You are reading the article Apple Swoops In To Grab Autonomous Car Talent As Another Startup Fails updated in December 2023 on the website Minhminhbmm.com. We hope that the information we have shared is helpful to you. If you find the content interesting and meaningful, please share it with your friends and continue to follow and support us for the latest updates. Suggested January 2024 Apple Swoops In To Grab Autonomous Car Talent As Another Startup Fails
Apple swoops in to grab autonomous car talent as another startup fails [Updated]
Autonomous car startup chúng tôi will permanently shut down, with Apple swooping in to grab key driverless tech engineers, it’s been confirmed, as the tough challenge of removing humans from behind the steering wheel claims another victim. The company launched publicly back in mid-2023, promising its artificial intelligence and deep learning algorithms would allow its self-driving vehicles to quickly assess and learn new locations.
Come 2023, chúng tôi was ready to put that into practice. The company began an on-demand ride-hailing service in Arlington, Texas, with users in the pilot able to summon an autonomous van that would shuttle them around certain preconfigured locations.
The reality of the challenge chúng tôi had taken on, though, quickly became clear. Originally, the pilot had intended to offer flexible pick-ups and drop-offs; that was downgraded to a handful of preset stops. It’s unclear how many people have used the service since its launch.
Reports earlier this month suggested chúng tôi was struggling, and on the hunt for potential suitors, with Apple named as a strong possibility. Leaks indicated talks were ongoing to bring the chúng tôi team in-house, and use its expertise to bolster Apple’s Project Titan, the project working on autonomous car technologies and other automotive work.
Now, chúng tôi will shutter its business, according to a filing made with the Employment Development Department of California. In the document, spotted by the SF Chronicle, it’s confirmed that 90 employees will lose their jobs due to the company permanently closing. That will take effect at the end of the week.
A spokesperson for the city of Arlington confirmed that the autonomous pilot ended on May 31, despite the original contract running through until October. chúng tôi requested that the one year long pilot end early.
It’s a tough end for a startup that, only two years ago, was valued at around $200 million. However at least some of the talent there has gone on to find new roles at Apple. The SF Chronicle reviewed a number of LinkedIn profiles for hardware and software engineers, and discovered that at least five have updated to show that they left chúng tôi in June and joined Apple. Four of the five are said to list their roles as in “special projects” at the Cupertino firm.
Apple’s intentions for Project Titan have reportedly varied, as the company looks to expand its footprint into new segments. Originally believed to be working on a homegrown autonomous vehicle, a shake-up in the team seemed to downgrade those ambitions somewhat. Instead, it was suggested, Apple was aiming to supply electronics, driver-assistance technologies, and infotainment products to existing automakers.
Since then, though, signs that there may be something more significant than that have reawakened. Doug Field, who left Apple to join Tesla, rejoined Apple in 2023. During his five years at the automaker, he was VP of Vehicle Programs, and led development of new electric cars. Now, he’s in charge of Apple’s Project Titan.
Update: Apple confirmed to Axios that this was an acqui-hire, with “dozens” of engineers from chúng tôi joining the Cupertino workforce. chúng tôi will, as the filing suggests, officially shut down, and apparently ceased operations within the past two weeks. According to sources, the hired staff are “mostly in the area of engineering and product design”; Apple’s purchase price was not revealed.
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Apple Acquired Mapping Firm Broadmap’s Talent, Location
Apple has been on a roll this year in terms of acquisitions. According to Apple CEO Tim Cook, the Cupertino firm acquired 15 companies this year, but only ten have been revealed. That list includes mapping companies such as Embark, chip makers like Passif, search specialists such as Cue and Topsy, and hardware companies such as PrimeSense. Because only 10 of the 15 Apple acquisitions of 2013 have been revealed, we have been digging and asking around to find the few remaining Apple pickups. Based on evidence and chatter from sources, Apple seemingly acquired mapping firm BroadMap in the first half of this year and Evernote-competitor Catch within the last few months…
BroadMap is a comprehensive and expansive mapping firm with several different products and services. While the other Apple maps-related acquisitions this year focused on transit and indoor mapping capabilities, which will likely be integrated into iOS 8, BroadMap’s expertise is managing, sorting, and analyzing mapping data. As company executives explain in the video above, BroadMap has expertise and technologies that could assist Apple is improving the data it has for its Maps app on iOS and OS X.
