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"562 Interactive's Alluris takes best in show at Indie Prize USA 2019 | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/562-interactives-alluris-takes-best-in-show-at-indie-prize-usa-2019"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages 562 Interactive’s Alluris takes best in show at Indie Prize USA 2019 Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Indie Prize USA 2019 contestants.
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Alluris from 562 Interactive in the U.S. won the best in show “audience choice” award at GameDaily Connect’s Indie Prize USA 2019 contest in Anaheim, California yesterday. The contest drew dozens of entrants from indie game developers from around the world.
The Indie Prize is an international scholarship program for indie game developers. The ten winners were chosen from among 100 finalists from dozens of countries. Prizes for the winners were provided by Photo, Inlingo, and Greenlit. Judges were chosen from a variety of developers within the industry. Yuliya Moshkaryova runs the contest. I got a look at the some of the games and was impressed at the quality of the entrants.
Alluris is a fantasy card game where you create your characters, unlock backstories, and explore a world. It is coming on a variety of platforms in 2019. OtherWorldly from Idea.org in the U.S. won most innovative game.
Above: 562 Interactive’s Alluris won the audience choice award.
The Lighthouse from Shadow Knights in the U.S. won best game narrative.
Trident’s Wake from Bacus Studios in Argentina won best multiplayer game.
Party Time! from HyperTeam won best kids and family game.
Astrologaster from Nyamyam in the United Kingdom won the best mobile game.
Above: The winners of the best innovative game, OtherWorldly, from Idea.org.
Art Inc.
from Pixio in Hong Kong won best game art.
Nubla 2 — M, the City at the Center of the World from Gammera Nest from Spain won best game design.
And Unheard from Next Studios in China won best game audio.
Disclosure: The organizers of GameDaily Connect paid my way to Anaheim. Our coverage remains objective.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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4,514 | 2,019 |
"The shift toward open source conversational AI | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/the-shift-toward-open-source-conversational-ai"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest The shift toward open source conversational AI Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
In July, Uber released a new open source AI library called the Plato research dialogue system. A couple of months ago, Cisco open-sourced its MindMeld conversational AI platform , after acquiring the company of the same name in 2017 for $125 million.
Why are so many new libraries being announced? There seems to be a trend of developers adopting open source conversational AI and leaving behind closed-source alternatives. Most of the key tooling for building conversational AI that has been developed in the last three years is open source. And companies like Uber and Cisco want to be in the running to define the standard conversational AI stack.
In fact, the whole field of AI has seen a strong shift toward open source infrastructure in the past few years. The initial spark may have been Google’s decision to open-source TensorFlow in 2015. At that point, many businesses started paying attention. Google Search data shows that interest in open source libraries like TensorFlow and PyTorch has grown at the expense of closed platforms such as IBM Watson and Amazon’s Sagemaker.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! The market is driving this shift. Companies are increasingly deciding that many of the AI capabilities they need are strategically important and should be developed in-house. By using open source tools, they can build up their own training data sets and other IP, such as custom integrations with their backend systems. By developing the talent, data, and software to ship AI themselves, these companies control their own AI destiny.
This trend has now reached the field of conversational AI. Looking at developer interest in two of the most popular cloud-based tools, it’s clear the number of questions asked on Stack Overflow has gone flat since early 2018.
(Note that although “botframework” is the name of an open source SDK, it’s used to access Microsoft’s conversational AI platform, which is not open source.) While interest in closed-source tools like Dialogflow and Microsoft Bot Framework has stalled, monthly installations of the most popular open source natural language understanding (NLU) libraries increased six-fold between mid-2018 and mid-2019. I predict that within 12 months, open source will overtake the cloud APIs and become the dominant force in conversational AI.
So why now? In 2016, chatbot hype had reached its peak, with companies exploring chatbots and voice assistants. For building a proof of concept, the convenience of a fully hosted solution like Dialogflow is compelling, because it requires very little in the way of engineering effort or up-front costs. Now, however, companies in various verticals are deploying conversational AI to solve more compelling business problems, and many prefer to control the tools and training themselves.
The market for conversational AI is starting to mature, especially in the banking, insurance, and health care industries. Bank of America’s Erica and Capital One’s Eno are examples from leading banks that have built large teams to develop conversational AI. Challenger startups like Lemonade and N26 are on the path to building autonomous organizations, which becomes possible as the industry moves from level three conversational AI to level five.
As always, with market maturity comes differentiated products. There are already multiple competing open source solutions targeted at different types of developers.
MindMeld’ s main purpose is to enable developers to build use cases on Cisco-specific conference devices and the wider Cisco ecosystem. Uber’s Plato system operates in a different vertical; it’s optimized for the needs of researchers who want to develop and test new algorithms and evaluate them on standard data sets, similar to other research-focused libraries, such as PyDial and the very recent ConvLab.
Then, of course, there’s tooling targeted at developers that are shipping products into production. Vendors include Rasa (where I am CTO and cofounder), DeepPavlov , and Snips.
If open source does overtake the cloud APIs in the next 12 months to become the dominant force in conversational AI, tools from the likes of Cisco and Uber are just the beginning.
Alan Nichol is founder and CTO of Rasa.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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4,515 | 2,019 |
"MIT's 'roboats' autonomously form bridges across bodies of water | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/mit-roboats-autonomously-form-bridges-across-bodies-of-water"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages MIT’s ‘roboats’ autonomously form bridges across bodies of water Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn MIT CSAIL's 'roboats.' Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Need to bridge a wide pond or canal in a pinch, or perhaps a backyard pool? Robots pioneered by researchers at MIT and the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS Institute) might fit the bill. Dubbed robotic boats, or roboats, they’re autonomous platforms designed to “shapeshift” at will by reassembling into different configurations.
As MIT’s Rob Matheson explains in a blog post , the roboats — rectangular hulls packing sensors, thrusters, microcontrollers, GPS modules, cameras, and other hardware — are the fruit of the ongoing Roboat joint project between MIT and the AMS Institute. Its longstanding goal is to create structures capable of ferrying goods and people along Amsterdam’s over 160 canals, and of self-assembling into bridges that could help reduce pedestrian congestion.
This latest development — a novel algorithm handles planning and tracking, enabling groups of roboats to travel a path while avoiding collisions — is the culmination of three years’ worth of work. According to director of MIT CSAIL Daniela Rus, it builds on 3D-printed prototypes that could move along predetermined routes with latching mechanisms that targeted and clasped onto each other. “We’ve enabled the roboats to now make and break connections with other roboats, with hopes of moving activities on the streets of Amsterdam to the water,” said Rus.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! The roboats consist of two basic components — coordinators and workers — sporting four propellers, a wireless microcontroller, and automated latching mechanisms and sensing systems. Coordinators, which are aware of and can communicate with all connected workers, additionally have GPS for navigation and inertial measurement units responsible for computing localization, pose, and velocity.
Connected roboats compare the differences between their initial shape and new shapes before figuring out whether they should remain still or move. Then, they’re assigned a time to disassemble and a new position, at which point they precompute collision-free regions and find the shortest trajectory to their final destinations. Thanks to a battery of optimization techniques, the researchers say it takes less than 100 milliseconds to identify safe paths before the coordinator estimates the poses and velocities to move each roboat into the target locations.
In real-world experiments staged in an MIT pool, the paper’s coauthors managed to get the roboats to rearrange themselves from a connected straight line, where they were latched together at their sides, into a straight line connected at front and back, as well as an “L.” They leave to future work scaling the algorithm to roboats up to 4 meters long and 2 meters wide (the prototypes were 1 meter long and half a meter wide), and ensuring the system is robust enough to contend with severe weather (such as heavy rain) and connect to slippery structures like the walls of canals.
Within a year, the team hopes to deploy a dynamic bridge across a 60-meter canal between the NEMO Science Museum in Amsterdam’s city center and an area that’s under development, as part of a project called RoundAround.
If all goes according to plan, roboats will sail in a continuous circle across the canal, picking up and dropping off passengers at docks and stopping or rerouting when they detect anything in the way.
“This will be the world’s first bridge comprised of a fleet of autonomous boats,” said MIT professor Carlo Ratti. “A regular bridge would be super expensive, because you have boats going through, so you’d need to have a mechanical bridge that opens up or a very high bridge. But we can connect two sides of canal [by using] autonomous boats that become dynamic, responsive architecture that float on the water.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
Discover our Briefings.
The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Didi announces autonomous taxi pilot for Shanghai | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/didi-announces-autonomous-taxi-pilot-for-shanghai"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Didi announces autonomous taxi pilot for Shanghai Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn China's Didi is piloting a robo-taxi service in Shanghai Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing (Didi) has announced plans to pilot a self-driving taxi service in Shanghai, weeks after spinning out its autonomous driving unit as a standalone company.
On Tuesday of this week, the Shanghai government greenlit Didi’s push to test its fleet of autonomous vehicles on public roads.
Didi, for the uninitiated, emerged back in 2015 following a merger between local rivals Didi Dache and Kuaidi Dache, with the combined company now the market leader in China by a considerable distance. As an aside, Uber unfurled a white flag over its Chinese ambitions back in 2016 when it sold its local unit to Didi in a $35 billion deal, and in the intervening years Didi has doubled down on its global ambitions via a number of international launches — with Uber firmly in its crosshairs.
Like Uber, which has been investing heavily in autonomous driving technology , Didi has been ramping up its ambitions in the driverless car sphere, and in early August it revealed a new independent self-driving vehicle entity designed to expedite its R&D and real-world implementations. The unit now employs 200 people, working across the various facets of autonomous vehicle design and development, including HD mapping, security, behavior prediction, infrastructure, and more.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Speaking at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai this week, Didi CEO and founder Cheng Wei revealed specifics about Didi’s “robo-taxi” initiative, with riders able to hail a self-driving car through the Didi app.
Above: Didi is launching a robo-taxi pilot in Shanghai Didi said it will deploy 30 different models of level 4 autonomous vehicles, which will include human safety drivers, on roads in the Jiading district of Shanghai.
“Technology only has worth when it brings value to people’s lives,” Cheng said. “We believe giving ordinary citizens access to large-scale, shared autonomous fleets is key to achieving our shared goal of safety, efficiency, and sustainability for future cities.” Global efforts A number of companies are working to bring fully autonomous vehicles to roads around the world. The most advanced and high-profile of these is Alphabet subsidiary Waymo, which unveiled its first commercial driverless taxi service last year, with further expansions firmly on its agenda.
Last year, Russia’s Yandex led the European autonomous vehicle charge with the first public pilot of a robo-taxi service, and it recently committed to putting 100 driverless cars on roads by 2020. Japanese companies are also turbocharging their efforts to get autonomous vehicles on roads in time for the Tokyo Olympic Games next year.
Didi’s latest move fits into the broader global push to make autonomous vehicles a reality — with the claim of “first” conveying strategic advantage, from both a global and local perspective.
“Working with our auto industry partners, Didi has the potential to become the first business to realize a large-scale robo-taxi service in China,” added Didi chief technology officer (CTO) Zhang Bo.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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4,517 | 2,019 |
"AI Weekly: Cutting-edge research promises to imbue AI with contextual knowledge | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-weekly-cutting-edge-research-promises-to-imbue-ai-with-contextual-knowledge"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI Weekly: Cutting-edge research promises to imbue AI with contextual knowledge Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Viewing scenes and making sense of them is something people do effortlessly every day. Whether it’s sussing out objects’ colors or gauging their distances apart, it doesn’t take much conscious effort to recognize items’ attributes and apply knowledge to answer questions about them.
That’s patently untrue of most AI systems, which tend to reason rather poorly. But emerging techniques in visual recognition, language understanding, and symbolic program execution promise to imbue them with the ability to generalize to new examples, much like humans.
Scientists at the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, a joint 10-year, $240 million partnership to propel scientific breakthroughs in machine learning, are perfecting an approach they say might overcome longstanding barriers in AI model design. It marries deep learning with symbolist philosophies, which advocate representations and logical rules as intelligent machine cornerstones, to create programs that learn about the world through observation.
Here’s how Dario Gil, IBM Research vice president of AI and IBM Q, explained it to me in an interview last week: Imagine you’re given a photo of a scene depicting a collection of objects and tasked with classifying and describing each of them. A purely deep learning solution to the problem would require training a model on thousands of example questions, and that model could be tripped up by variations on those same questions.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! “You need to decompose the problem into a variety of things,” said Gil. “You have a visual perception challenge — you have a question and you have to understand what those words mean — and then you have a logic reasoning part that you have to execute to solve this problem [as well].” By contrast, symbolic reasoning approaches like that described in a recent paper from MIT, IBM, and DeepMind leverage a neurosymbolic concept learner (NS-CL), an amalgamated model programmed to understand concepts like “objects” and “spatial relationship” in text. One component is set loose on a data set of scenes made up of objects, while another learns to map natural language questions to answers from corpora of question-answer pairs.
The framework can answer new questions about different scenes by recognizing visual concepts in those questions, making it highly scalable. As an added benefit, it requires far less data than deep learning approaches alone.
