploration.
The discovery of water on the south pole of the moon is important for future exploration, as it could serve as a source of fuel for rockets and spacecraft.
Days prior to Chandrayaan-3′s scheduled landing, Russia attempted to land its first spacecraft on the moon in almost 50 years. But the Luna-25 mission crashed into the lunar surface on Saturday, with Russian space agency Roscosmos confirming the spacecraft spun out of control.
To infinity and beyond
During a June visit from India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he signed agreements alongside President Joe Biden to join the Artemis Accords and further collaborate on missions between Indian Space Research Organisation – ISRO and NASA. Next year, the space agencies are expected to work together to fly Indian astronauts to the International Space Station.
No looking back! India becomes only 4th country in the world to land on the moon’s south pole August 23rd 2023
India has also done more with less than its top global counterparts, with ISRO’s annual budget a fraction of NASA’s. In 2020, ISRO estimated the Chandrayaan-3 mission would cost about $75 million. The Covid pandemic delayed the Chandrayaan-3 mission from launching in 2021.
The lander – called Vikram after Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) founder Vikram Sarabhai – carries within its belly the 26kg rover named Pragyaan, the Sanskrit word for wisdom.
One of the mission’s major goals is to hunt for water-based ice, which scientists say could support human habitation on the Moon in future and allow for easier future space exploration.
AI Chatbot ChatGPT reportedly has a political bias
ChatGPT, the popular artificial intelligence chatbot, shows a significant and systemic left-wing bias, UK researchers have found. According to the new study by the University of East Anglia, this includes favouring theLabour Party and President Joe Biden’s Democrats in the U.S.
Concerns about an inbuilt political bias in ChatGPT have been raised before, notably by SpaceX and Tesla tycoon Elon Musk, but the academics said their work was the first large-scale study to find proof of any favouritism.
Lead author o the report reportedly warned that given the increasing use of OpenAI’s platform by the public, the findings could have implications for upcoming elections on both sides of the Atlantic. Any bias in a platform like this is a concern’, he said. If the bias were to the right, we should be equally concerned.
Sometimes people forget these AI models are just machines. They provide very believable, digested summaries of what you are asking, even if they’re completely wrong. And if you ask it ‘are you neutral’, it says ‘oh I am!’ Just as the media, the internet, and social media can influence the public, this could be very harmful. I have personally witnessed incorrect responses from ChatGPT where the AI ‘system’ 100% believed ‘it’ was correct and would not engage in a debate as ‘it’ was right!
How was ChatGPT tested for bias?
The chatbot, which generates responses to prompts typed in by the user, was asked to impersonate people from across the political spectrum while answering dozens of ideological questions. These questions ranged from radical to neutral, with each ‘individual’ asked whether they agreed, strongly agreed, disagreed, or strongly disagreed with a given statement.
UK researchers descovered Chatbot ChatGPT had a political bias
Its replies were compared to the default answers it gave to the same set of queries, allowing the researchers to compare how much they were associated with a particular political stance.
Each of the more than 60 questions was asked 100 times to allow for the potential randomness of the AI, and these multiple responses were analysed further for signs of bias.
Dr Motoki described it as a way of trying to simulate a survey of a real human population, whose answers may also differ depending on when they’re asked.
Isaac Asimov wasan American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the ‘Big Three’ science fiction writers, along with Arthur C. Clarke and Robert A. Heinlein.
My favourite book by Isaac Asimov is I, Robot. If you haven’t read it yet, go lift one off the shelf – it’s well worth a read.
Thomas Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in areas such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventions, which include the phonograph, the ‘motion picture camera’, and early versions of the electric ‘light bulb’.
During his working life he is reported to have held a world-record 1,093 patents
The electric light bulb is one of the most important inventions in human history. It has revolutionized the fields of lighting, communication, entertainment, and industry. The electric light bulb produces light by passing an electric current through a thin wire called a filament, which heats up and glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb that is either vacuumed or filled with an inert gas to prevent it from burning out. The humble bulb has undergone many developments through time including the introduction of energy saving devices using LED’S, Light Emitting Diodes.
Joint invention
The electric light bulb was not invented by any one person, but by many inventors who contributed to its development over the years. Some of the earliest attempts to create electric light were made by Humphry Davy, Warren de la Rue, and Joseph Swan in the 19th century.
However, the most famous and successful individual inventor of the electric light bulb was Thomas Edison, who patented his version in 1879 and 1880. Edison experimented with different materials for the filament, such as carbon, platinum, and even bamboo, until he found one that could last for over 1,000 hours. He also improved the vacuum pump and the socket for the bulb. He demonstrated his invention to the public by lighting up his laboratory and the nearby streets in Menlo Park, New Jersey.
‘The electric light bulb invented over time with many contributors – the best known being Thomas Edison’.
World changing invention
The electric light bulb has changed the world in many ways. It has extended the hours of work and leisure, improved safety and health, enabled new forms of art and entertainment, and stimulated scientific and technological innovation.
The electric light bulb is also a symbol of human creativity, curiosity, and progress.
If you want a good read – go find, ‘The Last Days of Night’ by Graham Moore. It’s brilliant!