On its website, BroadMap lists its various areas of expertise. While BroadMap does not have a central feature that could be integrated into Apple’s existing product (like transit or indoor mapping functions), BroadMap’s experience in sorting data, cartography, points of interest, enterprise integration, geocoding, web development, and mobile application development would be invaluable to Apple CEO Tim Cook and Apple Services Senior Vice President Eddy Cue’s plan to bring Apple Maps up to the expectations of Apple’s customers.
According to BroadMap’s website, the company works with several large businesses, local governments, and notable companies. As can be seen above, BroadMap’s technology has been integrated into the successful MapQuest and Nokia Maps initiatives.
On his LinkedIn profile, BroadMap CEO Daniel Perrone says that BroadMap was acquired by a “Fortune 5” company to “support their digital mapping efforts.” Looking at the 2013 Fortune 500 list of companies, no company in the top 5 seems to have a mapping product.
However, number 6 does: Apple (shown above).
In addition to the information from Perrone’s LinkedIn profile, almost every BroadMap executive is now on Apple’s mapping team.
In addition to acquiring BroadMap, it seems likely that Apple bought Catch. Catch was a popular, cross-platform note taking application that has been regarded by many as a competitor to Evernote. Catch, which existed on both iOS and Android, was known for its ability to sync over the cloud, its simple user-interface, its reminders and notifications functionality, and its ability to logically and conveniently sort notes with both text and media including picture and audio files.
The company shut down in August of this year citing a “difficult decision to take the company in a different direction.” While this “difficult decision” appears (on the surface) to be the company simply closing its doors, the context of the shutdown was mysterious. See, only approximately one month before announcing its shutdown, the company launched a major new enterprise-related product called Catch Team. It would be odd for the company to shut down so quickly after launching a new product.
Catch was also popular among many productivity application fans and with… Apple. In fact, Apple promoted the Catch application across its different marketing platforms. As can be seen above, the Catch team is posing in front of a banner for their application in an Apple retail store.
The app was also promoted via banners at Apple media events and even as a reason to buy an iPhone on Apple’s own website. Following positive reviews and promotion from Apple, the company actually “shut down” because it was acquired.
Catch could help Apple in several potential manners: Catch could be used to integrate with Siri for reminders and notes functions, integrate with the Notes and Reminders iOS/OS X apps, assist Apple with mobile user-interfaces, and help out Apple’s iCloud team.
Perhaps even more interesting, Catch used to operate a known Android application called Compass. The application was location-based and infused locations with notes. Essentially, it was an app to “annotate your world.” Perhaps Apple was interested in that technology and this potential acquisition was more of an Apple Maps play. The Compass app is no longer available.
Besides learning of the likely BroadMap and Catch acquisitions, sources have clarified that Apple’s earlier acquisitions of both Cue and Topsy were specifically for enhancements to Siri over the next few major releases of iOS. 2013 has been an atypical year for Apple in terms of acquisitions, with the company buying three times as many companies this year as it did in 2012. Apple acquisitions are intriguing because they typically foretell future products. For example, Apple’s Authentec acquisition helped design Touch ID for the iPhone 5s, and before Siri launched with the iPhone 4S, Siri was a Silicon Valley-based startup.
Update: Apple confirmed the acquisitions to AllThingsD. The report also notes that the BroadMap acquisition was centered around talent, as we previously noted, not the company’s resources and name.
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How To Run A Linux Command As Another User
If you are an experienced Linux user, you know that sometimes you need to run a command as another user. This can be necessary for various reasons, such as running a command that requires root privileges or running a command that belongs to another user. In this article, we will explain how to run a Linux command as another user.
Understanding User Accounts in LinuxBefore we dive into the specifics of running a command as another user, it is important to understand the concept of user accounts in Linux. Every user in Linux has a unique user ID (UID) and a corresponding username. Additionally, every user belongs to at least one group, which is identified by a group ID (GID) and a group name.