“The data efficiency in solving the task essentially perfectly is [incredible],” said Gil. “[Y]ou can achieve the same accuracy with 1% of the training data, [which is good news for the] 99.99% of businesses that [don’t] have an overabundance of large amounts of labeled data.” MIT and IBM’s work in symbolic reasoning is one of several recent efforts to inject AI with contextual knowledge about the world. In June, Salesforce researchers detailed an open source corpus — Common Sense Explanations (CoS-E) — for training and inference with a novel machine learning framework (Commonsense Auto-Generated Explanation, or CAGE), which they said improves performance on question-and-answer benchmarks by 10% over baselines and demonstrates an aptitude for reasoning in out-of-domain tasks.
According to Salesforce chief scientist Richard Socher, it could lay the groundwork for more helpful, less frustrating AI assistants. Imagine a machine learning algorithm that intuitively “knows,” without having been explicitly taught, what happens when a ball is pushed off of a table.
“It turns out that, despite all the recent breakthroughs over the last decade, it’s been historically really hard to capture commonsense knowledge in a form that algorithms can actually make useful,” Socher told VentureBeat in a previous phone interview. “The reason I’m so excited for [this research] is that [it’s the] first approach to capture commonsense knowledge, and it turns out that language models — simple models that read text and try to predict the next word and make sense of the future to autocomplete sentences — capture this commonsense knowledge.” The emergence of more capable AI models has necessitated new benchmarks capable of measuring their performance. To this end, Facebook AI Research, together with Google’s DeepMind, University of Washington, and New York University, earlier this month introduced SuperGLUE , the successor to the General Language Understanding Evaluation (GLUE) benchmark for language understanding.
It assigns systems numerical scores based on how well they perform in nine English sentence understanding challenges for natural language understanding systems, with a focus on tasks that have yet to be solved using state-of-the-art methods.
“Current question answering systems are focused on trivia-type questions, such as whether jellyfish have a brain. [SuperGLUE] goes further by requiring machines to elaborate with in-depth answers to open-ended questions, such as ‘How do jellyfish function without a brain?'” Facebook explained in a blog post.
Artificial general intelligence (AGI), or a system that can perform any intellectual task that a human can, remains more or less a pipe dream. But if models and methods at the cutting edge are anything to go by, we might find ourselves engaging in meaningful conversation with an AI assistant sooner rather than later.
As always, if you come across a story that merits coverage, send news tips to Khari Johnson and Kyle Wiggers — and be sure to bookmark our AI Channel and subscribe to the AI Weekly newsletter.
Thanks for reading, Kyle Wiggers AI staff writer VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"AI generates melodies from lyrics | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-generates-melodies-from-lyrics"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI generates melodies from lyrics Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Generating sequences of musical notes from lyrics might sound like the stuff of science fiction, but thanks to AI, it might someday become as commonplace as internet radio. In a paper published on the preprint server Arxiv.org (“ Conditional LSTM-GAN for Melody Generation from Lyrics “), researchers from the National Institute of Informatics in Tokyo describe a machine learning system that’s able to generate “lyrics-conditioned” melodies from learned relationships between syllables and notes.
“Melody generation from lyrics has been a challenging research issue in the field of artificial intelligence and music, which enables to learn and discover latent relationship between interesting lyrics and accompanying melody,” wrote the paper’s coauthors. “With the development of available lyrics and melody dataset and [AI], musical knowledge mining between lyrics and melody has gradually become possible.” As the researchers explain, notes have two musical attributes: pitch and duration. Pitches are perceptual properties of sounds that organize music by highness or lowness on a frequency-related scale, while duration represents the length of time that a pitch or tone is sounded. Syllables align with melodies in the MIDI files of music tracks; the columns within said files represent one syllable with its corresponding note, note duration, and rest.
The researchers’ AI system made use of the alignment data with a long-short-term memory (LSTM) network, a type of recurrent neural network capable of learning long-term dependencies, with a generative adversarial network (GAN), a two-part neural network consisting of generators that produce samples and discriminators that attempt to distinguish between the generated samples and real-world samples. The LSTM was trained to learn a joint embedding (mathematical representation) at the syllable and word levels to capture the synaptic structures of lyrics, while the GAN learned over time to predict melody when given lyrics while accounting for the relationship between lyrics and melody.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! To train it, the team compiled a data set consisting of 12,197 MIDI files, each paired with lyrics and melody alignment — 7,998 files from the open source LMD-full MIDI Dataset and 4,199 from a Reddit MIDI dataset — which they cut down to 20-note sequences. They took 20,934 unique syllables and 20,268 unique words from the LMD-full MIDI, and extracted the beats-per-minute (BPM) value for each MIDI file, after which they calculated note durations and rest durations.
Here’s one generated sample: And here’s another: After splitting the corpus into training, validation, and testing sets and feeding them into the model, the coauthors conducted a series of tests to determine how well it predicted melodies sequentially aligned with the lyrics, MIDI numbers, note duration, and rest duration. They report that their AI system not only outperformed a baseline model “in every respect,” but that it approximated well to the distribution of human-composed music. In a subjective evaluation during which volunteers were asked to rate the quality of 12 20-second melodies generated using the baseline method, the AI model, and ground truth, scores given to melodies generated by the proposed model were closer to those composed by humans than the baseline.
The researchers leave to future work synthesizing melodies with sketches of uncompleted lyrics and predicting lyrics when given melodies as a condition.
“Melody generation from lyrics in music and AI is still unexplored well [sic],” wrote the researchers. “Making use of deep learning techniques for melody generation is a very interesting research area, with the aim of understanding music creative activities of human.” AI might soon become an invaluable tool in musicians’ compositional arsenals, if recent developments are any indication. In July, Montreal-based startup Landr raised $26 million for a product that analyzes musical styles to create bespoke sets of audio processors, while OpenAI and Google earlier this year debuted online creation tools that tap music-generating algorithms. More recently, researchers at Sony investigated a machine learning model for conditional kick-drum track generation.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"After 5,000 games, Microsoft's Suphx AI can defeat top Mahjong players | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/after-5000-games-microsofts-suphx-ai-can-defeat-top-mahjong-players"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages After 5,000 games, Microsoft’s Suphx AI can defeat top Mahjong players Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Bolstered by algorithmic breakthroughs and an abundance of cheap computing power, AI has become a veritable games champion, notching wins against the world’s top-ranked players of chess, the Chinese board game Go, Montezuma’s Revenge, and countless others. In yet another victory for the machines this week, Microsoft detailed an AI system — Super Phoenix, or Suphx for short — capable of besting champions at Mahjong.
“For as long as researchers have studied AI, they have worked to build agents capable of accomplishing game missions,” said corporate vice president of Microsoft Asia Pacific R&D Group and MSR Asia Dr. Hsiao-Wuen Hon. “Mahjong is more complex than other board games, [so] playing becomes an art as well as a science. Good Mahjong players rely on a combination of observation, intuition, strategy, calculation, and chance that presents unique challenges for an AI system.” As Dr. Hon and colleagues explained further, Mahjong is what’s known as an imperfect information game, meaning a number of factors remain unknown to players throughout matches. For instance, they must account for opponents’ unseen tiles and decide whether to fold, leading to bluffs.
To overcome this, the team had Suphx play against thousands of people on Tenhou, a Japan-based global online Mahjong competition platform with more than 300,000 members, to self-learn common strategies. It soon developed its own play style and learned to balance attack and defense moves, strategically weighing short-term losses against long-term gains and making decisions with ambiguous data.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Suphx demonstrated expert-level play after 5,000 games over the course of four months, and it recently became the first AI system to compete at Tenhou’s 10th dan ranking, something only 180 humans have ever done.
Microsoft’s AI gains come after San Francisco-based OpenAI’s Dota 2 bot defeated 99.4% of players in public matches and a team of professional players twice, and after DeepMind’s AlphaStar AI swept StarCraft II pros in head-to-head match. Tencent’s Honor of Kings AI earlier this month beat a team of professional players. And beyond the video game arena, Facebook AI Research and Carnegie Mellon University in July detailed Pluribus , a poker-playing AI that Facebook claims is the first to best 15 human professionals in Texas Hold’em.
The advancements aren’t merely pushing forward game design. Rather, they’re informing the development of systems that might one day diagnose illnesses, predict complicated protein structures , and segment CT scans.
“[Our game-playing AI] is a stepping stone for us all the way to general AI,” Alphabet’s DeepMind cofounder Demis Hassabis told VentureBeat in a previous interview. “The reason we test ourselves and all these games is … that [they’re] a very convenient proving ground for us to develop our algorithms. … Ultimately, [we’re developing algorithms that can be] translate[ed] into the real world to work on really challenging problems … and help experts in those areas.” GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
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"Electronic Arts' core franchises delivered while Apex Legends reloaded | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/pc-gaming/electronic-arts-core-franchises-delivered-while-apex-legends-reloaded"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Electronic Arts’ core franchises delivered while Apex Legends reloaded Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Good boy.
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Electronic Arts had a strong first quarter of its fiscal 2020. The publisher generated $743 million in revenue, which beat Wall Street’s expectations.
That’s down less than 1% from $749 million during the same period last year.
EA’s share price is up around 3.5 percent in after-hours trading on that news.
EA’s positive results were due largely to the solid performance of its most familiar brands. The company noted that FIFA Ultimate Team had an in-game event that attracted 3 million daily active players.
Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes has nearly reached 80 million lifetime registrations. And The Sims 4 , meanwhile, saw a year-over-year increase of 55% for its expansion and game pack sales. This is all good news for EA, which is trying to generate regular, ongoing revenue from fewer new releases.
“We had a strong start to fiscal-year 2020, bringing rich new experiences to our growing communities for Apex Legends, EA Sports, The Sims, and more,” Electronic Arts chief executive officer Andrew Wilson said. “From great new games to live services with longevity, subscriptions on more platforms, and competitive gaming for more franchises, we’re pushing to lead with innovation, quality and choice for our players.” What about Apex Legends? While Wilson mentioned Apex Legends, the company’s quarterly report barely mentioned it. It did note that Respawn Entertainment launched its Season 2 on July 2. That will show up on the next financial disclosure.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! But this is likely good news for EA. If Season 2 is better at getting players to spend time and money on Apex Legends, the company could see some major growth during Q2. That is especially true if all of EA’s other games and services continue to chug along the way they did in Q1.
“We delivered operating results significantly above our expectations, driven by broad strength across our core franchises,” EA chief financial and operating officer Blake Jorgensen said. “This quarter shows how the power of our portfolio strategy, combined with live services, delivers strong results.” GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"EA: Apex Legends has 8-to-10 million players a week | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/pc-gaming/ea-apex-legends-has-8-to-10-million-players-a-week"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages EA: Apex Legends has 8-to-10 million players a week Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Apex Legends.
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Apex Legends may not have the 50 million monthly players that it launched with back in March, but it still has a huge audience. During a conference call with investors, publisher Electronic Arts confirmed that the battle royale shooter has 8 million-to-10 million weekly players.
It’s difficult to compare that to other games like Fortnite and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds , because that data is not publicly available. Regardless, Apex has a huge number of recurring fans showing up across PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. It also gives EA and developer Respawn Entertainment a lot of potential to generate revenue from the free-to-play game. And the publisher made it clear that it intends to do exactly that.
Respawn just launched Season 2 for Apex Legends in early July. It features improved progression to encourage more players to spend money. Now, EA is already talking about what’s next. EA chief executive officer Andrew Wilson confirmed Respawn is working on Season 3. And it’s “even bigger” than Season 2.
Ten years of Apex Legends Don’t expect Apex to come to an end any time soon, either.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! EA chief financial and operating officer Blake Jorgensen told an analyst that Apex Legends will continue operations for the next 10 years — maybe even longer. That’s not out of the ordinary for publishers like EA. It has had Star Wars: The Old Republic running for seven years already, for example.
But the publisher is also indicating that it has a lot of faith in both Respawn and the Apex Legends brand. It noted that it has other teams standing by to help Respawn build more content for the game as needed.
“We have a large team in DICE Los Angeles that can help with Apex if Respawn wants that,” said Jorgensen.
Apex is clearly EA’s new ace, so fans can likely expect a long-term relationship from the game if they want one.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
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"Verizon brings 5G to Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington D.C. | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/verizon-brings-5g-to-atlanta-detroit-indianapolis-and-washington-d-c"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Verizon brings 5G to Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington D.C.
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Verizon may have been the first to launch 5G home broadband in the United States , and one of the world’s first carriers to offer commercial mobile 5G to paying customers, but its early 5G networks have been limited in both cities and coverage. That’s improving somewhat today with the addition of four new mobile 5G cities : Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington D.C. are joining Chicago, Denver, Minneapolis, Providence, and Saint Paul, bringing the company’s 5G tally up to nine.
The new cities are going live with the same caveat as their predecessors: 5G service is being activated in “select areas” rather than blanketing everything, and the carrier says it’s available now “in and around public spaces,” including “parks, monuments, museums, college campuses, and stadiums.” While Verizon was recently accused by rival T-Mobile of being dead in the water without a 5G strategy, Verizon says it’s firing up 5G Ultra Wideband in “dense, urban areas where people tend to congregate,” suggesting that it too will blanket areas with a lower-bandwidth version of 5G to achieve true citywide coverage.