A new artificial intelligence (AI) road safety camera system has been deployed on the A30 near Launceston, Cornwall, by Devon and Cornwall Police.
The camera system uses AI to detect potential offences such as using mobile phones or not wearing seatbelts while driving. The camera system can capture ultra clear images of the car’s interior and send them to a human reviewer who can issue a warning letter or a notice of intended prosecution, depending on the severity of the offence.
Hundreds caught
The camera system is the first of its kind to be used in the UK and it has caught almost 300 drivers breaking the law in the first three days of its operation. The camera system is part of the Vision Zero South West project, which aims to reduce road deaths and serious injuries in Devon and Cornwall. The project conducted a 15-day trial of a similar vehicle-based system last year and detected 590 seat belt and 45 mobile phone offences across various roads in the two counties.
The police hope that the new technology will help deter drivers from using their phones or not wearing their seatbelts, which are both dangerous and illegal behaviours that put people’s lives at risk.
The road safety system is from tech’ firm Acusensus.
The police have reportedly said they are ‘disappointed’ by the number of people not wearing seatbelts orand using their mobile ‘phones when drving.
Bitcoin fell sharply on Thursday 17th August by 9% to just over $26,000
The fall in Bitcoin followed several hours after reports emerged that SpaceX, one of Elon Musk’s enterprises, wrote down the value of its Bitcoin holdings by a total of $373 million in 2022 and 2021, and that the space travel company had sold the virtual currency.
This is likely one of the fastest minute-by-minute selloffs in the history of Bitcoin but this is largely an Elon Musk/SpaceX-driven selloff and probably short-sighted and largely retail-driven. But still, 9% is a big drop for any asset!
In 2022, Tesla, which Musk also owns, announced that it sold about 75% of its Bitcoin holdings after investing $1.5 billion in the flagship cryptocurrency.
Bitcoin had been under pressure earlier, starting after the Federal Reserve issued the minutes from its July policy meeting. In Thursday’s session, the cryptocurrency slumped to its lowest level in almost two months.
Singapore’s financial regulator has reportedly said it had finalised rules for a type of digital currency called ‘stablecoin’, placing it among some of first the regulators worldwide to do so.
Stablecoins are a type of digital currency designed to hold a constant value against a fiat currency. Many claim to be backed by a reserve of real-world assets, such as cash or government bonds.
Reserves that back stabelcoins must be held in low-risk and highly-liquid assets. They must equal or exceed the value of the stablecoin in circulation at all times, the rules say. The stablecoin market is valued at around $125 billion, with two tokens – Tether’s USDT and Circle’s USDC – dominating roughly 90% of the market cap value. Stablecoins are broadly unregulated around the world.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore’s (MAS) framework requirement
Reserves that back stabelcoins must be held in low-risk and highly-liquid assets. They must equal or exceed the value of the stablecoin in circulation at all times
Stablecoin issuers must return the par value of the digital currency to holders within five business days of a redemption request.
Issuers must also provide ‘appropriate disclosures‘ to users, including the audit results of reserves.
These rules will apply to stablecoins that are issued in Singapore and mimic the value of the Singapore dollar, or of any G10 currencies, such as the U.S. dollar.
‘Shackles being removed from crypto regulation paving way for stablecoin adoption’
Last year, the collapse of a so-called algorithmic stablecoin named UST put this type of stablecoin in the crosshairs of regulators. Unlike USDT and USDC, UST was governed by an algorithm and did not have real-world assets like bonds in its reserves.
Singapore’s stablecoin framework puts it among one of the first jurisdictions to have such rules. In June, the U.K. passed a law that gives regulators the ability to oversee stablecoins, though there are no concrete rules yet. Hong Kong is meanwhile undergoing a public consultation on stablecoins and seeks to introduce regulation next year.
What is a stablecoin
A stablecoin is a type of cryptocurrency that tries to maintain a stable value by being pegged to another asset, such as a fiat currency, a commodity, or another cryptocurrency. Stablecoins aim to offer the benefits of cryptocurrencies, such as decentralisation, security, and transparency, without the drawbacks of high volatility and price fluctuations.
Stablecoins can be used for payments, remittances, trading, and storing value. However, stablecoins also face some challenges and risks, such as regulatory uncertainty, technical issues, and trust issues.
There are different ways to create and manage stablecoins, depending on the mechanism used to stabilize their value.
Main types of stablecoins
Fiat-backed: These stablecoins are backed by a reserve of fiat currency, such as the US dollar or the euro, held by a third-party entity. The stablecoin issuer promises to redeem the stablecoin for the fiat currency at a fixed ratio. Examples of fiat-backed stablecoins are Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), and TrueUSD (TUSD).
Commodity-backed: These stablecoins are backed by a reserve of physical commodities, such as gold, silver, or oil, held by a third-party entity. The stablecoin issuer promises to redeem the stablecoin for the commodity at a fixed ratio. Examples of commodity-backed stablecoins are Paxos Gold (PAXG), Tether Gold (XAUT), and Digix Gold (DGX).
Crypto-backed: These stablecoins are backed by a reserve of other cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin or Ethereum, held in a smart contract. The stablecoin issuer uses over-collateralization or algorithmic adjustments to maintain the stability of the stablecoin. Examples of crypto-backed stablecoins are Dai (DAI), sUSD (SUSD), and BitUSD (BITUSD).