When you log in to a Linux system, you are assigned a user account that determines your permissions and access to system resources. By default, you have limited privileges and cannot perform certain actions that require elevated permissions. However, you can use the sudo command to temporarily elevate your privileges and perform administrative tasks.
Using the su Command to Run a Command as Another UserThe su command in Linux allows you to switch to another user account and run commands as that user. To use the su command, you must have the password of the user account you want to switch to. Here is the syntax of the su command:
su [options] [username]
[options]: This parameter specifies any optional arguments that modify the behavior of the su command. For example, you can use the -c option to specify the command to run as the target user.
[username]: This parameter specifies the username of the target user account.
When you run the su command without any options, you are prompted to enter the password of the target user account. Once you enter the correct password, you are switched to that user’s account and can run commands as that user.
Here is an example of how to use the su command to run a command as another user:
su john -c "ls /home/john"In this example, we are running the ls command as the user john. The -c option specifies the command to run, and the argument "ls /home/john" specifies the directory to list.
Using the sudo Command to Run a Command as Another UserAnother way to run a command as another user is to use the sudo command. Unlike the su command, the sudo command does not require you to enter the password of the target user account. Instead, you must have the permission to run commands as that user.
To run a command as another user using the sudo command, you must specify the -u option followed by the username of the target user. Here is the syntax of the sudo command:
sudo -u [username] [command]
-u [username]: This option specifies the username of the target user account.
[command]: This parameter specifies the command to run as the target user.
Here is an example of how to use the sudo command to run a command as another user:
sudo -u john ls /home/johnIn this example, we are running the ls command as the user john. The -u john option specifies the target user, and the argument /home/john specifies the directory to list.
ConclusionRunning a Linux command as another user can be useful in many situations, such as when you need to run a command that requires elevated privileges or when you need to access files or directories that belong to another user. In this article, we explained how to use the su and sudo commands to run a command as another user. By following these instructions, you can perform administrative tasks and access system resources with ease.
Will We See Apple Car And Xiaomi Car Ever? Everything You Should Know
Apple Car Project Titan
Recently, Reuters quoted sources as reporting that the Apple Car plan is still ongoing, and Apple aims to start mass production of its own brand cars in 2024. Moreover, the source claim it will use a new generation of batteries that take into account power saving and safety.
The Apple car is developed under Project Titan. This project was launched in 2014. Apple hopes to enter the automobile manufacturing industry when the growth of consumer electronics gradually slows down. Apple originally hoped to launch the first car in early 2023. Project Titan has successively undergone team changes and complex parts supply chain, causing time delays. In 2023, the direction of the project was changed from self-manufactured vehicles to self-driving systems.
Also Read: Apple Car To Come In 2023, Two Years Ahead Of The Original Schedule
Commander Project Titan kept changing roles during this period. The latest report pointed out that the person in charge for the skillet after Apple switched to 2023 Tesla Doug Field, under his leading, in early 2023 the project laid off plan managers, engineers and product designers, and other 190 workers. Now, it’s reported that the project is going well.
Apple’s GoalAnother source said that Project Titan’s strategic focus is on a new battery design. It should use a unique monocell design. The latter will reduce the number of battery modules and films, thereby freeing up more battery internal space for storage. Incorporating more active materials will not only significantly reduce battery costs, but also effectively increase driving distance. In addition, Apple is also studying lithium iron phosphate batteries (LFP). They are less prone to overheating. Thus, they should to be safer than other lithium batteries. The source pointed out that it’s the next-generation battery, which will brighten the eyes of the world.
In response to the lithium iron phosphate battery, Tesla CEO Elon Musk pointed out via Twitter on Tuesday that Tesla’s Shanghai plant has now been used to produce mid-range vehicles. He also pointed out that the report claiming the design of a monocell is unlikely to be achieved electrochemically.
Making Apple Car May Take LongerNot that long ago, Bloomberg quoted sources as reporting that Apple Car may be five to seven years away from its actual launch.