Based on the company’s list of supported areas, 5G coverage in Washington D.C. is fairly significant, with sites at numerous metro stops and tourist destinations across the district, plus hospitals and nearby Crystal City, Virginia. Atlanta, Detroit, and Indianapolis all have shorter lists of 5G zones, though the carrier says it will be expanding availability “in the months ahead” to reach more people and businesses.
Verizon’s 5G network is also backed by a respectable collection of supported devices. As of today, Verizon 5G access is available to users of Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G, LG’s V50 ThinQ 5G, Motorola’s Z3 or Z4 with the 5G Moto Mod, and Inseego’s MiFi M1000.
The carrier has promised that the current list of 5G cities will expand to more than 30 by the end of 2019, with some major destinations yet to be named. It has specifically said 5G is coming soon to Boston, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Dallas, Des Moines, Houston, Kansas City, Little Rock, Memphis, Phoenix, San Diego, and Salt Lake City. Customers can currently get unlimited 5G access for no additional charge with the company’s Beyond Unlimited and Above Unlimited data plans, which Verizon is calling a $10 monthly savings.
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"IDC: Smartphone shipments declined 2.3% in Q2 2019, Huawei beats Apple again | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/idc-smartphone-shipments-q2-2019"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages IDC: Smartphone shipments declined 2.3% in Q2 2019, Huawei beats Apple again Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Huawei has now beaten Apple in smartphone shipments for four out of the last five quarters.
In Q2 2018, Huawei overtook Apple , marking the first time in seven years that Samsung and Apple were not the top two smartphone makers.
Huawei maintained second place in Q3 2018 , Apple regained its silver spot in Q4 2018 , and Huawei won again in Q1 2019.
Today we learned that the Chinese company beat its U.S. counterpart again, in Q2 2019. (Samsung has held the top spot throughout.) Smartphone vendors shipped a total of 333.2 million smartphones worldwide in Q2 2019, down 2.3% from the 341.2 million units in Q2 2018. Of the top five, Samsung, Huawei, and Oppo shipped more units than the year before. The Q2 2019 figures come from IDC (though Strategy Analytics agrees that Huawei passed Apple again), which summarized its findings in the following chart: Samsung, Huawei, and Apple As you can see above, Samsung gained 1.7 points (from 21.0% to 22.7%) as it shipped 4.0 million more smartphones (75.5 million). Samsung typically owns about a fifth of the market, and that remains unchanged. The Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10+ did well, but because consumers are holding onto devices longer and opting for less expensive options, not well enough. Samsung’s A-series devices were able to pick up the slack.
Huawei gained 1.7 points, hitting 17.6% market share. The Chinese company once again increased the gap above Apple and closed in on Samsung — for the second quarter in a row it is closer to its Korean competitor than its American counterpart. Huawei is successfully dismantling the smartphone duopoly. Despite trade tensions, shipments were up by 4.5 million (though down 0.6% when compared to Q1 2019). The Huawei P30 and P30 Pro did well. Huawei’s high-end devices continue to find strong demand, as do its Honor models sold via online channels. In China especially, Huawei has a well-rounded portfolio targeting all segments.
Apple’s share, meanwhile, fell 2.0 points (from 12.1% to 10.1%), the lowest it has been since the year the iPhone debuted. Shipments were down by 7.5 million units (to 33.8 million) as wearables and services made up for the iPhone.
Competitors continue to eat away at Apple’s market share, and the company is moving too slowly on 5G , which is unlikely to change this year.
Chinese domination Xiaomi gained 0.2 points (to 9.7%), Oppo grew 0.3 points (to 8.9%), and Vivo was sixth, though IDC didn’t provide figures for the company. Xiaomi is incredibly close to passing Apple, but only in this quarter. Companies outside of the top five together lost 1.9 points.
Consumers are no longer as obsessed with upgrading to the latest and greatest smartphone. But when they do, or when first-time buyers join, they’re increasingly considering a Chinese company over Samsung or Apple.
“Despite a lot of uncertainty surrounding Huawei the company managed to hold its position at number two in terms of market share,” IDC program vice president Ryan Reith said in a statement. “When you look at the top of the market — Samsung, Huawei, and Apple — each vendor lost a bit of share from last quarter, and when you look down the list the next three — Xiaomi, OPPO, and vivo — all gained. Part of this is related to the timing of product launches, but it is hard not to assume this trend could continue.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Fitbit cuts 2019 revenue view, stock drops to record low | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/fitbit-cuts-2019-revenue-view-stock-drops-to-record-low"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Fitbit cuts 2019 revenue view, stock drops to record low Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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( Reuters ) — Wearable device maker Fitbit cut its 2019 revenue forecast on Wednesday, blaming disappointing sales of its newly launched cheapest smartwatch Versa Lite, sending its shares tumbling as much as 16% to a record low.
Fitbit in March launched Versa Lite , priced at $160, compared with the $200 the full version sells for. The watch, which can track workouts and heart rate, lacks features such as the ability to store music directly.
“While Versa Lite received good present consumer reviews, we saw that consumers were willing to pay more for a smartwatch with additional features or look for discounting versus everyday value,” Chief Executive Officer James Park said during a post earnings call with analysts.
The company had moved into the smartwatch market to cushion the hit from slowing growth of its popular colorful fitness trackers, but has faced tough competition from deeper-pocket companies such as Apple and Samsung.
Smartwatch revenue decreased 27% year-over-year in the second quarter.
On the call, Chief Financial Officer Ron Kisling also said the company anticipates burning cash in the first three quarters before generating cash in the fourth.
Fitbit lowered its 2019 revenue forecast to between $1.43 billion and $1.48 billion, compared with its prior expectations of $1.52 billion to $1.58 billion.
The disappointing performance of Versa Lite suggests the overall health of the business is not as strong as we had thought, DA Davidson analyst Thomas Forte said.
Versa Lite also weighed on average selling price, which fell 19% to $86 per device and missed Wall Street expectations of $91, according to research firm FactSet.
Some analysts also pointed to the weak performance of the company’s health business – widely seen as a growth driver – that connects users with doctors, hospitals, and lifestyle coaches.
Fitbit has been partnering with health insurers and making tuck-in acquisitions in the healthcare market as part of efforts to diversify its revenue stream.
Wedbush Securities analyst Alicia Reese said the 16% growth in the business during the second quarter was underwhelming and investors would want to see more if the segment is the major growth driver for Fitbit.
The business reported a 70% growth in the preceding quarter to post revenue of $30.5 million.
Fitbit estimated revenue of between $335 million and $355 million for the third quarter, below analysts’ average estimate of $399.4 million, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
The company also forecast an adjusted loss of between 9 cents and 11 cents per share. Analysts were expecting a profit of 2 cents per share.
Excluding items, the company lost 14 cents per share in the second quarter ended June 30, smaller than estimates of 18 cents loss.
Revenue rose about 5% to $313.6 million, beating analysts’ average estimates of $312 million.
The company’s shares have fallen 15.5% this year to Wednesday’s close.
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"Apple's Q3 2019 earnings call: Wearables and Services make up for the iPhone | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/apples-q3-2019-earnings-call-wearables-and-services-make-up-for-the-iphone"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Apple’s Q3 2019 earnings call: Wearables and Services make up for the iPhone Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Tim Cook at WWDC 2019 Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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After releasing third-quarter 2019 financial results today , Apple CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri hosted their quarterly live question-and-answer session for financial analysts. We covered the session live, with updates below in chronological order as the call proceeds.
Today’s Q&A comes after Apple disclosed largely expected results, including a 1% improvement in overall revenues — enough to just barely qualify as a record quarter — with continued declines in iPhone sales, offset by growth in Services and Wearables revenues.
Tim Cook: Prepared remarks Cook opened the call by discussing the company’s return to growth in the quarter, led by improving Wearable and Services sales, which are collectively approaching the size of a Fortune 50 company. Services are looking strong: Apple is now aggregating TV content from numerous providers, and the company’s Apple TV Channel service is poised to continue growing as customers respond well to over-the-top TV services. Apple Pay is also growing — expanding into transit systems and ride-hailing providers and moving into more countries. Apple Card will begin to roll out in August.
Apple Watch demand continues to be excellent, as is demand for AirPods, making the Wearable business very strong. This was the third consecutive quarter of growth for the iPad, buoyed by sales of the new iPad Air and iPad mini. And the Mac grew due to MacBook Pro and MacBook Air introductions, with a “killer” $999 MacBook Air. Apple’s also looking forward to debuting the most powerful Mac ever, the Mac Pro (with Pro Display XDR) in the Fall.
Sales in Greater China returned to growth in constant currency. The iPhone business saw improvements in year-over-year numbers, thanks in part to consumer responses to trade-in deals, as well as government incentives. App Store sales have also been strong.
The Intel smartphone modem acquisition is in furtherance of Apple’s strategy, enunciated under Steve Jobs, to own and control the key technologies it uses in its products. Apple plans to welcome the Intel engineering team into the company, as the largest collection of people and second-largest acquisition by dollars, in the company’s history.
As debuted during WWDC, Apple’s new operating systems will bring plenty of new features to iPhones, iPads, Apple TVs, Apple Watches, and Macs. In particular, macOS Catalina’s new Catalyst feature will enable iPad apps to arrive for the Mac ecosystem, and the company expects many of them to be available when Catalina ships in the fall. The company is also enthusiastic about AR technologies introduced at WWDC, including ARKit 3 and Reality Composer.
Luca Maestri: Prepared remarks Apple CFO Luca Maestri noted that the company returned to growth despite challenging exchange rates, and all geographic segments grew in constant currency. The small percentage basis growth seen during this quarter was an improvement over declines earlier in the year, and records were set in a number of countries. Apple expects continued improvements in revenue for the next quarter despite $1 billion in currency headwinds.
The latest survey of consumers shows U.S. iPhone customer satisfaction at 99% for the iPhone XR, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max combined. Additionally, the Wearables business is now the size of a Fortune 200 company on its own.
Services revenue grew by double digits across all territories and now represents over 21% of the company’s revenues. There are now over 420 million paid subscriptions, and the company believes it will surpass the 500 million mark in 2020, without depending more than 0.25% on any single app for the resultant revenue.
While Mac numbers were up a little, that was notably during a time of continued declines for the PC industry as a whole, and nearly half of buyers were new to the Mac platform. The iPad was up a bit and has a 94% customer satisfaction rating, with continued interest from a strong majority of business buyers interested in buying tablets; 60% of the biggest banks are supporting the iPad internally and are developing software to radically cut customer onboarding — in one case from an hour down to 12 minutes.
Q&A What gives you the confidence in a strong September quarter? Maestri says there will likely be continued strong growth in non-iPhone categories, including Wearables and Services.
What’s driving renewed success in China? Cook says that government stimulus/VAT reduction, pricing actions, iPhone trade-in programs, and growing engagement with the broader Apple ecosystem collectively helped boost everything in China.
Any additional detail on linearity, specifically app deterioration in China in June? Cook adds that the company looks at linearity in detail but doesn’t say what it has concluded.
What’s happening in Services? Could this reaccelerate? Maestri says the installed base continues to grow in every geography and all major product categories, which is important for the Services business. There are two interesting factors: the App Store had sequential acceleration of growth, including in China, where game titles were approved by the government, but AppleCare growth decelerated due to expected factors, including real strength from additional AppleCare retailers last year that might be hard to match. Subscriptions are on the uptick, new services are launching soon, and between Apple Card, Apple Arcade, and Apple TV+, there will be continued momentum in Services.
Maestri adds that Apple News+ is available right now, and TV Channels as well. The new services will have different trial periods, and the roads to monetization will take time.
How successful was the iPhone trade-in program? Cook says it was quite successful in retail, and trade-in as a percentage of total sales is significant, with financing a key element of it. Between retail and online, it collectively led to growth in June, he says. The company is advocating the use of trade-ins more widely with carrier partners and retail partners.
Cook adds in response to a separate question that customers are holding onto phones longer, but Apple is still expanding its customer base. In addition to customers who buy new phones, and customers who keep using old phones, there’s also the secondary (resale/refurb) market as a way to reach customers Apple doesn’t reach in another way.
Three to five years from now, will Services still be tethered to the iPhone’s growth, or be separate from the hardware install base? Cook says there are elements today not tethered to the iPhone, such as products that work with Android or Apple TV. Apple has the strongest hardware portfolio ever, with new products on the way, and has loyal customers and switchers supporting the company. On the market side, there are emerging markets with low penetration, but there’s been some bounce back in India and Brazil; there are new opportunities with things like augmented reality.
What’s the long-term situation on China, given tariff situations and trade and manufacturing? Cook says the vast majority of Apple products are “kind of made everywhere,” including content from the U.S., Korea, Japan, China, and the EU. That’s the nature of a global supply chain and will continue to be the case in the future. But Apple is currently investing in a way to keep making the Mac Pro in the United States, he suggests — a surprise, given that the company reportedly had major problems making the prior version here.