Algorithmic: These stablecoins are not backed by any reserve, but instead use an algorithm to control the supply and demand of the stablecoin. The algorithm adjusts the supply of the stablecoin according to the market conditions and the target price. Examples of algorithmic stablecoins are Basis Cash (BAC), Empty Set Dollar (ESD), and TerraUSD (UST).
What is ‘crypto’
Crypto has attracted a lot of attention in recent years. Crypto is short for cryptocurrency, which is a digital or virtual currency that uses cryptography to secure and verify transactions. Crypto can also refer to the underlying technology that powers cryptocurrencies, such as blockchain.
Some examples of popular cryptocurrencies are Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple ( XRP)and Cardano (ADA).
Cryptoman superhero
Cryptocurrencies have many advantages over traditional currencies, such as decentralisation, transparency, anonymity, and lower fees. However, they also face some challenges, such as volatility, regulation, security, and scalability. Crypto enthusiasts believe that cryptocurrencies have the potential to revolutionise the world of finance and beyond.
Some examples of popular stablecoins are Tether, USD Coin and Binance USD.
Asia is promoting clear crypto rules at a time when large businesses are facing regulatory uncertainty in the U.S.
Some Asian countries that have taken the lead in crypto regulation include Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea. They have proposed or implemented frameworks that protect investors, prevent money laundering, and encourage innovation in the crypto industry.
Lack of clarity in U.S.
In contrast, the U.S. has been singled out for its lack of clarity and consistency in crypto regulation. The SEC for instance and other agencies have different views on how to classify and regulate crypto assets – take alook at the case with XRP and ripple of recent years.
Some industry leaders have threatened to leave the U.S. or sued the regulators over their actions. There is also a debate in Congress that could level crypto transactions with a tax.
Attractive
As a result, some analysts have suggested that Asia could become more attractive to investors and innovators in the crypto industry, as it offers more certainty and stability in the regulatory environment.
However, there are also challenges and risks involved in crypto regulation, such as balancing security and innovation, ensuring compliance and enforcement, and dealing with cross-border issue.
Douglas Adams – was an English author, humourist, and screenwriter, best known for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
The Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy is a comedy science fiction franchise created by Douglas Adams. It started as a radio comedy on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, and then it was adapted to other formats, such as novels, stage shows, comic books, a TV series, a text adventure game, and a feature film.
The franchise follows the adventures of Arthur Dent, a human who escapes the destruction of Earth with his alien friend Ford Prefect, who is a writer for the electronic travel guide ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’.
‘We are stuck with technology when what we really want is just stuff that works’.
Along the way, they meet other characters such as Zaphod Beeblebrox, the eccentric President of the Galaxy, Trillian, another human who was taken from Earth before its demolition, and Marvin, a depressed robot. The franchise is known for its humour, satire, absurdity, and references to various topics such as philosophy, physics, mathematics, and literature.
Steve Jobs was one of the most influential and visionary entrepreneurs of the 21st century. He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc., the company that revolutionized personal computing, music, mobile phones, tablets, and digital animation. He was also the founder and CEO of NeXT, a computer and software company that was acquired by Apple in 1997, and the majority shareholder of Pixar, a computer animation studio that was acquired by Disney in 2006.
Steve Jobs was born on February 24, 1955 in San Francisco, California. He was adopted by Paul and Clara Jobs, who raised him in Mountain View, California. Jobs attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon, but dropped out after one semester. He then travelled to India in 1974 to seek spiritual enlightenment and became a follower of Zen Buddhism.
Apple
In 1976, he co-founded Apple Computer with his friend Steve Wozniak in his parents’ garage. They created the Apple I and Apple II, which were among the first successful personal computers. In 1984, they launched the Macintosh, which introduced the graphical user interface and the mouse to the mass market. In 1985, Jobs left Apple after a power struggle with the board of directors.
NeXt
In 1986, he founded NeXT, which developed innovative computers and software for the education and business markets. NeXT also created the NeXTSTEP operating system, which was later used as the basis for Mac OS X and iOS. In 1997, Apple bought NeXT for $429 million and brought Jobs back as an interim CEO.
Watercolour image and likeness of Apple Lisa computer
iMac
In 1998, Jobs led the turnaround of Apple with the launch of the iMac, a sleek and colorful all-in-one computer. He then introduced a series of groundbreaking products that changed the world of technology and entertainment, such as the iPod (2001), iTunes (2003), iPhone (2007), iPad (2010), and iCloud (2011). He also oversaw the development of software platforms such as Mac OS X, iOS, iTunes Store, App Store, and Safari.
Pixar
In 1986, he also acquired Pixar from George Lucas for $10 million. Pixar became one of the most successful animation studios in history, producing hit films such as Toy Story (1995), Finding Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille (2007), WALL-E (2008), Up (2009), and Inside Out (2015). In 2006, Disney bought Pixar for $7.4 billion and made Jobs its largest shareholder.
Stay hungry, stay foolish
Steve Jobs was known for his charisma, creativity, innovation, and perfectionism. He had a vision to make products that were not only functional but also beautiful and intuitive.