Bloomberg reported that Apple’s Project Titan has indeed expanded from a purely self-driving system a few years ago to a more ambitious project. Apple has organized a small team of hardware engineers to produce driving systems, vehicle interiors, and design external car bodies. The members also include several senior executives dug from Tesla.
However, some members believe that the car plan has not yet come to the mass production stage. If Apple Car really promotes the plan, it will take 5 to 7 years for the product to be launched. One of the reasons is that under the COVID-19 epidemic, members of the task force can only work at home or work in the company for a short period of time, which delays the progress of the entire plan.
The South Korean media Hyundai Economic Daily News reported last week and then Hyundai Motor Company confirmed to CNBC that it is negotiating with Apple to produce electric cars.
However, Hyundai Motor pointed out that according to the company’s understanding, Apple is negotiating with many global automakers, including Hyundai Motor. As the discussions between the two sides are still in the early stages, nothing has been decided yet.
Hyundai Motor announced in December last year that it would acquire an 80% stake in the robotics company Boston Dynamics for US$1.1 billion. At that time, Hyundai Motor stated that it planned to use Boston Dynamics’ robots to realize the company’s vision of smart mobile solutions, investing in self-driving cars, connected and electric vehicles, and smart factories, operations research, construction and other automation solutions.
Analysts are optimistic about the cooperation between the two partiesSamsung Securities Auto Analyst Im Eun-Young said: ‘Through cooperation, Hyundai Motor can provide Apple with its electric vehicle platform, and Apple can provide the necessary technology and software for electric vehicles. If it becomes a reality, it will be a huge leap in the industry for Korean cars.’
Hyundai Motor Chairman Euisun Chung, who took office last October, also said that the company will actively promote new growth businesses, focusing on electric vehicles, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and future mobile platforms.
Last month, Hyundai Motor launched a new platform that will support its electric vehicle business in the next few years. Currently, South Korea’s largest automobile group (Hyundai Motor) is committed to seizing a larger share in the fast-growing electric vehicle market.
According to Hyundai’s medium and long-term strategy, its goal is to supply 8% to 10% of the world’s electric vehicles by 2025. Hyundai Motor plans to launch more than 12 battery-powered electric vehicles (BEV) based on E-GMP, which is a dedicated electric vehicle platform for Hyundai Motor.
In addition, in order to transform into a leading service provider in the field of future travel, Hyundai Motor has also established a joint venture company Motional for autonomous vehicles with Aptiv.
Xiaomi CarWell, let’s travel to China. Everything is more interesting here. Say, Baidu has officially announced that it will personally build cars; Alibaba and SAIC have jointly established Zhiji Auto. But Xiaomi, which has always referred to itself as an ‘Internet company’, frequently appears on topics concerning car manufacturing.
In the 10 years since this Internet company started with smartphones, three-fifths of the time surrounded by ‘car-making’ rumors has been around. Although these rumors have been denied one by one by the authorities, the endless reverie they have aroused has largely reflected the expectations of the outside world.
More importantly, Lei Jun said in 2023, ‘We will not build a car in three to five years because of insufficient energy.’
From now to 2023, the ‘three to five years’ that Lei Jun originally said has expired. Moreover, the development of the smartphone industry has approached the ceiling. In contrast, the smart car market is in the early stage of its outbreak.
At the same time, as new players continue to cannibalize the market, the optimal time window for the layout of the smart car market will also be closed at an accelerated rate. Perhaps Xiaomi can also try to build a car.
Should Xiaomi build a car?After 10 years of hard work, Xiaomi has become a real internet giant. But it is undeniable that Xiaomi started from smartphone products, and now half of Xiaomi’s world is still supported by the smartphone business. According to the latest financial report data, in Q3 2023, Xiaomi’s smartphone business revenue accounted for 66% of the company’s total revenue.
However, with the development of technology, it is difficult for smartphones to have disruptive innovations. And the demand for user replacement is no longer strong.
Smartphones have realized the transition from the incremental era to the inventory era, and the market is close to saturation. According to the latest survey by IDC, in Q3 2023, the global smartphone market shipments will drop by 1.3% year-on-year. Prior to this, the year-on-year decline in Q1 in 2023 was 11.7%; the year-on-year decline in Q2 in 2023 was as high as 16%. This is the worst performance in the history of the smartphone industry.