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"Apple reports record Q3 2019 revenue of $53.8 billion, led by services | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/apple-reports-record-q3-2019-revenue-of-53-8-billion-led-by-services"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Apple reports record Q3 2019 revenue of $53.8 billion, led by services Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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The first two fiscal quarters of 2019 were disappointing for both Apple and investors, thanks to a historic holiday season shortfall and a subsequent year-over-year second quarter decline.
Today, Apple announced its fiscal third quarter 2019 results, including revenues of $53.8 billion — just enough to be a company record, though the number is up only 1% compared with last year, roughly flat with the year-ago quarter.
Analysts had estimated revenues of $53.3 billion, centered within Apple’s guidance range of $52.5 to $54.5 billion, and all but identical compared with last year’s $53.265 billion third quarter.
Apple had also projected gross margins of 37%-38% and operating expenses of 8.7-8.8% for the quarter.
For the quarter, Apple is listing net sales for the iPhone of $25.986 billion, versus Mac sales of $5.82 billion, iPad sales of $5.023 billion, “wearables, home and accessories” sales of $5.525 billion, and services sales of $11.455 billion. That’s down sharply for the iPhone from last year’s $29.47 billion, but up for the Mac ($5.258 billion), iPad ($4.634 billion), and other products ($3.733 billion), with a nice bump from last year’s $10.17 biilion for services.
As for regional distributions, net sales were down from $12.14 billion to $11.925 billion in Europe, and down from $9.55 billion to $9.157 billion in Greater China. These shortfalls were offset by a slightly improvement in the Americas, which grew to $25.056 billion from last year’s $24.5 billion of total revenues, as well as Japan (up to $4.082 billion from $3.87 billion) and the Asia Pacific region (up to $3.589 billion from $3.17 billion).
After becoming the first U.S. company to do so, Apple has exceeded $1 trillion in market capitalization briefly in both 2018 and 2019, but spent much of the year under the historic number. It jolted investors by stopping device unit sales reporting at the end of 2018, as iPhone, iPad, and Mac shipments all appeared to have flattened out. Instead, the company pointed investors to its total product line revenues, including increasingly popular wearables, and growing services revenues from subscriptions, Apple Pay, and Apple Music.
To that end, services revenue was up 16% in the second quarter, which ended just after the rollout of Apple News+ , and before the releases of three new services, Apple Card , Apple Arcade , and Apple TV+.
But the launch of Apple News+ disappointed both publishers and early adopters, and was not expected to contribute materially to any services revenue growth. Even so, services revenue was up nearly 13% for the third quarter, a particularly bright spot alongside wearables, which increased roughly 48% over last year’s levels.
iPhone sales are a continued sore spot for the company. They slowed in late 2018 as the company increased the prices of its flagship iPhones, starting the iPhone XR at $749 and adding the iPhone XS Max at $1,099, numbers that made the devices all but unaffordable in developing markets.
Customers also began to hold onto their iPhones longer, in part due to a discounted battery replacement program Apple implemented during 2018. However, Apple CEO Tim Cook appears to be unconcerned about the slowdown.
“This was our biggest June quarter ever — driven by all-time record revenue from Services, accelerating growth from Wearables, strong performance from iPad and Mac and significant improvement in iPhone trends,” Cook said. “These results are promising across all our geographic segments, and we’re confident about what’s ahead. The balance of calendar 2019 will be an exciting period, with major launches on all of our platforms, new services and several new products.” For the fourth quarter, Apple is predicting revenue between $61 and $64 billion, gross margin between 37.5% and 38.5%, operating expenses between $8.7 and $8.8 billion, $200 million of other income, and a tax rate of 16.5%. The company is also issuing a $0.77 per share cash dividend, payable August 15, 2019 to shareholders on record as of August 12, 2019.
Further details on the results will be forthcoming in a quarterly earnings call, which we’ll be covering live.
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"App developer Lightricks raises $135 million at a $1 billion valuation | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/app-developer-lightricks-raises-135-million-at-a-1-billion-valuation"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages App developer Lightricks raises $135 million at a $1 billion valuation Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Despite concerns about saturation, the mobile app market shows no sign of slowing down. The Google Play Store and Apple App Store boasted 2.6 million apps and 2.2 million apps, respectively, as of Q1 2019. App Annie reports that the total number of downloads in 2018 hit 194 billion, up from 178 billion the year prior, while consumer spend in Q2 2018 ticked up 20% year-over-year. And if the current trend holds, overall app spending is anticipated to grow 120% to reach $156 billion worldwide by 2023.
Jerusalem-based Lightricks — the developer behind subscription-based content creation apps Facetune and Enlight — has successfully ridden the wave to unprecedented success. Fresh off a $60 million round in November 2018, the startup today announced that it’s secured $135 million in series C funding at a $1 billion valuation led by Goldman Sachs, with participation from Insight Partners and ClalTech.
The capital infusion brings Lightricks’ total raised to $205 million to date, and it’ll see Goldman Sachs Private Capital Investing’s Kirk Lepke join the board of directors.
Above: Lightricks’ Enlight Photofox app.
Founder and CEO Zeev Farbman says the round will accelerate AI-enhanced tool development, lay the groundwork for strategic acquisitions, and furnish a third office in Germany. (The bulk of Lightricks’s 250-employee workforce is currently concentrated in Israel and London.) VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! “We’re excited to reach this milestone, but we’re just getting started on our mission to create fun and powerful tools that reimagine the way content is created all over the world,” said Farbman. “As we accelerate our expansion, the additional funding will cement our position as the leader in mass-market content creation, which is proving to be a multi-billion dollar industry.” Lightricks — the brainchild of PhD students Nir Pochter, Yaron Inger, Zeev Farbman, Amit Goldstein, and former Supreme Court of Israel clerk Itai Tsiddon, who cofounded the company in 2013 — focuses the majority of its R&D on computational photography techniques. However, it also maintains a mobile advertising platform that taps algorithms to predict the spend required to secure spots on best-selling app lists.
Above: Facetune 2.0 from Lightricks.
Facetune 2, which debuted in November 2016, leverages AI to let users fine-tune selfies by adjusting their proportions and manipulating lighting. Its augmented reality component enables them to preview and apply real-time effects like teeth whitening, blemish removal, and skin smoothing.
Lightricks’ five-app Enlight suite is a bit broader in scope. Photofox features a layers system with blending modes, opacity controls, fills, transformations, fonts, graphic elements, brushes, tonal adjustments, and presets. Videoleap, a basic non-linear video editor, lets users composite two video streams together, apply translucency and other effects, and insert text. Quickshot features a collection of “handcrafted” filters, like HDR+ and color autocorrection tools, while Pixaloop allows editors to animate parts of photos with customizable movement and overlay controls. Lastly, Swish lets business owners quickly create video ads with specially crafted templates and stock music.
All of Lightricks’ apps are available for free, but the company offers in-app paid subscription plans that unlock functionality. (One example is Enlight Photofox’s Darkroom, a premium editing mode with tonal controls and tuneable film filters.) Facetune makes available individual features for purchase, but additionally offers an all-you-can-eat subscription that guarantees access to future content.
Lightricks made the leap from a one-time payment model to subscriptions in 2015, and it’s seemingly done wonders for business. The startup is profitable, with 3 million paying subscribers and 180 million downloads worldwide, and Farbman says revenue has tripled each year over the past three years. (He previously said he expects revenue will exceed $100 million this year.) The accolades haven’t hurt. Enlight was Apple’s App of the Year for 2015, the eleventh best-selling paid iOS app in 2016, and the recipient of an Apple Design Award in 2017.
“We have been very impressed with Lightricks’ exceptional growth trajectory, outstanding technology and talented management team,” said Goldman Sachs Private Capital Investing managing director Christian Resch. “Lightricks is a great fit within our strategy of supporting best-in-class technology entrepreneurs in their ambition to build global category leaders in large markets.” Insight Partners’ board member Harley Miller added, “We are firm believers in Lightricks’ vision to bring content creation to everyone. Since last year, the company has tripled revenues, released several new innovative products, and opened a third international office. We believe that Lightricks is solidifying its standing as the category-defining, clear market leader.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Tobii Spotlight's foveated rendering can cut VR graphics load by 57% | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/tobii-spotlight-uses-foveated-rendering-to-cut-vr-graphics-load-by-57"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Tobii Spotlight’s foveated rendering can cut VR graphics load by 57% Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Tobii’s gaze-tracking hardware for VR headsets is getting some serious software enhancements, the company announced today, in the form of full support for foveated rendering — with “even more foveated-related capabilities and benefits moving forward.” The features are being offered as Tobii Spotlight Technology, with significant initial rendering performance benefits.
Foveated rendering is an advanced technology that uses your eye’s position to create a particularly sharp focus point for a GPU to concentrate more of its resources upon, while areas outside that point can be rendered at lower detail levels. In order for the feature to work, the eye’s position needs to be tracked — Tobii’s specialty — and the software needs to have both designated “in focus” and “out of focus” areas, with a rendering pipeline to differentially tackle those areas.
Tobii has worked with Nvidia to achieve variable rate shading foveation in Tobii Spotlight, and says that it’s already seeing GPU rendering load reductions of 57%, bringing the average shading rate using dynamic foveated rendering down to 16% from around 24%. This frees up GPU resources for other purposes, such as boosting frame rates or conserving power, and Tobii expects that it will be used in the future to transfer and stream data that’s been dynamically optimized for the user’s current visual focus, including over low-latency 5G networks.
“Tobii Spotlight Technology is advanced eye tracking specialized for foveation,” said Tobii CEO Henrik Eskilsson. “Tobii Spotlight Technology directly addresses the ever-increasing demand for computational efficiency. Working with our partners to enable foveated rendering is just the beginning, and Tobii Spotlight Technology reflects our ongoing commitment to innovation in this area for years to come.” Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! The higher the resolution of the headset, the better the dynamic rendering works compared with fixed rendering, which would otherwise need to fill every pixel of a high-res frame with full detail. Initial results are coming from a Vive Pro Eye headset with Tobii gaze tracking hardware, plus an Nvidia RTX 2070 , but the company expects that the dynamic foveated rendering will be able to keep shading manageable even when headset pixel counts reach or exceed 15K (compared with current 2K, 3K, 5K, and 8K models).
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Super Nintendo World will be the cornerstone of Universal's third Orlando theme park | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/super-nintendo-world-will-be-the-cornerstone-of-universals-third-orlando-theme-park"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Super Nintendo World will be the cornerstone of Universal’s third Orlando theme park Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Super Nintendo World.
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Tomorrow, Universal will announce its third theme park for its Orlando, Florida resort. According to rumors from theme park news sites like Orlando ParkStop , this will be home to Super Nintendo World , a land based on the beloved video game company.
Although this park hasn’t been announced, it has been the subject of rumors and leaks for years ( Update, August 1 8:20 a.m. Pacific: Universal has announced the project ).
Universal is already building the property and has been clearing land for months. Right now, Universal Orlando consists of two theme parks, a water park, a shopping district, and six hotels. This new project will encourage guests to book longer visits to the resort.
Fantastic Worlds was once the rumored name for this park according to sources like Orlando ParkStop and theme park journalist Jim Hill , although an objection from Warner Bros. (who owns the Harry Potter film franchise along with the Fantastic Beasts subseries) forced Universal to switch to Epic Universe as a moniker. This park will have a similar structure to Universal’s second Orlando theme park, Islands of Adventure. Each land will represent some kind of popular media franchise. Other rumored areas for Epic Universe includes sections based on Fantastic Beasts , How to Train Your Dragon , and classic Universal monsters like Frankenstein, the Mummy, and Dracula.
But Super Nintendo World will be the highlight of this new park. Universal and Nintendo announced their partnership to create theme park attractions based on Nintendo’s popular gaming franchises in 2016. This includes expansions at the existing Universal theme parks in Osaka, Japan and Hollywood.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! However, while those versions will have one or two Nintendo attractions, the Super Nintendo World in the new Orlando theme park could be the biggest of them all and host three rides.
This is kind of a big deal.
pic.twitter.com/boxonV1uJF — Universal Orlando Resort (@UniversalORL) July 29, 2019 Nintendo takes Orlando “It’s strongly believed that the brand new theme park will open with Super Nintendo World, including the Mario Kart ride, Yoshi’s Adventure family ride, and Donkey Kong’s Mine Cart Madness roller coaster,” Alicia Stella of Orlando ParkStop told GamesBeat.
Stella and her site have been at the head of many of the rumors and leaks concerning Universal’s new park. Her research includes the discovery of the trademark filings for both Fantastic Worlds and Epic Universe. She believes that Super Nintendo World will be the cornerstone of Universal’s Orlando expansion.
“The Nintendo area is expected to be the most important for the new park, and I expect it will be utilized heavily in marketing going forward,” Stella noted.
The Unofficial Universal Orlando Podcast posted pictures of a supposed model for Super Nintendo World earlier this month. We have asked Universal if these models are real and will update this story if it responds. The diorama includes Bowser’s Castle, which will serve as the entrance for the Mario Kart ride. You can also see a parade of Yoshi characters marching along the hills of the land. These represent the ride vehicles for the family-friendly Yoshi attraction.
Above: A model of Super Nintendo World.
Another image shows off the Donkey Kong Country-themed area of the land. This includes a roller coaster that will simulate the series’ mine train levels, including the illusion of jumping broken sections of the track.