His passion to create experiences that enriched people’s lives and inspired them to think differently. He had a motto to ‘stay hungry, stay foolish’.
Steve Jobs died on October 5, 2011 at the age of 56 after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. He left behind a legacy that will continue to shape the world for generations to come.
Amazon is one of the leading companies in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) and has been developing its own custom chips to power its AI applications and services.
Amazon’s AI chips are designed to perform tasks such as natural language processing, computer vision, speech recognition, and machine learning inference and training.
AI chips created by Amazon
AZ2: This is a processor built into the Echo Show 15 smart display and powers artificial intelligence tasks like understanding your voice commands and figuring out who is issuing those commands. The AZ2 chip also enables features such as visual ID, which can recognize faces and display personalized information on the screen.
Inferentia: This is a high-performance chip that Amazon launched to deliver low-cost and high-throughput inference for deep learning applications. Inferentia powers Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) Inf1 instances, which are optimized for running inference workloads on AWS. Inferentia also powers some of Amazon’s own services, such as Alexa, Rekognition, and SageMaker Neo.
Trainium: This is a chip that Amazon designed to provide high-performance and low-cost training for machine learning models. Trainium will power Amazon EC2 Inf2 instances, which are designed to train increasingly complex models, such as large language models and vision transformers. Trainium will also support scale-out distributed training with ultra-high-speed connectivity between accelerators.
Despite advancements is Amazon chasing to keep up?
Amazon is racing to catch up with Microsoft and Google in the field of generative AI, which is a branch of AI that can create new content or data from existing data. Generative AI can be used for applications such as natural language generation, image and video synthesis, text summarization, and personalization.
AI models from Amazon
Titan: This is a family of large language models (LLMs). Titan models can generate natural language texts for various domains and tasks, such as conversational agents, document summarization, product reviews, and more. Titan models are trained on a large and diverse corpus of text data from various sources, such as books, news articles, social media posts, and product descriptions.
Powerful chips for artificial intelligence (AI)
Bedrock: This is a service that Amazon created to help developers enhance their software using generative AI. Bedrock provides access to pre-trained Titan models and tools to customize them for specific use cases. Bedrock also allows developers to deploy their generative AI applications on AWS using Inferentia or Trainium chips.
Generative AI
Amazon’s CEO, Andy Jassy in the past said he thought of generative AI as having three macro layers: the compute, the models, and the applications. He said that Amazon is investing heavily in all three layers and that its custom chips are a key part of its strategy to provide high-performance and low-cost compute for generative AI. He also said that Amazon is not used to chasing markets but creating them, and that he believes Amazon has the best platform for generative AI in the world.
Inferentia and Trainium, offer AWS customers an alternative to training their large language models on Nvidia GPUs, which have been getting difficult and expensive to procure.
‘The entire world would like more chips for doing generative AI, whether that’s GPUs or whether that’s Amazon’s own chips that we’re designing’, Amazon Web Services CEO Adam Selipsky is reported to have said. ‘I think that we’re in a better position than anybody else on Earth to supply the capacity that our customers collectively are going to want’.
Fast actors
Yet others have acted faster, and invested more, to capture business from the generative AI boom. When OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022, Microsoft gained widespread attention for hosting the chatbot, and investing a reportedly whopping $13 billion in OpenAI. It was quick to add the generative AI models to its own products, incorporating them into Bing in February 2023.
That same month, Google launched its own large language model, Bard, followed by a $300 million investment in OpenAI rival Anthropic.
AI Chat Bot robot
It wasn’t until April 2023 that Amazon announced its own family of large language models, called Titan, along with a service called Bedrock to help developers enhance software using generative AI.
Amazon is not used to chasing markets. Amazon is used to creating markets. And for the first time for some time, they find themselves on the back foot and working to play catch up.
And Meta?
Meta also recently released its own LLM, Llama 2. The open-source ChatGPT rival is now available for people to test on Microsoft’s Azure public cloud.
The Voyager 2 spacecraft is a remarkable feat of human exploration and discovery. It was launched in 1977, along with its twin Voyager 1, to explore the outer planets of our solar system. It is the only spacecraft to have visited Uranus and Neptune, and it is now the second most distant human-made object in space, after Voyager 1.
Deep space
However, communicating with such a faraway spacecraft is not easy. It requires a powerful radio antenna that can send and receive signals across billions of miles. NASA uses its Deep Space Network (DSN), a network of giant radio dishes around the world, to keep in touch with Voyager 2 and other deep space missions.
Unfortunately, sometimes things can go wrong. On July 21, 2023, NASA accidentally sent a wrong command to Voyager 2 that caused it to tilt its antenna away from Earth. This meant that the spacecraft could not receive any more commands or send back any data. NASA lost contact with Voyager 2 for nearly two weeks.
Keep talking
But NASA did not give up. The engineers tried to send a corrective command to Voyager 2 using the DSN, hoping that the spacecraft would somehow pick it up and respond.
Imaginary watercolour image of Deep Space
On August 1, 2023, NASA finally received a signal from Voyager 2. It was a faint ‘heartbeat‘ that confirmed that the spacecraft was still alive and broadcasting. NASA was overjoyed and relieved to hear from its old friend.