If the bleakness of the smartphone market in 2023 is affected by the epidemic, then looking at the entire 2023, global smartphone shipments were 1.371 billion units, a year-on-year decline of 2.3%, which is the third consecutive year that global smartphone shipments have declined.
New Market, New OpportunitiesFocusing only on the Chinese market, under favorable policies, new electric cars sales will reach 20% of total vehicle sales by 2025.
This means that even if overall car sales no longer increase, based on the sales scale in 2023, the market size of new electric cars will exceed 5 million in 2025, which is about five times the current size.
In addition, most countries and regions in the world are promoting the development of new electric cars, and the market size will also multiply.
Moreover, automobiles have begun to transform from traditional means of transportation to smart mobile terminals. They have become important scenarios for the landing of emerging technologies such as big data, cloud computing, 5G and AI.
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What Will Make Future Cars Competitive?Based on the recognition of the potential of the Internet car model, Tesla’s total market value has soared to more than 800 billion U.S. dollars, almost four times that of Toyota (about 210 billion U.S. dollars), which has long dominated the global auto companies’ market value list.
Even Baidu, which only announced the components of the smart car company, after the official announcement of the news, the stock price rose by 70 billion yuan ($10.82 billion) overnight.
Regardless of the angle of view, the smart car market has infinite opportunities, which has attracted many crossover players. Among them, for smartphone manufacturers with a keen sense of smell, smart cars are very likely to be another business growth point after their smartphones.
To this end, Apple has been low-key preparations for many years, Huawei is gearing up, and Xiaomi may also be looking for a suitable opportunity.
In addition, as a major smart terminal device in the future, smart cars have a deeper meaning for Xiaomi. We mean it can become a key part of Xiaomi’s second largest business AIoT business and expand its Internet of Everything.
Can Xiaomi build a car?Although Xiaomi has never made a clear intention to build a car, as early as 2013, Lei Jun visited Musk twice and showed great interest in smart cars.
Subsequently, Xiaomi and Lei Jun began a series of investments in smart cars. The car-making level includes two new car-making forces for young users, Weilai Automobile and Xiaopeng Automobile; the Internet of Vehicles investment includes PATEO and Kay Lide; autonomous driving levels such as Smart Traveler.
The ecological chain companies invested by Xiaomi also include companies that develop smart car products such as 70 Mai, Ruimi Technology, Banya Technology, and Chemi Technology. The product categories include smart driving recorders, smart mirrors, smart rearview mirrors, and smart car chargers.
The three parties, including Lei Jun, Xiaomi Technology, and Shunwei Capital, have invested in about 40 companies related to car manufacturing, automotive aftermarket and travel.
Strong EcologyThere are also many cases where Xiaomi itself and Xiaomi’s ecological chain companies and car companies jointly build smart cars. For example, through Xiao Ai, the Mercedes-Benz MBUX human-computer interaction system, the Weimar EX5 model, and the FAW Pentium T77 Mifen customized model can realize the control of smart home; Xiaomi smartphones can play Xiaopeng and BYD car keys role; the Xiaomi Mi Watch also supports the intelligent control of related models of Weilai.
Lei Jun once said, ‘The Internet of Vehicles is an important part of future technology. And cars are also the most important intelligent terminals in people’s lives in the future.
Based on the above information, the Internet of Vehicles is indeed the focus of Xiaomi’s deployment in the automotive field. Related business developments also confirm this point. According to some data, Xiaomi Technology Co., Ltd. has applied for the registration of the Xiaomi Mi Chelian trademark. At the same time, it applied for related graphic trademarks.
The number of IoT devices connected to Xiaomi’s AIoT platform has reached 289 million. Moreover, the user base continues to increase. Among them, the number of users with five or more devices connected to the Xiaomi AIoT platform (excluding smartphones and laptops) has reached 5.6 million; in addition, Xiao Ai has 78.4 million monthly active users and is one of the most active voice assistants in the world.