Above: A model of the Donkey Kong Country section of Super Nintendo World.
Universal’s original plans for Nintendo in Orlando were much smaller. Like in Japan and Hollywood, it would have just created a smaller-scale Super Nintendo World inside the original theme park, Universal Studios Orlando. Moving it to the new park and its untouched land allows for a larger plan.
A plumber to beat a mouse Universal is in an IP war with Disney, its chief competitor in the theme park market. Universal was always a distant second, but its introduction of Harry Potter-themed offerings in 2010 helped close the gap. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter changed how both companies approach theme park expansions. Both used to more often use a franchise as the inspiration for a single ride. Now an IP is used to create a comprehensive land of connected rides, shops, and dining. These are theme parks within a theme park. Disney has so far countered Harry Potter with new lands based on Avatar, Toy Story, and Star Wars.
But Universal may have found an IP coup with Nintendo. Video games have become a cross-generational hobby, and characters like Mario are as beloved as any cartoon or film character. Disney has long suffered in its attempts to enter the gaming market and doesn’t have anything that it could easily use to counter Nintendo.
“I will tell you flat out that the Nintendo park worries Disney, because they just don’t have — you can respond to a Harry Potter with a Star Wars,” theme park journalist Jim Hill told GamesBeat last year as we were researching a story on the Millennium Falcon ride that opened with the new Star Wars land, Galaxy’s Edge. “But the thing is, what worries Disney is this generation of gamers who now have kids that they themselves game with. When Fantastic Worlds opens in Orlando, how do you respond to that if you’re Disney?” Above: Disney invested heavily into a new Star Wars land at both Disneyland and Walt Disney World.
If Disney wants to compete, it will have to do what Universal did and make a deal with a popular gaming company. But no other publisher has access to as many beloved franchises and characters as Nintendo. In fact, Universal’s plans for Nintendo in its theme parks could extend outside of the three rides we talked about.
“Universal has lots of ideas for more attractions based on several other Nintendo properties, but they are hesitant to green-light them until after waiting to see how the initial Nintendo lands perform in Japan next year, and in Hollywood soon after,” Stella told GamesBeat. “Rumors for additional rides or lands include everything from Pokémon and Zelda, to Super Smash Bros. and Kirby. While the Universal Orlando Resort has the most space available for new additions like these, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the land in Japan’s park get an addition like these sometime in the next few years as well.” Plans for theme parks often change (the iconic Haunter Mansion ride was once envisioned as a walk-through attraction, for example), and we won’t know what exactly Universal will be revealing tomorrow until it makes its announcement. But Nintendo will be a huge part of Universal’s future, and it could be the next Harry Potter-sized step toward surpassing Disney.
Update, August 1 8:20 a.m. Pacific: Universal has confirmed the park, which will be called Epic Universe. Although the announcement was short on details, Universal did reveal concept art that shows Super Nintendo World (both the Mushroom Kingdom and Donkey Kong Country areas) as part of the complex. Alicia Stella took the art and labeled what it shows.
The worlds of Universal's Epic Universe pic.twitter.com/yhpUMnMP29 — Alicia Stella (@AliciaStella) August 1, 2019 You can also see the rumored lands for the classic Universal monsters, Fantastic Beasts , and How to Train Your Dragon.
Update, August 1 8:20 a.m. with details from announcement, confirming much of this report.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"The tokenization of securities is happening right now and no one is noticing | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/commerce/the-tokenization-of-securities-is-happening-right-now-and-no-one-is-noticing"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest The tokenization of securities is happening right now and no one is noticing Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
On July 10, the SEC officially cleared blockchain startup Blockstack to hold the first regulated security token offering under Reg A+ crowdfunding rules.
This means that after years of back-and-forth with the SEC, Blockstack now has the regulatory green light to raise $28 million by selling Bitcoin-like, tokenized (digital asset) securities to the public, the first compliant offering of this kind. Influencer live-streaming app YouNow announced just a day later that it had received a similar approval for its Props utility token under the same Reg A+ structure.
Crypto skeptics and enthusiasts alike have long questioned what the first mainstream use case of blockchain and cryptocurrency technology would be outside of speculation and trading. Well, here it is. The tokenization of formerly private, illiquid securities will be the first widespread use case for blockchain. It has the potential to democratize investment opportunities at a global scale and reduce capital friction on many levels. This new mechanism for fundraising, investment, and value transfer will bring about a Cambrian explosion of entrepreneurial and economic growth.
A look at the past Private assets, such as the equity of popular startup companies like Uber or Airbnb, have historically only been available to venture capitalists, private equity groups, and other high net worth individuals at an early stage of the company’s life. These types of investments are inherently risky. However, they account for an immense amount of value creation when the startup succeeds.
The idea of making these types of private securities and assets available for the public to participate in is not a new idea.
Crowdfunding regulation passed in 2016 made it legal for startups to open up funding events to anyone, reducing the time, resources, and connections usually needed to raise funds from venture capitalists, angel investors, or wealthy friends and family.
As a result of that regulation , numerous crowdfunding platforms have sprung up — platforms like SeedInvest , MicroVentures , and others — that allow almost anyone to buy an equity stake in an early stage startup. And these platforms have grown quickly.
However, there are still snags with these platforms. The biggest being that these investments are still incredibly illiquid. If you were to invest your money in a young company through one of these platforms, that investment is, at most times, completely tied up until there is a liquidity event like an acquisition or an IPO. This is not ideal for many everyday investors who do not have the flexibility to let money sit idly for years, if not decades. There is no easy way for me to sell my shares in a private company like Uber after I’ve made my investment. I can’t easily transfer ownership of my shares to a new, willing investor. There is no secondary exchange. There is no liquidity.
Enter digital securities Blockchains and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin have facilitated an enormous amount of creativity amongst entrepreneurs when it comes to capital structure and ownership. When Ethereum launched in 2015, Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) quickly became a hot new way to raise money for startups — however the vast majority did not comply with securities laws. Still, this new form of financing cracked the door open to the idea of using blockchains to offer digital securities that could represent an ownership stake in a real-world asset and simultaneously be as easily transferable as cryptocurrency.
If you could compliantly raise money for a venture by issuing a digital asset security — or token — you could potentially solve the liquidity problem that has plagued equity crowdfunding to date, as the digital asset would be easily transferable from one owner to another. Unfortunately, there has been no way to offer a regulatory approved digital security … that is until this month.
The SEC’s official clearance of both Blockstack and YouNow to hold regulated token offering under Reg A+ on July 10 was an enormous win. It offers a clear path for other companies that want to issue their own digital securities. We will see an enormous number of companies now raise money by offering tokenized securities in months and years to come.
These digital assets will give everyday investors the opportunity to invest in early stage companies and other assets at a global scale. In addition, these digital assets now solve for the pain point that has plagued non-tokenized crowdfunding, as they will have liquidity built-in due to how they are structured on a blockchain.
Investors can exit these investments without friction, whenever they want by selling them on secondary markets facilitated through broker-dealers, alternative trading systems, and exchanges that are built to handle blockchain transactions. Prior to blockchain and cryptocurrency, this liquidity was not possible.
The big opportunity It’s clear that a massive market opportunity exists for the platforms that will be conducting the issuing, buying, and selling of these future digital securities.
The startups chasing this opportunity are practically tripping over each other trying to be the first to market. OpenFinance, Long Term Stock Exchange, and Vertalo are among those competing to become this platform. It’s a competitive race, and it’s heating up quickly.
Further proof of the intensity of this race comes with Circle’s acquisition of SeedInvest earlier this year. Circle operates popular cryptocurrency exchanges like Poloniex, and with this acquisition it owns a very popular equity crowdfunding platform.
In the not-so-distant future, the winner of this race will look like the NYSE and NASDAQ of today except much bigger, as it will eventually offer almost every single type of digital asset — not just public company securities like the NYSE and NASDAQ.
I don’t think it’s far fetched to believe that many different types of assets will eventually become tokenized in the future. Real estate, home equity loans, startup companies, commodities, funds, and funds of funds all have the potential to be offered as a digital security to reduce the capital friction associated with investing and taking ownership of assets.
This wave of digital securities will create an explosion of economic growth. It will simultaneously allow entrepreneurs and businesses to raise and transfer capital faster, while also giving everyday people access to what used to be untouchable investments.
Many new business models will be born to further serve and capitalize on this new industry, and it’s almost impossible today to predict the impact digital securities will have on the global economy — just as it would have been almost impossible to predict the impact the internet would have on the world in the ’90s.
Given the significance of this moment, it’s surprising to me that so few people outside of the crypto community seem to be taking notice. We’ve seen a number of stock exchanges experiment with blockchain and crypto assets.
Other financial service providers like JP Morgan have been developing in the space. But will the stalwarts of traditional finance really be ready to move quickly enough to adapt to the coming change? The risks of ignoring these technologies and these early market movements are substantial. Clayton Christenson lays it out in his business classic, The Innovator’s Dilemma.
Large companies fail when they ignore what appear at the time to be insignificant markets. However, when these markets turn out to be fueled by transformational technology, a flippening happens: Consumer adoption occurs at an exponential rate, and the large companies that were ignoring these once small markets seal their fate.
How quickly will this month’s SEC decision trigger large-scale economic change? We will have to wait and see.
David Kemmerer is CEO and Co-Founder of CryptoTrader.Tax , a cryptocurrency-focused tax platform.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Zynga found its footing in mobile, and now it's finding big growth | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/zynga-mobile-growth"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Zynga found its footing in mobile, and now it’s finding big growth Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Portrait and lifestyle shoot at Zynga's headquarters, San Francisco, CA, April 24-25, 2019. Pictured: a Zynga sketch artist in the Words With Friends department.
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Zynga is once again one of the fastest-growing game developers. The studio saw its revenue jump to $306 million during the second quarter of its fiscal 2020. That’s up 41% year-over-year. The company also had bookings of $376 million, which is up 61% compared to the same quarter from its fiscal 2019. While the studio was once known for social-network games like FarmVille on Facebook, it has spent the last half decade attempting to shift to mobile. That transition is now over. Zynga now generates 95% of its revenue from mobile.
Both Zynga’s revenues and bookings were ahead of Wall Street estimates, and the stock is up around 1 percent in after-hours training. Investors are likely pleased to see that the developer has a lot of diversity in its strategy in the moment.
Empires & Puzzles and Merge Dragons both hit record revenues during Q2. The long-running hit Words With Friends had its best Q2 for mobile revenue and bookings ever. And other familiar Zynga brands, like CSR2, Zynga Poker, and Hit It Rich Slots are all growing as well.
“We put together a pretty strong Q2,” Zynga chief executive Frank Gibeau told GamesBeat. “We delivered ahead of guidance and saw a very strong uptick in our bookings — 61% year-over-year. It was the best mobile-bookings quarter we’ve ever had. We’re starting to see really nice cash flow. We generated $99 million in the quarter, which is the best Zynga has seen since 2011. It’s up 140% year-over-year. We were able to raise our annual guidance based on the momentum we’ve had in live services.” As for its earnings, Zynga recorded a net loss of $56 million. That was ahead of its guidance of a $70 million loss. And with the company is pointing to its strong cash flow and significant revenue growth as evidence for its future profitability. For Q3, it is expecting to see a net income of $250 million, but that includes $305 million from the recent sale of its San Francisco headquarters.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! The secret to Zynga’s growth Zynga’s revenue growth is significant and impressive. And if you’re looking for the reason why it’s happening, Gibeau will cite the company’s live-service strategy.
“The live services component of our business is really humming,” Gibeau told GamesBeat. “We’re seeing record performances from all the forever-franchises like Words With Friends and Zynga Poker. That’s the foundation of our success: investing in these ongoing franchises and growing them globally.” Empires & Puzzles is benefiting from that more than any other game. Zynga tries to update it weekly with new content or in-game events, and that keeps players engaged and interacting with their friends. Empires & Puzzles accounted for $84 million of the company’s $310 million in online game bookings.
To compound that growth, Zynga is looking at multiple paths forward. It wants to create more of these “forever franchises.” These are games that don’t just come and go. Instead, they come and then they stick around for years. The studio already has multiple releases like that with Zynga Poker and Words With Friends. But it believes it needs more. That is why it recently launched FarmVille 3.
Additionally, the studio is working with more big intellectual properties. It just launched Game of Thrones Slots. And it also has games based on Star Wars and Harry Potter in the works.
Zynga is also on the lookout for new acquisitions. The company recently sold its headquarters in the hot S.F. real-estate market. That should give it some cash should it wish to move forward with bringing in any new studios or IP.
Zynga in Asia But one of the biggest potential growth opportunities for Zynga is in the numerous and significant Asian markets. The company has focused its efforts for years on Europe and the Americas. When it did launch games in Asia, it didn’t put a lot of direct effort into growing in those regions. But it’s trying to change that now.