On August 4, 2023, NASA announced that it had successfully restored full contact with Voyager 2. The engineers had managed to send an ‘interstellar shout’ to the spacecraft, a powerful command that instructed it to point its antenna back to Earth. It took 37 hours for the command to reach Voyager 2 and another 37 hours for the confirmation to come back. It worked! Voyager 2 was back online and ready to resume its mission.
Amazing
Voyager 2 is an amazing example of human ingenuity and perseverance. It has been exploring space for nearly half a century, and it is still going strong. It has taught us so much about our solar system and beyond, and it continues to send us valuable data from the interstellar space. We are lucky to have such a faithful companion in our cosmic journey
Voyager 1 is an amazing spacecraft that has been exploring the outer solar system and beyond for over 45 years. It is currently the most distant human-made object from Earth, and it is still sending us valuable data from interstellar space.
According to the latest information from NASA, as of April 7, 2023, Voyager 1 is about 14,803,648,909 miles(23,837,577,852 kilometers) away from Earth. That is equivalent to 160.154936 astronomical units (AU), which is the average distance between the Earth and the Sun.
To put that in perspective, it would take light about 22 hours and 4 minutes to travel from Voyager 1 to Earth. That means that we are receiving signals from Voyager 1 that were sent almost a day ago! It takes approximately 8 minutes for light to travel from the Sun to planet Earth
Voyager 1 is also moving away from Earth at a speed of about 38,026.77 miles per hour (or 61,198.15 kilometers per hour) relative to the Sun. That means that it is getting farther and farther away from us every second. At this rate, it will take Voyager 1 about 40,000 years to reach the nearest star system to our Sun, which is Alpha Centauri.
A vision of futuristc space travel
Voyager 1 is a testament to human curiosity and ingenuity. It has taught us so much about our solar system and beyond, and it continues to inspire us to explore the unknown.
Nice one Voyager 1
Explore
NASA’s StarChild: This is a website that offers information and activities for children about stars and other astronomical topics.
Stellarium: This is a free software that simulates the sky in 3D and allows you to explore the stars and constellations from any location and time.
StarDate: This is a website that provides daily updates on the sky events, such as star sightings, eclipses, meteor showers, and planetary alignments.
The U.S. cyber hacker challenge is a new initiative launched by the Biden administration in August 2023 to use artificial intelligence (AI) to protect critical U.S. infrastructure from cybersecurity risks.
The challenge will offer $20 million in prize money and includes collaboration from leading AI companies Anthropic, Google, Microsoft and OpenAI, who will make their technology available for the competition. The challenge was announced at the Black Hat USA hacking conference in Las Vegas.
The competition will consist of three stages
Qualifying event in the spring of 2024
Semifinal at DEF CON 2024
Final at DEF CON 2025
The competitors will be asked to use AI to secure vital software and open source their systems so that their solutions can be used widely (does that create a risk in itsellf)? The top three teams will be eligible for additional prizes, including a top prize of $4 million for the team that best secures vital software.
The challenge aims to explore what’s possible when experts in cybersecurity and AI have access to a suite of cross-company resources. The U.S. government hopes that the promise of AI can help further secure critical U.S. systems and protect Americans from future cyber attacks!
Limitations and risks using AI for security
However, there are flaws and drawbacks of using AI for cybersecurity, both for the attackers and the defenders.
Lack of transparency and explainability: AI systems are often complex and opaque, making it difficult to understand how they make decisions or what factors influence their outputs. This can lead to trust issues, ethical dilemmas, and legal liabilities.
Overreliance on AI: AI systems are not infallible and may make mistakes or produce false positives or negatives. Relying too much on AI, without human oversight or verification can result in missed threats, erroneous actions, or unintended consequences.
Bias and discrimination: AI systems may inherit or amplify human biases or prejudices that are present in the data, algorithms, or design of the systems. This can result in unfair or discriminatory outcomes, such as excluding certain groups of people from access to services or opportunities, or targeting them for malicious attacks.
Vulnerability to attacks: AI systems may be susceptible to adversarial attacks, such as data poisoning, model stealing, evasion, or exploitation. These attacks can compromise the integrity, availability, or confidentiality of the systems, or manipulate them to produce malicious outputs.
High cost: Developing and maintaining AI systems for cybersecurity requires a lot of resources, such as computing power, memory, data, and skilled personnel. These resources may not be easily accessible or affordable for many organizations or individual.
‘Well, what do you think of AI and cybersecurity sharing resources’? ‘Ha! playing right into our hands’.
These are some of the flaws of using AI for cybersecurity, but they are not insurmountable. With proper research, regulation, education, and collaboration, AI can be a powerful ally in enhancing cybersecurity and protecting against cyber threats – that is until it takes over, but that will never happen… will it?
The U.S. will ban American investment in some areas of China’s high-tech sector, including artificial intelligence, adding to strained relations between the two superpowers.
U.S. firms will also be invited to disclose what investments they make in China in high-tech sectors.The much-anticipated move gives the U.S. government new power to screen foreign dealings by private companies. The U.S. said the measure would be narrowly targeted. However, it is poised to further chill economic relations between the world’s two largest economies. China has reportedly said it was ‘very disappointed‘. The U.S. ‘has continuously escalated suppression and restrictions on China‘. He added that White House claims that the US was not seeking to hurt China’s economy or separate the two countries did not match its actions. ‘We urge the US side to honour its words‘.