Xiaomi Seems To Have Been Preparing For The Development Of Smart Cars All The TimeIn 2023, Xiaomi applied for patents related to this field. According to the information disclosed by the National Patent Office, among the more than 2000 patents declared by Xiaomi Technology, about 10 are related to automobiles, mainly including vehicle cruise control, energy supplement, vehicle control, navigation, assisted driving, driving safety, parking information Forecast etc.
On the other hand, Xiaomi has begun to open up new automotive retail channels and deploy offline stores. In May last year, Xiaomi and Changan Mazda announced a strategic cooperation to help Changan Mazda in car sales.
Subsequently, Xiaomi’s e-commerce platform Xiaomi Youpin added ‘auto sales’ category, which is a key component of Xiaomi’s new retail strategy.
In short, Xiaomi has accumulated a certain amount of accumulated vehicles, smart cockpits, smart networking, and car sales. It has penetrated into many links in the smart car industry chain and built its own ecosystem and resource pool.
Once Xiaomi is determined to build a car, these forward-looking layouts will play a vital role.
How does Xiaomi build a car?Looking at the entire industry, Internet car manufacturing can be divided into three main models: independent car manufacturing; independent design, car factory OEM; and in-depth cooperation with traditional car companies.
Unlike consumer electronic products, the automotive industry chain is complex and lengthy. Also, it has extremely high requirements for safety and reliability. At the same time, building a car independently requires heavy asset investment.
This model has been endorsed by many giants: Baidu + Geely, Ali + SAIC (Zhiji Auto), Huawei + Changan + CATL, Apple + Kia.
Earlier, Lei Jun stated in an open letter to employees that Xiaomi has clarified the strategic direction of ‘5G+AI+loT next-generation super internet’. It will invest 50 billion yuan ($7.73 billion) in this by 2025.
The smart car coincides with the three technologies of this strategy to a high degree:
5G can provide information transmission conditions with higher reliability and lower latency for intelligent networked vehicles to meet the needs of vehicles and the outside world;
AI technologies, including computer vision, machine learning, natural language processing, etc. are all core applications in the smart car scenario;
IoT devices are an indispensable part of Xiaomi’s getting on the car.
If Xiaomi really decides to build a car, it is likely to also cooperate with car companies.
After all, in the third quarter of 2023, Xiaomi’s smartphone shipments ranked top three in the world. Also, its stock price is rising. Relying on one’s own strength to rush all the money to the smart car, which is still losing money, may bring risks.
Moreover, Xiaomi smartphones are often known for their high performance-to-price ratio. But it’s not a small challenge for Xiaomi to create a smart car that meets the expectations.
‘Smartphone’ Is, To Some Extent, Xiaomi’s Core AdvantageAs the smart hardware with the highest degree of close integration with users’ lives, smartphones can clearly understand users’ daily habits and life patterns, making it easy to collect massive amounts of user real data. This is an essential element to create a personalized and customized driving experience.
At the same time, in terms of smartphones, Xiaomi has developed the MIUI operating system on the basis of Android. Perhaps this successful experience can also be copied to the car and the ‘MIUI system’ suitable for cars.
What happens if you don’t build a car?Prior to this, China has proposed to achieve 20% of the total sales of new electric cars by 2025. It should achieve the ‘carbon peak’ by 2030 and achieve the goal of ‘carbon neutrality’ by 2060. With the continuous support of policies, new electric cars will become a super outlet in the next few years. Moreover, it will be so even in the next ten years.
With the official announcements of Ali and Baidu, the curtain of Internet giants building cars has also begun. From the perspective of Xiaomi alone, its current focus is mostly on the Internet of Vehicles. And its willingness to build cars has not been clearly indicated. However, the competition in the field of Internet of Vehicles is now very fierce.
Xiaomi And Apple Are Not UniqueTechnology giants such as Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, Huawei, and Byte have all entered the game. And the problem of product function homogeneity is relatively serious.
Moreover, Xiaomi’s AIoT ecosystem is slightly closed and only supports devices in its own system. In contrast, Huawei has launched an open protocol that can be accessed by any manufacturer.