“We’ve officially entered Asia,” Gibeau said. “We’ve had games out in Asia before, but now we’ve gone to a self-publishing model in South Korea and Japan with Empires & Puzzles. And it’s doing very well. In fact, it’s doing well enough that we’re going to turn on some marketing to start to grow out our business in Asia.” China, South Korea, and Japan are among the biggest markets in the world for mobile gaming. While Zynga’s growth is impressive, it is potentially leaving a lot of money on the table if it’s not finding ways to capitalize on those territories.
“For us to be able to open that market is very exciting,” said Gibeau.
The executive also noted that the company plans to be very global when it launches games based on popular brands like Star Wars and Harry Potter.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
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"Ubisoft acquires 70% stake in Green Panda Games, bolstering its hyper-casual stable | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/ubisoft-acquires-70-stake-in-green-panda-games-bolstering-its-hyper-casual-stable"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Ubisoft acquires 70% stake in Green Panda Games, bolstering its hyper-casual stable Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Green Panda Games' stable is all about hyper-casual mobile titles.
Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Ubisoft Entertainment has a strong presence in PC, console , and mobile games — but it doesn’t have a lot of representation in a growing segment inside the smartphone market, hyper-casual games , outside of Ketchapp, which it acquired in 2016.
Today, the French publisher flexed its hyper-casual muscle by acquiring a 70% stake in Green Panda Games , which makes games like Bee Factory and Golf Orbit and has over 78 million downloads, estimates mobile intelligence firm Sensor Tower.
This is Ubisoft’s second deal with a hyper-casual studio. The only terms that Ubisoft released is that it has the option to acquire the other 30% of the studio.
Market research firm Newzoo reported in June that it estimates that mobile gaming will hit $68.5 billion this year , and hyper-casual is a thriving segment inside that market. Eighty percent of that comes from smartphone games — where hyper-casual is at its strongest.
Green Panda’s most downloaded game is Bee Factory, Senor Tower reports, with an estimated 15 million downloads. Golf Orbit is its highest grossing game with over $710,000 of in-app purchases. Sensor Tower notes this doesn’t count in-app advertising, which it says likely generates much more revenue than IAPs.
But the stat that stands out the most is that Green Panda’s downloads are up 664% year-over-year this month, Sensor Tower estimates.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! And don’t be surprised if Green Panda’s games get more downloads after this deal. Ubisoft has considerable resources for user acquisition.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"StreamElements helps brands partner with influencers without leaks | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/streamelements-helps-brands-partner-with-influencers-without-leaks"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages StreamElements helps brands partner with influencers without leaks Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Magic the Gathering was the first brand to take advantage of SE VideoDrop Live.
Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
Learn more.
Let’s say you have a trailer for a new season of content for your popular live-service game. And someone on your marketing team has the idea to work with influencers to debut the video. That’s a nice thought, but it’s also a logistical nightmare. Every streamer introduces several new points of failure; the video could leak early or end up looking terrible. This is a challenge even for large PR teams. But that is where the StreamElements comes in with a solution that makes it easy to handle this sort of simultaneous broadcast across multiple channels.
StreamElements provides a set of production tools for creators on YouTube, Twitch, and Facebook Gaming. Its latest feature is SE VideoDrop Live that enables brands, game developers, and others to launch a video on multiple streaming channels all at the same time. This tool enables marketing teams to take advantage of influencer audiences without having to turn over any of the actual material to the influencers themselves. This maintains control over sensitive promotional content without the risk that an influencer is going to share it early.
Scott Clark, StreamElements’ brand partnerships boss, says that a lot of brands are interested in working with influencers to reach younger audiences. At the same time, however, the marketing teams at those companies are wary about giving up control to dozens of creators who could easily make a mistake that derails a carefully planned campaign.
“[Young people are] spending significant time on live streaming platforms, making it the perfect medium to promote films, games, and music,” said Clark. “SE VideoDrop Live provides an exciting and hype-building controlled execution in a live environment that is simply not possible in any other medium.” Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! How SE VideoDrop Live works VideoDrop Live gives complete control to the brand or marketing team. StreamElements has already tested it once in a partnership with Wizards of the Coast and Liquid Advertising. The two companies worked with 22 different Twitch broadcasters to debut a trailer for the Magic the Gathering: War of the Spark set.
Through StreamElements’ interface, those 22 channels were able to tap into a countdown to the video without ever having to handle anything themselves. Only when Wizards and Liquid pressed the button did the trailer actually propagate into the partner feeds.
The potential of this is pretty clear for developers who want to ensure the biggest pop possible for their announcements. While minimizing the chance of leaks, developers can now get their most enthusiastic audience members to gather around and watch something at the exact same moment.
“The SE VideoDrop Live is yet another example of the unique benefits of StreamElements’ tools, technology, and legendary service,” StreamElements chief executive Doron Nir said. “With our unique deployment and measurement capabilities, we are raising the bar of what live stream influencer marketing should be for brands and creators alike.” To ensure that more marketers take advantage of this, StreamElements has also hired industry veterans Jeff Skaggs and Daniel Cole to build deeper relationships with brands.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Spotify grew subscribers 31% in Q2 2019, extending its lead over Apple Music | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/spotify-grew-subscribers-31-in-q2-2019-extending-its-lead-over-apple-music"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Spotify grew subscribers 31% in Q2 2019, extending its lead over Apple Music Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Spotify on the NYSE Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
Learn more.
Spotify today reported it added 8 million new subscribers in the most recent quarter as it widened its lead over rival Apple Music.
The Swedish music streaming leader said in its Q2 earnings report that it now has a total of 108 million premium subscribers, up 31% from the same period one year ago.
Apple disclosed in June that its streaming service has 60 million subscribers, a figure that includes people in the free three-month trial period. Apple had previously said it had 50 million paid subscribers in January, not counting free trials.
Bottom line: While Spotify has added a total of 12 million subscribers so far in 2019, Apple Music has added fewer than 10 million.
The two companies have been locked in a fierce battle since Apple launched its streaming service four years ago. Apple’s service grew quickly, thanks to its default position on the company’s iPhones. Meanwhile, Spotify has filed an antitrust complaint in Europe , accusing Apple of abusing the power of its App Store, a move that further increased tensions between the two companies.
Overall, Spotify reported Q2 revenue that exceeded analyst expectations, though its subscriber number failed to hit the high end of its guidance. Spotify reported earnings before the stock market opened, and that slight subscriber miss sent its stock down 2.04% to $152.10 per share in premarket trading.
The company’s revenue for Q2 was $1.86 billion, up 31% from the same period one year ago, beating analyst estimates of $1.83 billion.
Spotify posted a loss of $84 million for Q2, down from $158 million in Q1 and $439 million the previous year.
Total monthly active users, which includes its free ad-supported tier, grew 29% in Q2 to 232 million, from 180 million in Q2 2018.
The company attributed its growth in part to the expansion of its podcasting offerings.
While many of those numbers appeared solid, Spotify executives acknowledged some disappointment with their subscriber numbers.
The company had offered guidance of 107 million to 110 million subscribers for the quarter; so the 108 million number was below the mid-point. Spotify attributed this shortfall to a weakness in its plan targeting students.
“As we have discussed previously, our goal is to perform at roughly the 70th percentile of our guidance range, and we missed on subs,” the company said in its earnings release. “That’s on us. The good news is that the shortfall was execution-related, rather than softness in the business, and we expect to make up the lost ground before year-end.” For the rest of 2019, the company is forecasting subscriber numbers will rise to between 110 million and 114 million in Q3 and 120 million and 125 million in Q4.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Microsoft releases new Windows 10 preview with Japanese IME and Snip & Sketch improvements | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/microsoft-releases-new-windows-10-preview-with-japanese-ime-and-snip-sketch-improvements"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Microsoft releases new Windows 10 preview with Japanese IME and Snip & Sketch improvements Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
Learn more.
Microsoft today released a new Windows 10 preview with Japanese IME and Snip & Sketch improvements. The update bumps Windows 10 from build 18945 (made available to testers on July 26) to build 18950. These builds are from the 20H1 branch, which represents the Windows 10 update that will arrive in the first half of next year.
Windows 10 is being developed as a service , meaning it receives new features on a regular basis. Microsoft has released seven major updates so far: November Update , Anniversary Update , Creators Update , Fall Creators Update , April 2018 Update , October 2018 Update , and May 2019 Update.
Microsoft is still iterating on the Japanese IME reintroduced in build 18875.
Today’s release fixes an issue where the focus inside prediction candidate window wouldn’t move when using the Up Arrow key. It also improves the discoverability of key assignment settings. The default assigned value of Ctrl + Space has been set to None.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Snip & Sketch has received three improvements, but each is being tested with select Insiders in the Fast ring. There’s a new Single window mode for those that retake screenshots, a zoom option (CTRL+Plus, CTRL+Minus, and Ctrl+Mouse wheel are supported), and WIN+Shift+S is now more discoverable with a quick tutorial.
Bug fixes This 20H1 build includes the following bug fixes and improvements: Insiders may notice some references to “Cloud download” relating to PC reset or refresh. This feature isn’t available and working quite yet.
Fixed an issue where ctfmon.exe might crash if clicking the input mode indicator in the taskbar to switch the Japanese IME between modes.
Fixed an issue where pasting from clipboard history (WIN+V) wouldn’t work when using the Bopomofo IME.
Fixed an issue resulting in hanja conversion not working for the updated Korean IME when typing in certain apps.
Fixed an issue that could result in the OneNote app intermittently acting as if the Ctrl key was pressed when it wasn’t.
Known issues This build has four known issues: There has been an issue with older versions of anti-cheat software used with games where after updating to the latest 19H1 Insider Preview builds may cause PCs to experience crashes. Make sure you are running the latest version of your games before attempting to update the operating system.
Some Realtek SD card readers are not functioning properly.
Tamper Protection may be turned off in Windows Security after updating to this build. You can turn it back on. In August, Tamper Protection will return to being on by default for all Insiders.
On occasion, the candidate selection in prediction candidate window for the Japanese IME doesn’t match with the composition string As always, don’t install this on your production machine.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"KEEN Growth Capital, an Impact Investing Fund Focused on Food and Wellness Announces the Addition of Strategic Talent in Operations, Sales and Finance | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/keen-growth-capital-an-impact-investing-fund-focused-on-food-and-wellness-announces-the-addition-of-strategic-talent-in-operations-sales-and-finance"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release KEEN Growth Capital, an Impact Investing Fund Focused on Food and Wellness Announces the Addition of Strategic Talent in Operations, Sales and Finance Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn New Team Members To Fuel Portfolio Company Market Penetration and Growth ORLANDO, Fla.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–July 30, 2019– KEEN Growth Capital (KEEN), an impact investing fund focused on food, beverage and wellness CPG categories, today announced the addition of strategic, new talent in operations, sales and finance. The new team members include, Ed Cremean, VP, Operations, Simone Luke, VP, Strategic Sales; and Sally Maxwell, Senior Financial Planner & Analyst.
Jerry Bello, Managing Partner, KEEN Growth Capital said, “We have innovative companies with great potential in our portfolio and it takes dedicated and motivated professionals to help them establish their place in the market and grow them into widely beloved brands. Our core existing team will only be complemented with these new additions – building out a specialized go-to-market infantry.” Jonathan Smiga, KEEN Growth Capital Managing Partner added, “These strategic additions are meant to provide functional support to KEEN Growth Capital portfolio companies. Their goal is to fuel growth, capture speed to market opportunities and generate increased market penetration and growth. Ultimately, we seek to deliver better-than-market returns to our investors.” Ed Cremean has 35 years in the food industry and most recently worked with Snyder’s-Lance (the second largest salty snack maker in the U.S.) as VP of Business Development & Customer Service. Ed brings deep experience in operations, manufacturing, business development, sales and marketing.
Simone Luke has over 30 years of experience in customer development with an extensive background in CPG and service industries. Most recently, she has focused on leading the selling efforts for emerging brands, including working on some brands in the Keen Growth Capital portfolio as part of the ProForm Group.
Sally Maxwell brings a diverse wealth of financial expertise to KEEN, with 15+ years of experience. A seasoned professional with backgrounds creating and refining budgets, forecasts, margin analysis, productivity metrics, data analysis and long-term planning.
KEEN Growth Capital portfolio companies include (alphabetical order): Advanced Micronutrition, DAHlicious Organic, Go Raw, MEDOLAC, Nosh Mates, O’DANG Hummus, SNAX-SATIONAL Brands, The Jersey Tomato Co., and Ticks-N-All.
About KEEN Growth Capital KEEN Growth Capital invests in early stage food-related companies that generate meaningful social impact in addition to above market financial returns. KEEN has particular focus on healthy snacking, functional foods and patented, science backed companies that positively impact consumer health, environmental and community wellness, and long term disease mitigation. Keen’s infusion of intellectual and financial capital delivers enriched outcomes for all stakeholders while creating a healthier world. KEEN is based in Orlando. Ideas welcome everywhere. Visit KEENGrowthCaptial.com for more.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190730005093/en/ Addison Ames KEEN Growth Capital 917-721-2961 [email protected] VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
Discover our Briefings.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Innovest Global Announces Date for Second Quarter 2019 Earnings Release, Provides Updates to First Quarter Results | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/innovest-global-announces-date-for-second-quarter-2019-earnings-release-provides-updates-to-first-quarter-results"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release Innovest Global Announces Date for Second Quarter 2019 Earnings Release, Provides Updates to First Quarter Results Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn First Quarter Amended Results Include Upward Revisions to Net Sales and Gross Profit, and a Reduction of Operating Loss CLEVELAND–(BUSINESS WIRE)–July 30, 2019– Innovest Global Inc. (OTC Markets: IVST ), a diversified industrials company which recently announced its plan to spin-off its biotechnology holdings to focus on non-scientific revenue opportunities, intends to release its second quarter results at 4PM ET on Monday, August 5 th.