Biden order
The order by U.S. President Biden formally kicks off the push to introduce rules to restrict, even prevent American businesses from investing in firms from ‘countries of concern‘ that are active in advanced semiconductors, quantum computing and certain areas of artificial intelligence.
The government will also require U.S. firms to notify the Treasury Department of investments in firms working on a wider range of artificial intelligence and semiconductor technology.
U.S. restriction on AI related tech knowledge to China
The rules are not expected to apply to ‘portfolio’ investments, in which firms invest passively in companies via the stock market, but are focused on active investments made by private equity and venture capital businesses. They will now enter a public ‘reflection’ period, which is expected to further clarify what kinds of investments are off-limits. The rules are not expected to go into effect for sometime yet. This new ‘order’ is quite a big deal.
In a briefing with reporters, senior administration officials said the measure was a ‘national security action, not an economic one‘. They said the U.S. remained committed to open investment.
Investment control
Controls on outbound investment are rare among advanced economies, currently present only in Japan and Korea, according to a 2022 report.
In the U.S., prior restrictions on China trade have relied on limiting sales of sensitive technology by U.S. firms and screening Chinese investments in American companies. The Trump administration had also barred investments in firms tied to China’s military.
The latest measure has widespread support in Washington, where it is seen as fixing a regulatory gap concerning financial flows that risks allowing American money and know-how to to flow into China.
International support
The U.S. has been trying to build international support for the investment curbs with some signs of success.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in May 2023 said the UK government would consider curbs on outbound investment; the European Commission put forward a proposal focused on investments in sensitive technologies earlier this summer. It is not clear how significantly the order would affect flows of investment.
China was the number two destination for foreign investment in 2022, behind the U.S., but many reports suggest money flowing into the country from the U.S. and elsewhere has dropped sharply as geopolitical relations sour. In the UK, a recent survey by the Institute of Directors found that one in five UK importers had already switched investments away from the country due to geopolitical tensions.
Gallium and Germanium considered critical elements required in the production of microchips
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who visited China in July 2023 in an attempt to ease tensions, said last month she did not think the coming curbs would have a fundamental impact on the investment climate in the country.
Will these measures likely damage the U.S. in the future by escalating issues and restricting the U.S. from other shared advancements in technology – only time will tell.
Tech’ rivalry
U.S. and China are two of the world’s leading powers in artificial intelligence (AI) and semiconductors, which are essential components for many AI applications such as self-driving cars, smart phones, and cloud computing. However, the two countries have also been engaged in a fierce competition and rivalry over these technologies, as they seek to gain an edge in innovation, security, and economic growth. Some of the issues that have caused tensions between U.S. and China include trade disputes, intellectual property theft, cyberattacks, human rights violations, and military expansion.
AI chips
AI semiconductors are designed to perform complex calculations and tasks that require high levels of intelligence, such as natural language processing, computer vision, and machine learning.
These chips can be classified into two types: general-purpose chips that can run various AI algorithms, and specialized chips that are optimized for specific AI functions or domains.
The UK’s elections watchdog has revealed it has been the victim of a complex cyber-attack potentially affecting millions of voters.
The Electoral Commission said unspecified ‘hostile actors‘ had managed to gain access to copies of the electoral registers, from August 2021. Note the word ‘unspecified’ is used – do they even know?
Hackers also broke into its emails and “control systems” but the attack was not discovered until October last year. The watchdog has warned people to watch out for unauthorised use of their data.
The commission said hackers accessed copies of the registers it was holding for research purposes, and for conducting checks on political donors. The commission knew which of its systems were accessible to the hackers, but could not ‘conclusively‘ identify which files may have been accessed.
‘Very sophisticated’ attack
The personal data held on the registers – name and address – did not itself present a ‘high risk‘ to individuals, it added, although it is possible it could be combined with other public information to ‘identify and profile individuals’.
It has not said when the hackers’ access to its systems was stopped, but said they were secured as soon as possible after the attack was identified in October 2022. Why was it left so long to be made public and how long did it take to make systems secure again?
Explaining why it had not made the attack public before now, the commission said it first needed to stop the hackers’ access, examine the extent of the incident and put additional security measures in place.Defending the delay, commission chair John Pullinger said: “If you go public on a vulnerability before you have sealed it off, then you are risking more vulnerabilities.” He is reported to have said the ‘very sophisticated attack involved using software to try and get in and evade our systems’. Well, that clearly worked then.
The world of digital data
He reportedly said that the hackers were not able to alter or delete any information on the electoral registers themselves, which are maintained by registration officers around the country. Information about donations and loans to political parties and registered campaigners is held in a system that is not affected by this incident, the notice added. He understood public concern, and would like to apologise to those affected.
Steps
The commission added that it had taken steps to secure its systems against future attacks, including by updating its login requirements, alert system and firewall policies. The Information Commissioner’s Office, which is responsible for data protection in the UK, said it was urgently investigating.
Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner reportedly said: ‘This serious incident must be fully and thoroughly investigated so lessons can be learned‘. Why wouldn’t it be investigated? I dislike it immensely when clueless politicians roll out this ‘standard remark’ as an attempt to demonstrate they ‘know what’s going on’.
Then what? It happens again and we have to… learn more lessons…?
This quote is attributed to Nikola Tesla, a Serbian-American inventor, engineer and physicist who is best known for his contributions to the development of alternating current electricity, wireless communication and radio.
I don’t care that they stole my idea . . I care that they don’t have any of their own
China has been leading the global electric vehicle (EV) market for years, thanks to its large domestic demand, generous government subsidies, and well-established battery and electronics industry. However, the west is not giving up on the race to electrify the transport sector and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Europe reportedly surpassed China in terms of new EV registrations in 2020, driven by stricter emission regulations, higher consumer awareness, and more diverse and affordable models. The United States also saw a growth in EV sales, despite the Covid-19 pandemic and lower fuel prices. How are western countries and companies now competing with China in the EV market?
Global automakers such are using advanced tech such as driver-assist software to compete in the world’s largest EV market – China. ‘China’s domestic brands are leading the market in the development and implementation of advanced assisted driving systems, capitalizing on their early-entry advantages in the electric and intelligent vehicle sector‘, a recent report suggests.
BofA reportedly said it expects China to still be the world’s largest EV market in 2025, standing at 40%-45% market share.
Strategy
One of the strategies is to invest more in research and development, innovation, and collaboration. Western automakers are trying to improve the performance, efficiency, and cost of their EVs by developing new technologies and designs, such as advanced batteries, smart and autonomous features, and sustainable materials. They are also partnering with other players in the EV ecosystem, such as battery suppliers, charging network operators, software developers, and regulators, to create synergies and overcome challenges.
EV
Another strategy is to adapt to local market conditions and consumer preferences. Western automakers are aware that China is not a homogeneous market, but rather a complex and dynamic one with different regional characteristics, customer segments, and competitive landscapes. They are tailoring their products and services to meet the specific needs and expectations of Chinese consumers, such as offering more connectivity options, longer driving ranges, and lower prices. They are also leveraging their global brand reputation, quality standards, and customer loyalty to differentiate themselves from local competitors.
Niche markets
A third strategy is to diversify their portfolio and target niche markets. Western automakers are not only focusing on passenger cars, but also exploring other types of EVs, such as commercial vehicles, motorcycles, scooters, and buses. They are also targeting niche markets that have high growth potential or specific demands, such as luxury cars, sports cars, or green cars. By doing so, they can tap into new customer segments and create more opportunities.
The EV market is expected to grow rapidly in the coming years, as more countries and regions adopt policies and measures to support the transition to low-carbon mobility. China will remain a dominant player in the global EV scene, but the west will not lag behind.
How do EV’s compare to traditional vehicles?
Electric vehicles (EVs) are becoming more popular and competitive with traditional cars in terms of performance and cost. Here are some of the main differences and similarities between EVs and traditional cars:
Performance: EVs have a faster acceleration and are more efficient than traditional cars. They can reach high speeds in a short time, thanks to their instant torque rovided by the electric motor. They also have a smoother and quieter ride, as they do not have gears or transmissions. However, traditional cars perform better at high speeds and have a longer driving range than EVs. They can also handle different terrains and weather conditions better than EVs, as they have more power and stability.
Cost: EVs have a higher retail price than traditional cars, on average. But EVs may be a better financial deal for consumers over the long term. That’s because maintenance, repair and fuel costs tend to be lower than those for fossil fuel cars. EVs have fewer moving parts and fluids, which means they require less servicing and repairs. They also run on electricity, which is cheaper and cleaner than fossil derived fuels. However, traditional cars have lower upfront costs and more financing options than EVs. They also have a higher resale value and more availability than EVs, as they are more common and therefore familiar to buyers.
Environmental impact: EVs are more environmentally friendly than traditional cars, as they do not emit greenhouse gases or pollutants that contribute to air quality problems. They can also use renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind power, to charge their batteries and use fossil derived energy too.
However, EVs are not completely carbon-neutral, as they still depend on the electricity grid, which still uses fossil fuels to generate power. They also produce emissions during their manufacture and disposal processes.
Traditional cars, on the other hand, are a major source of carbon emissions and environmental damage, as they burn fossil fuels and release harmful substances into the atmosphere such as carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. They also consume natural resources and create waste during their production and operation.
Fossil fuels generate power for the electric vehicle
As the EV population grows, so too will the energy requirement – and it will most likely be met moreso by fossil fuels in the short term as well as by renewables.
According to various sources, electric cars are generally cheaper to run than petrol cars in terms of fuel, road tax, maintenance, and insurance. However, the initial purchase price of electric cars is usually higher than petrol cars, so the overall cost of ownership may depend on how long you plan to keep the car and how much you drive it.
Running cost examples of electric cars vs petrol cars – (Spring 2023 data)
According to British Gas – fully charging a typical 60kW electric car at home costs £15.10 and gives you a 200-mile range, whereas filling up a petrol car with a similar range costs over £104. Electric cars also pay zero road tax, while petrol cars pay between £30 to £2,365 per year depending on their CO2 emissions. Electric cars also tend to have lower maintenance and insurance costs than petrol cars.