On the other hand, the ultimate goal of the Internet of Vehicles lies in the ‘car’ itself, and car companies have an absolute say in the choice of suppliers. Car companies start to increase investment in the Internet of Vehicles. So the future may further reduce the space for Internet giants to play.
More importantly, the mobile Internet era has encountered a bottleneck. So smart cars may become the traffic portal for the next era.
If Internet giants do not have a more in-depth layout on the smart car terminal, and only rely on smart devices and application ecology to ‘get on the car’ and ‘bind’, it may be more like a wedding dress for others. Nowadays, new car-building forces such as Tesla and Weilai are competing in front of this track. And new brands born within traditional car companies are also ready to go.
If Internet giants do not catch up, they are likely to lose their tickets to the autonomous driving arms race that has not yet arrived.
Of Course, Not All Crossover Vehicles Will Have Happy EndingDyson’s 30 billion yuan ($464 billion) electric car manufacturing project ended in failure. And many new car manufacturers also declared bankruptcy last year.
However, smart cars have gone through several years of development, and the business model has been initially verified. If Xiaomi announces that it is going to build a car one day, it will be logical.
After all, in the past 5 years, Xiaomi has not rarely threaded needles in the field of smart cars. Perhaps one day, these lines will form a huge net.
ConclusionAs you can see, not only Apple and Xiaomi, but many other internet giants are going to attack this niche. It’s reasonable – they want new markets. Well, in other words, they want to find directions that will be more profitable for them. But if the aforementioned Ali, Baidou, and others are top-level internet companies, people know Xiaomi and Apple for their mobile products mainly. In this regard, it’s quite interesting to see how they can cope with this task.
P.S. We took these two not accidentally. Xiaomi is called Chinese Apple because, at least, in the past, it was copying Apple’s business model and Apple’s phones.
Reflection Tokens Grow As Another Staking Platform Freezes Withdrawals
Voyager is the latest crypto platform to freeze all trading, deposits, and withdrawals.
The New York-based digital asset brokerage announced on Friday, July 1, that ‘current market conditions’ meant the platform could not operate as usual. Voyager offers rewards to investors staking tokens like Polkadot, Apecoin, USDC, Bitcoin, Ethereum, and more.
The catalyst for the suspension of activity on Voyager Digital was a customer defaulting on a loan worth more than $670 million.
The customer – crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital – suffered heavy losses during the huge sell-off of cryptocurrencies that have been happening from mid-May until today.
Bitcoin and Ethereum are both down more than 70% from their all-time highs reached in November last year.
Crypto lending DeFi platforms struggle in a bear marketJust a few weeks ago, it was the DeFi platform Celsius that froze customer assets and withdrawals.
While Voyager offers crypto rewards up to 10%, Celsius was offering up to 18% on certain cryptocurrencies. Neither could continue to offer such impressive APY on cryptocurrencies as both prices fell and customers began withdrawing their investments.
Of course, it’s not only DeFi projects offering high staking rewards for crypto that are feeling the pinch.
Businesses like Coinbase and chúng tôi have also had to cut staff to survive the current crypto winter caused by macroeconomic conditions – inflation, war, global supply shortages – and the collapse of the Terra Luna network in mid May.
Reflection tokens grow – will they save DeFi?Reflection tokens have been growing their investor bases despite the crypto bear market.
These cryptocurrencies also offer crypto passive income to investors – but the mechanism is much more scalable than fixed APY rewards which look great on a website homepage. Reflection tokens charge a transaction tax on buy and sell orders, but this tax is spread across all existing investors depending on their holding size.
EverGrow Coin is leading the reflection token space with a 14% transaction tax.
The 14% is split into 8% redistributed in the BUSD stablecoin, with 3% set aside for liquidity, 2% for buyback and burn and 1% for marketing. Since launching in September last year, EverGrow Coin has paid out more than $37 million in BUSD and burned 53% of its initial coin supply.
There’s no guarantee of APY with EverGrow Coin – you have to calculate the math yourself using calculators on the EverGrow Coin website.
An example. At the current EverGrow Coin price of $0.0000001366 a $1,000 investment would buy you EGC 7.3 billion. With the trading volume at $111,000 today, this would net you an annual return of just $53 – or an APY of 0.5%.