Yesterday, the company posted revised first quarter results. The primary revision was an increase in net sales to $12.8 million from previously reported $11.7 million. The most notable effect of the revisions is an increase in gross profit to $1.0 million, from a previous reported gross loss of ($293,000). Obtaining the specific information that resulted in these changes had been delayed due to an accounting system transition of an entity acquired at the end of 2018.
The revised quarterly report can be found by clicking here.
Notable information from the financial report: First quarter Net Sales of $12.8 million are highest ever with 1,716% growth over first quarter prior year and 190% over previous quarter.
Net Income $2.0 million after gain on non-operating income; first positive Net Income in Company history Operating Loss: ($329,000) Basic EPS: $0.014 Total Assets $17.6 million Current Assets $11.1 million No long-term debt, no convertible debt Questions about the financial reports can be directed to Investor Relations at [email protected] or 440.644.1027. Please follow us across social media, a frequent medium for important updates and news @innovestglobal. Look for much more information to come soon.
About Innovest Global, Inc.
Innovest Global, Inc. (OTC Markets: IVST ) has operations in industrials (commercial and industrial products and services, energy, construction, and building materials ) and investments in biotechnology. Our primary growth strategy is to acquire existing companies in a select few industries and attract new customers in cost effective ways.
For more information, please visit: http://www.innovestglobal.com , and follow us on Twitter @innovestglobal.
Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. All statements other than statements of historical facts included in this press release are forward-looking statements. These statements relate to future events or to the Company’s future financial performance, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Investors should not place any undue reliance on forward-looking statements since they involve known and unknown, uncertainties and other factors which are, in some cases, beyond the Company’s control which could, and likely will, materially affect actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements. Any forward-looking statement reflects the Company’s current views with respect to future events and is subject to these and other risks, uncertainties and assumptions relating to operations, results of operations, growth strategy and liquidity. Such risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could impact the Company and the forward-looking statements contained herein are included in the Company’s filings with the OTC Markets. The Company assumes no obligation to publicly update or revise these forward-looking statements for any reason, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in these forward-looking statements, even if new information becomes available in the future.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190730005672/en/ Corporate Office: Damon Mintz (440) 644-1027 Investor Relations: (216) 815-1122 [email protected] VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
Discover our Briefings.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Hiring global tech talent brings benefits beyond growth | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/hiring-global-tech-talent-brings-benefits-beyond-growth"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Sponsored Hiring global tech talent brings benefits beyond growth Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Presented by Velocity Global When it comes to finding qualified talent, borders hold less sway than ever — and decision-makers know this. Ask just about any leader in the tech space looking to grow their global presence and they’ll say that the right talent for the job is often overseas, not in their domestic market.
Velocity Global wanted to know where, exactly, ambitious tech firms were seeking talent. And this is what we learned from surveying 1,000 senior-level U.S. and UK respondents in the industry.
The future of work is a flexible, global workforce Cross-border teams are nothing new.
However, their growing ubiquity is, which creates a new sense of urgency for those vying to outpace their competition. This means that companies must either expand their horizons regarding the evolving global workforce, or expect their competition to redefine the forefront for them.
This pressure is particularly palpable in the tech sector. Firms recognize that operating within their domestic markets won’t afford the type of growth they desire, and 90% of UK and 85% of U.S. firms have plans to expand globally within the next five years. But with the determination to expand also comes the challenge of finding the right talent to fuel that expansion. This is forcing companies to look towards international markets for talent to drive desired growth.
With 45% of U.S. and 42% of UK companies seeking qualified talent abroad, this is what the future of work will look like: teams spread across continents, innovating across time zones, and executing tasks and responsibilities when and where it is most convenient for them.
This should come as no surprise to those in leadership positions. The global workforce is now made up of the Millennial majority, and Gen Z is beginning to supplant outgoing older workers. Both generations have grown up with access to information whenever and wherever they want (or don’t want) it. So, why would they expect to hold professional roles that don’t reflect that on-demand accessibility? If employers hope to attract top talent to fuel growth, they must accept that employees across the globe now demand more autonomy over when and how they work.
The border-bound, 9-to-5 model is out — and that’s good for business No matter where a company expands, some degree of flexibility to working hours and environments will be required. But this isn’t solely for the benefit of keeping employees happy, healthy, and engaged; it’s an investment in staying ahead of the competition. Why? Because satisfied, dedicated employees who belong to two of the most tech-forward generations provide invaluable exposure to new ideas and perspectives on where innovation and competition might be headed.
So, where is the competition headed to find top talent? For 30% of both U.S. and UK firms, it’s Europe and Asia. This should be unsurprising to executives, as each region is home to some of the most-educated, technically-skilled populations anywhere.
Higher education and well-developed skills are undeniably integral to growing an exceptional team to best position companies for a successful international expansion. However, access to an emerging talent pool accustomed to an increasingly interconnected world is fertile ground for nurturing long-term growth — even if that means first establishing roots in a neighboring market.
Fortunately, both Europe and Asia offer clusters of adjacent countries perfect for a more strategic regional expansion. How so? If Europe is the target, first establishing a presence in an innovation epicenter like the Netherlands offers easy access to exploring options in top expansion destinations such as Denmark or Germany. The same applies in Asia; tech-forward Singapore is a sturdy springboard for pursuing growth options into the APAC region. Even in an ever-evolving digital world, it’s (still) all about location.
The brightest talent lies elsewhere — but it’s not out of reach Global market dynamics evolve quickly and often drastically; technological shifts routinely uproot industry standards to unearth rich ground for ambitious companies to till. However, this leaves little time for organizations to remain in their domestic markets before their competition establishes itself elsewhere. This urgency underscores just how essential it is for tech firms to explore the most-promising markets early on.
For those already looking abroad, The State of Global Expansion 2019 Report: Tech Industry provides an elevated vantage point to view some of the latest top markets. It offers foundational reinforcement when constructing a global expansion strategy — and serves as a reminder of the urgency needed to pursue growth opportunities elsewhere.
But for others who are unsure whether or not global expansion is the right move in the not-too-distant future, they should ask themselves this: how long can I afford to operate only in my domestic market before looking abroad? If they are too slow to decide, their competition may very well decide for them.
Ben Wright is CEO of Velocity Global.
Sponsored articles are content produced by a company that is either paying for the post or has a business relationship with VentureBeat, and they’re always clearly marked. Content produced by our editorial team is never influenced by advertisers or sponsors in any way. For more information, contact [email protected].
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"Harver raises $15 million to automate high-volume hiring in enterprises | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/harver-raises-15-million-to-automate-high-volume-hiring-in-enterprises"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Harver raises $15 million to automate high-volume hiring in enterprises Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Harver platform Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
The robots are coming to steal our jobs , or so the popular narrative goes , but the reality of automation’s impact on the workforce is somewhat more nuanced. While automation will undoubtedly have a seismic impact on employment, some analysts predict that many new roles will be created as a result of the broader artificial intelligence onslaught. Moreover, we’re seeing a growing number of companies developing AI and automation tools that can be used to help companies recruit human employees.
One of those is Harver , a New York-based startup that offers pre-hire assessment software covering all the key facets of recruitment process up until the interview stage. Harver today announced it had raised $15 million in a series B round of funding from Insight Partners, which it said it will use to “reinvent the volume recruitment process through digital automation,” according to a statement.
A core raison d’être of Harver’s platform is that it helps companies sidestep the laboriously manual process of sifting through sackfuls of resumes. It helps vet candidates based on data garnered from automated assessments, rather than feelings, first impressions, or intuition — which it touts as an effective way of minimizing unconscious bias in hiring.
Harver ships with more than a dozen customizable assessment modules, covering things like an individual’s cognitive aptitude, culture fit, personality, multitasking capabilities, and typing skills. Companies give candidates tailored situational judgement tests (SJTs), which serve up potential scenarios from the workplace, with a choice of responses which the candidate can select or rank. This gives the employer some insights into how a person’s brain is wired and whether they’re a good fit for the role.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Above: Harver: Situational judgement test Harver ranks candidates during the initial screening process to determine which individuals have the best job-fit and assessment performance.
Above: Harver ranking score Elsewhere, Harver enables its users to create workflows to avoid repetitive tasks, whereby specific actions are triggered automatically based on each candidate’s status and assessment results.
Above: Harver workflow builder Successful candidates can also self-schedule interviews based on mutual availability, thus circumventing the back-and-forth email / phone-call scenario.
Above: Harver: Schedule interview Though Harver may indeed help reduce bias due to the way it sets up its automated assessments, and the reduced direct human involvement in the vetting stages, it won’t actually help during what is arguably one of the most important stages — human-to-human interviews. However, the company told VentureBeat that it does help its clients collect data after the interview to fight future unconscious bias.
“Since one of our goals is to reduce bias, we are gathering and analyzing information at each stage to minimize biases that are not work related,” Dr. Ben Porr, VP of assessment and analytics at Harver, told VentureBeat. “We also collect sub-group data – for example, demographic or experiential data — post-hire and analyze it to ensure there was no bias or adverse impact to specific sub-groups. We are constantly monitoring hiring, and when we identify potential issues, we work closely with the client to balance diversity and inclusion, and performance.” Working capital Recruitment platforms have secured sizable chunks of VC cash in recent years , a trend that has continued into 2019 — SmartRecruiters recently closed a $50 million round of funding to help companies find and select new talent. AI and automation are also playing an increasingly big part of this, with the likes of Mountain View-based AllyO nabbing $45 million for a conversational AI platform that can quickly identify qualified job seekers and automate recruiting processes, and Eightfold raising $28 million for AI smarts that match candidates with employers. Elsewhere, New York-based Fetcher offers up AI tools to help companies proactively headhunt the best candidates, recently closing a small $5.4 million seed round of funding.
Prior to now, Harver had raised around $20 million since its inception in 2015, while it has secured some big-name clients along the way such as Netflix, Uber, Heineken, KPMG, and UiPath. With another $15 million in the bank, the company is well-financed to grow its product and target new clients.
“With our technology, we’re able to digitally transform the candidate selection process of large enterprise companies around the globe,” noted Harver cofounder and CEO Barend Raaff. “We’ll empower recruiters to match candidates better and faster while eliminating all bias from the decision-making process. To reach this goal, Harver will continue to expand on its product development and matching engine.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Google launches Migrate for Anthos, Traffic Director, and Layer 7 Internal Load Balancer | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/google-launches-migrate-for-anthos-traffic-director-and-layer-7-internal-load-balancer"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Google launches Migrate for Anthos, Traffic Director, and Layer 7 Internal Load Balancer Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Google today made a slew of hybrid and multi-cloud announcements. The company launched Migrate for Anthos in beta, which allows you to take virtual machines from on-premises or Google Compute Engine and move them directly into containers running in Google Kubernetes Engine ( GKE ).
Migrate for Compute Engine , which already supports moving virtual machines out of Amazon EC2, gained beta support for migrating virtual machines directly from Microsoft Azure into Google Compute Engine. Finally, Google added options for adopting microservices and modern load balancing.
Anthos is a service based on GKE that lets you run your applications unmodified via on-premises datacenters or in the public cloud. At Google Cloud Next 2019 in April, Anthos hit general availability.
Most interestingly, Google announced at the time that Anthos will run on third-party clouds, including AWS and Azure.
Now, Migrate for Anthos lets you modernize your virtual machines and move them to containers automatically. The manual processes of traditional container modernization strategies are no longer required, Google promises, “even for VMs you’d previously written off as not being able to modernize.” And once you’ve moved, there are plenty of automation benefits, like no longer having to manually maintain and patch your OS.
Traffic Director and Layer 7 Internal Load Balancer Google today also announced the general availability of Traffic Director in Anthos and the beta release of Layer 7 Internal Load Balancer (L7 ILB). The former makes it easier to adopt microservices and the latter to use modern load balancing. Both work out-of-the-box with virtual machines (Compute Engine) and containers (Google Kubernetes Engine or self-managed).
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Traffic Director is Google’s fully managed, scalable, resilient service mesh control plane that provides configuration, policy, and intelligence to Envoy or similar proxies. Originally built at Lyft, Envoy is an open source high-performance proxy that runs alongside the application to deliver platform-agnostic networking capabilities. Envoy abstracts away application networking, while Traffic Director delivers global resiliency, intelligent load balancing, and controls like traffic splitting, fault injection, and mirroring.
If you want to modernize existing applications, L7 ILB can bring load balancing features to legacy environments via a traditional load balancer. Because L7 ILB is powered by Envoy and Traffic Director, it’s also a great first step toward migrating legacy apps to service mesh.