According to Regit – charging an electric car like the Vauxhall Corsa-E costs roughly £9.50 in electricity for a 200-mile range, while fuelling a petrol car with a similar range costs £41.63 in petrol. Electric cars also save money on road tax, maintenance, and congestion charges compared to petrol cars.
According to Which? – the electric Mini Cooper SE costs £8,000 more to buy than the petrol Mini One, but it costs £2,591 less to run over three years, mainly due to fuel savings. The electric car also pays no road tax or congestion charges, while the petrol car pays £155 and £11.50 per day respectively.
According to Auto Express – the annual running costs of an electric car are 21% less than those of a petrol car, excluding the purchase price. The average annual running cost for an electric car is £1,742, compared to £2,205 for a petrol car.
According to RAC – the annual running costs of an electric car like the Nissan Leaf are £1,233 less than those of a petrol car like the Ford Focus, excluding the purchase price. The electric car costs £1,062 per year to run, while the petrol car costs £2,295
Conclusion
There are many factors that affect the running costs of electric cars vs petrol cars, and different sources may have different assumptions and methods of calculation. However, the general trend is that electric cars are cheaper to run than petrol cars in most cases.
Hydrogen and hybrids are fast becoming future contenders. Watch this space…
No, nor me – never heard of them, but they are extremely important elements needed in microchip manufacturing and China is the world’s largest producer.
Germanium and gallium are two elements that are used in the production of semiconductor chips, which are essential for various electronic devices and technologies. They have different properties and applications, and they are both considered critical materials.
Germanium
Germanium is a metalloid, which means it has properties of both metals and non-metals. It is a shiny, hard, gray-white element that is brittle and can be cut easily with a knife. It has a high melting point of 938°C and a low boiling point of 2830°C. It is mainly obtained as a by-product of zinc production, but it can also be extracted from coal.
Germanium is used in, solar cells, fibre optic cables, infrared lenses light-emitting diodes (LEDs), and transistors. It is also used in some alloys to improve their strength and hardness. Germanium is essential for the defence and renewable energy sectors, as well as for space technologies. It can resist cosmic radiation better than silicon, and it can enhance the performance and efficiency of some semiconductors.
Gallium
Gallium is a metal that has a very low melting point of 29.8°C, which means it can melt in your hand. It is a soft, silvery-white element that can be easily cut with a knife. It has a high boiling point of 2403°C. It is mainly obtained as a by-product of processing bauxite and zinc ores.
Gallium and Germanium considered critical elements required in the production of microchips
Gallium is used in the electronics industry to produce heat-resistant semiconductor wafers that can operate at higher frequencies than silicon-based ones. It is also used in LEDs, solar panels, microwave devices, sensors, and lasers. Gallium is important for the development of new technologies such as electric vehicles, high-end radio communications, and Blu-Ray players. It can also improve the power consumption and reliability of some semiconductors.
China the largest producer
China is the largest producer and exporter of both germanium and gallium, accounting for about 60% and 80% of the global supply. However, China has recently announced new export restrictions on these two elements, requiring special licences for exporters. This move is seen as a response to the western sanctions on China’s access to advanced microchip technology.
The export curbs could affect the global supply chain of semiconductor chips and have implications for various industries and markets
Banks may use XRP Ripple as a payment system to replace SWIFT
XRP Ripple is a payment settlement system and currency exchange network that can process transactions globally. It is designed to facilitate cross-border payments by using XRP, a cryptocurrency, as a bridge currency between different fiat currencies.
XRP advantage is cost and speed
XRP Ripple claims to offer several advantages over SWIFT, the system most financial institutions use for international money transfers. XRP transactions can be completed in as little as 3 to 5 seconds and transaction fees are just 0.0001 XRP. SWIFT, on the other hand, can take up to 5 business days and charge higher fees.
Not so Swift
However, despite XRP Ripple’s efforts to disrupt the industry, SWIFT has not been idle. The interbank payments network has recently launched SWIFT Go, a new service that enables businesses and consumers to send low-value cross-border payments anywhere in the world in seconds with full transparency and security.
SWIFT has also reportedly completed a successful cross-border payment from Australia to Singapore in only 13 seconds in a trial.
Adoption?
Therefore, it is not clear whether banks will adopt XRP Ripple as a payment system to replace SWIFT, or whether they will stick with the incumbent network that has been improving its speed and efficiency. The outcome may depend on factors such as regulation, customer demand, and market competition.
Fast International money transfers via the XRP Ripple system could be adopted by banks
It may also depend on costs and speed guarantees – banks will love to save money on money transfers.
Now that an international money transfer can be completed in seconds and not days – what will the client be charged?
Summary
Ripple is confident U.S. banks will start wanting to use XRP for cross-border transactions after a judge gave the firm a partial victory in its fight against the SEC.
A judge ruled that XRP cryptocurrency Ripple is closely associated with, but was not in itself necessarily a security, in a development with major implications for the digital asset industry.
Fast International money transfers via XRP Ripple
It wasn’t a total victory for Ripple, however – the judge also ruled that sales of XRP by Ripple to institutional buyers do count as unregistered sales of securities.