But if the trading volume were to hold at the 2023 peak of $12 million, you would earn $5,740 BUSD in a year – an APY of 574%. And this is not factoring in any price increase in the value of EverGrow Coin itself.
To ensure steady trading volume EverGrow Coin is releasing an NFT marketplace and content subscription platform in the coming months. LunaSky and Crator will ensure greater exposure for EverGrow Coin while any profits from the utilities will either be used to buyback and burn EverGrow Coin or be 100% redistributed as BUSD rewards among investors.
This is possible because, unlike other cryptocurrencies, all the core development teams earn salaries from BUSD rewards just like any other investor.
Apple Car: What We Know, What We Don’T Know
Despite years of speculation about an Apple Car, we still have little hard information about Apple’s plans.
When did the rumors begin?The first reports date back to early 2023, when a camera-festooned car was shown to be leased to Apple. While some believed this was for Apple Maps, others suggested it looked more like a test-bed for a self-driving car. Shortly afterwards, Apple was found to be poaching Tesla engineers., and we uncovered a significant number of senior automotive hires.
What is Apple up to?This is the $64,000 question. We know for sure that Apple is very actively exploring some kind of move into the automotive sector, but it’s still not 100% clear that the company plans to go as far as launching a car, which consumers will be able to buy.
Apple has said only that the area is of interest to the company.
We’ve seen three main possibilities suggested:
Some kind of car technology, but not a carThe first suggestion is that Apple wants to create some kind of car tech, but not go as far as actually making a car. Some believe Apple’s primary interest is in the in-car experience as the world transitions to self-driving cars – a kind of CarPlay on steroids, if you will. Others believe there is enough evidence that Apple is working on self-driving technology, but that it will license this to other companies, rather than make its own car.
Ride-sharing carsThe second possibility is that Apple plans to make cars, but not for retail sale. One obvious market for autonomous cars is ride sharing, so it’s possible that Apple plans to make a self-driving car for a ride-sharing service, but we wouldn’t be able to buy one.
A car for retail saleThe third option, of course, is a full-on car that consumers can lease or buy outright. It’s this possibility which has understandably lead to the greatest amount of debate and excitement.
Who would make it?Assuming Apple does plan to actually make a car, it would partner with a manufacturing company to actually produce the vehicles. Here there are two possible routes the company could take.
Partner with an established brandApple has been reported to have discussed a possible partnership with a wide range of established carmakers. These include Hyundai/Kia, Nissan, BMW, and Canoo.
The Hyundai/Kia idea was once presented as if it were almost a done deal, before later being dismissed – though there remains some minor partnership talk.
The big stumbling block here appears to be branding. Existing car brands would be reluctant to be relegated to the role of a contract manufacturer, where Apple makes all the decisions and the car has only Apple branding.
Use a contract manufacturerThe other, perhaps more likely, possibility is that Apple commissions a contract manufacturer to build the cars, just as it uses companies like Foxconn and Pegatron to make iPhones and other Apple products.
Foxconn is known to be working on electric car production, but likely working more at the lower end of the market. The company did buy a US EV factory, but almost certainly not for Apple cars. Magna is one of the best-known contract manufacturers able to build models for premium brands, and so appears a likely contender.
What have existing car makers said?Unsurprisingly, almost all are claiming not to be worried. For example, BMW’s CFO says he “sleeps peacefully” while VW says the company isn’t afraid. Toyota thinks Apple doesn’t understand that you have to be ready to provide 40 years of after-sales support for a car, where Apple tends to discontinue support five to seven years after it ceases to sell a particular model.
In reality, of course, any premium brand car maker has to be sweating right now. Tesla is the only car company to openly admit that Apple will pose extremely tough competition.
When would an Apple Car be launched?This too is one of the Big Questions. In 2023, some suggested an Apple Car might go on sale as early as 2023, which of course didn’t happen. A variety of other dates have been suggested, from 2024 through 2026 to 2028 or beyond.
With no deal apparently yet struck, and no leaks of anything specific, it is certainly clear that Apple is nowhere close to a launch anytime soon.
Concept image: CarWow
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