On its Q2 2019 earnings call last week, Google said its cloud business has hit an $8 billion annual run rate. That revenue figure includes G Suite, however, and it still puts the company behind competitors Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Today’s announcements are no surprise — Google is making it easier for potential customers to come into the fold.
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"Future Group Affiliate LivQuik Partners With Poynt to Provide Merchants Across India With Powerful Commerce Platform | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/future-group-affiliate-livquik-partners-with-poynt-to-provide-merchants-across-india-with-powerful-commerce-platform"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release Future Group Affiliate LivQuik Partners With Poynt to Provide Merchants Across India With Powerful Commerce Platform Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn PALO ALTO, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–July 31, 2019– Future Group, one of the world’s leading retail conglomerates, and its commerce payments affiliate LivQuik, have partnered with Poynt, the world’s leading open commerce platform, to mass deploy smart POS solutions across India.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190731005348/en/ Poynt’s POS platform will be distributed through Future Groups retail chains in over 440 cities and towns across India, so this partnership will play a major role in the future of commerce in the country’s complex and diverse growing economy. (Photo: Business Wire) The Poynt Platform, comprised of Poynt’s Smart Terminals, Poynt OS (a powerful Android-based Operating System) and Poynt Cloud (a set of cloud-enabled management tools), provides an application ecosystem that empowers merchants to grow their businesses with better inventory management, supply chain integration, and loyalty programs. For consumers, it will provide a fast and secure checkout process using their payment method of choice.
Poynt and Future Group, through its payments entity LivQuik, will form a joint venture, SabPe, a full-service omnichannel payments technology platform for merchants, banks, and other acquirers in India. Based in Mumbai, SabPe will enable acceptance of both traditional and emerging payment methods and provide access to curated business applications and support for merchants across India.
“Digital and physical interfaces are seamlessly merging and the payments infrastructure is a focal point for this seamless convergence. Poynt’s cutting edge commerce platform transforms the billing or POS terminal into a smart device that empowers businesses to lead their digital transformation and gives customers more convenience and choice,” said Kishore Biyani, Group CEO, Future Group. “We are introducing Poynt Smart Terminals across Future Group stores and through this partnership, we will now extend its benefits to every merchant in India,” he added.
Poynt continues to experience rapid growth globally, having surpassed $9 billion USD in Gross Payments Volume (GPV) in the last 12 months, up approximately 200% YOY. The partnership with Future Group will further accelerate growth in GPV for Poynt.
“We are thrilled to partner with Future Group and LivQuik,” said Osama Bedier, CEO of Poynt. “This joint venture furthers our mission to empower merchants with technology that delivers value well beyond payment acceptance, and consumers with the best shopping experience imaginable. This is especially exciting in India, an enormous and important market with multiple modes of payment that will help define the future of commerce worldwide.” Mr Mohit Lalvani, CEO of LivQuik added, “The joint venture with Poynt will help us deliver a personalized experience to customers of Future Group across all channels, online or offline. The line between in-store and e-commerce has completely blurred and we are excited to shape the future of payments in India.” About Future Group: Future Group is guided by the principle of ‘Rewrite Rules, Retain Values’ in shaping the consumption space in India. It offers more than 80 brands in fashion, footwear, FMCG, food and homeware segments that are distributed through its own retail chains in over 440 cities and towns across India. The country’s most trusted retail brand, Big Bazaar, along with Central, EasyDay, Foodhall, Brand Factory, Nilgiris, Heritage, fbb, Heritage Fresh and WH Smith in India are some of the retail chains operated by the group. On any given day, almost 2 million people visit its stores and digital platforms, experience its brands and work in sourcing, manufacturing and moving products that fulfill the needs and aspirations of a new India. Find out more on futuregroup.in About LivQuik: LivQuik, founded in 2012 and based in Mumbai, India, is a payments technology company that provides bespoke Fintech solutions to clients worldwide. LivQuik is licensed by the Reserve Bank of India as a Prepaid Payment Issuer.
About Poynt: Poynt is a revolutionary open commerce platform empowering merchants with software and services to transform their business. Founded in 2013, Poynt reimagined the ubiquitous payment terminal into a connected, multi-purpose device that runs third-party apps. As smart terminals become mainstream, Poynt OS is an open operating system that can power any smart payment terminal worldwide, creating a new app economy for merchants and allowing developers to write once and distribute everywhere. Poynt is headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif., with international headquarters in Singapore, and is backed by Elavon, Google Ventures, Matrix Partners, National Australia Bank, NYCA Partners, Oak HC/FT Partners, Stanford-StartX Fund, and Webb Investment Network. Find out more at poynt.com View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190731005348/en/ Future Group & LivQuik Rajesh Rana | [email protected] Poynt Scott Holt | [email protected] VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"FAA upgrades drone management app B4UFLY with real-time flight restriction info | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/faa-upgrades-drone-management-app-b4ufly-with-real-time-flight-restriction-info"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages FAA upgrades drone management app B4UFLY with real-time flight restriction info Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) today introduced an update of B4UFLY , its app for helping pilots and less experienced operators ensure drone flights are safe and compliant with federal law.
The previous version of the app made it confusing at times to understand whether it’s legal to fly a drone, but the update, led by drone company KittyHawk , makes it easy to understand if it’s OK to fly with commands like “Good to Go”, “Warning”, and “Do Not Fly”, a trio meant to give users a red, yellow, or green light.
Real-time information from the FAA is also incorporated into the app, such as temporary flight restrictions near airports or stadiums as well as more permanent airspace restrictions placed on flight around critical infrastructure, airports, national parks, or military training routes.
In the future, B4UFLY will take into account factors like weather or major events like a public emergency or natural disaster.
B4UFLY is available for download on iOS and Android smartphones. More than 700,000 people have used B4UFLY since its release in 2016. Plans to upgrade the app were initially announced in late Februar y.
Apps like B4UFLY will be crucial as airspace becomes more crowded with drones and other flying machines. The FAA is currently conducting experiments with public and private partners as part of its Unmanned Aircraft System Integrated Pilot Program (UAS IPP). Experiments underway include drone usage to combat mosquitoes in Florida as well as food deliveries by Uber and 5G amplification by AT&T.
As part of the program, the San Diego Fire Department and Chula Vista Police Department are also deploying telepresence drones to get a view of emergency situations before vehicles on the ground can reach the scene.
In recent advances in commercial services via drones, Alphabet’s Wing began to make deliveries in Australia earlier this year and Finland this summer , while Amazon plans to begin trials of its latest Prime Air delivery drones in the coming months.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Dgraph raises $11.5 million for scalable graph database solutions | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/dgraph-raises-11-5-million-for-scalable-graph-database-solutions"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Dgraph raises $11.5 million for scalable graph database solutions Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Dgraph Labs , a San Francisco-based company developing transactional distributed graph database software, today announced that it’s closed an $11.5 million in series A funding round led by Redpoint Ventures, with participation from previous backers Bain Capital Ventures, Blackbird Ventures, Grok Ventures, and Airtree Ventures. The capital infusion brings Dgraph’s total raised to nearly $15 million following seed rounds exceeding $3 million, and CEO Manish Jain says it’ll be used to expand the company’s enterprise features and user base and support next-generation applications.
“[C]urrent ‘off-the-shelf’ solutions don’t provide the benefits they require, such as horizontal scalability, performance, multiple data models which need to be served and flexible schema, among others,” said Jain, a former Google employee who worked on the tech giant’s Web Search and Knowledge Graph project before founding Dgraph in 2015. “This is what inspired Dgraph.” Graph databases — also known as graph-oriented databases — leverage graph structures for semantic queries, with nodes, edges, and properties representing and storing data. They’re a type of non-relational technology that depicts relationships connecting various entities (like two people in a social network, for instance).
Dgraph’s eponymous flavor, which is written in Go, is open-sourced under the Apache 2.0 license and uses a version of Facebook’s GraphQL as its default query language. It shares data horizontally and uses an adaptable schema to break queries into subqueries that run in parallel, enabling it to achieve low latency and reliably high throughput.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Moreover, Dgraph ensures that data remains evenly balanced across servers and individual racks by automatically moving shards, while its internal key-value store — Badger — reduces RAM usage and taps available SSDs to boost performance further. All the while, to protect against catastrophic data loss, Dgraph minimizes hard drive disk seeks and network calls and runs synchronous replication.
Jain claims that Dgraph is currently in production systems ranging from gaming services, advertising platforms, fraud detection frameworks, and search engines to internet of things backends, medical research suites, and machine learning and AI tools. “Most companies do not have the capability or desire to spend millions of dollars building a custom graph database,” he said. “Dgraph is designed to execute equally well on graph style joins and traversals and SQL style selects, providing the only truly scalable general-purpose graph database available today.” Markets and Markets anticipates the graph database market will reach $2.4 billion by 2023 from $821.8 million in 2018, and analysts at Gartner expect that enterprise graph processing and graph databases will grow 100% annually through 2022. Startups like Neo4j , TigerGraph, MongoDB, Cambridge Semantics, DataStax, and others have risen to meet the need, in addition to incumbents like Microsoft and Oracle. Even Amazon threw its hat in the ring in November 2017 with the launch of Neptune, a fully managed graph database powered by its Amazon Web Services division.
“I was immediately inspired by Manish’s vision to deliver the first general-purpose graph database,” said Redpoint Ventures partner Satish Dharmaraj, who plans to join Dgraph’s board of directors. “In an industry that has only seen incremental advances over the last several years, Redpoint is excited to partner with Dgraph on its mission to bring the the only truly scalable graph database to the market. We look forward to working with Manish and the team as the company continues to grow and scale.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Recogni raises $25 million for power-efficient autonomous car inferencing | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/recogni-raises-25-million-for-power-efficient-autonomous-car-inferencing"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Recogni raises $25 million for power-efficient autonomous car inferencing Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
RK Anand — along with Ashwini Choudhary, Eye-Fi founder Eugene Feinberg, former Lilium sensor systems engineer Gilles Backhus, and Valerie Chan — believes self-driving cars have a massive compute problem. While the AI models that guide the cars’ decision-making have powerful servers at their disposal for training, inferencing — the stage at which the algorithms make predictions — must be performed offline to ensure redundancy. But even fully trained models require powerful (and power-hungry) in-car PCs for real-time processing, a paradigm Anand and company believe is unsustainable.
That’s why in 2018 they cofounded Recogni, a San Jose, California-based company that’s developing a low-overhead perception system for autonomous vehicles. The pitch was evidently attractive to investors, who committed $25 million to the company’s series A round announced today. GreatPoint Ventures led the round, which saw participation from Toyota AI Ventures, BMW iVentures, automotive technology firm Faurecia, Osram’s Fluxunit, and DNS Capital.
“The issues within the … autonomy ecosystem range from capturing [and] generating training data to inferring in real time. These vehicles need datacenter-class performance while consuming minuscule amounts of power,” said CEO Anand, who added that the fresh funds will be used to grow Recogni’s engineering team. “Leveraging our background in machine learning, computer vision, silicon, and system design, we are engineering a fundamentally new system that benefits the auto industry with very high efficiency at the lowest power consumption.” Recogni’s integrated module — which comprises three passively cooled image sensors, an external depth sensor, and and a custom inferencing chip — can perform up to 1 peta operations per second while consuming about 8 watts of power, thanks to an approach that offloads central processing to multiple points on a vehicle. It captures and analyzes up to three uncompressed 8-12 MP streams at 60 frames per second, achieving a claimed 70% compute efficiency in typical vision applications (or up to 500 times better than several leading platforms).
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Recogni boldly claims its system outperforms rivals by more than two orders of magnitude on perception tasks like image classification, objection detection, action anticipation, and depth inference. On benchmark ResNet 50, it’s able to classify 92,105 images per second; on RetinaNet-101-800, it performs 1,750 inferences per second; and on R(2+1)D, it can spot 833 people concurrently. On DepthNet, Recogni says it’s capable of analyzing 3,500 scenes per second.
Recogni intends to initially target level 2 autonomous vehicles — as defined by the Society of Automotive Engineers — which includes those equipped with advanced driver assistance systems (like Cadillac’s Supercruise, Nvidia’s Drive Autopilot, and Volvo’s Pilot Assist) limited to highways and marked roads. In the near future, it plans to pivot to platforms for level 3 vehicles (that can steer, accelerate or decelerate, and pass other cars without human input) and level 4 cars (that can largely drive themselves without constant human intervention), with the goal of eventually enabling level 5 cars (that can do anything a human driver can do).
Strictly vision-based approaches to autonomous driving are by no stretch universally lauded, but they’re advocated by Intel’s Mobileye , which is developing a custom accelerator processor chip — EyeQ5 — that offers 360-degree coverage, courtesy of proprietary algorithms, cameras, and ultrasonic. Similarly, driverless semi-truck startup TuSimple says its camera-based technology (which employs lidar largely for redundancy) has a 1,000-meter detection range, and Beijing tech giant Baidu recently debuted a vision-based vehicle framework ( Apollo Lite ) that it claims has demonstrated full autonomy on public roads.
Recogni has a competitor in Mobileye, as well as Tesla, which in April detailed a Samsung-manufactured chipset featuring over 144 tera operations per second (TOPS) of neural network performance. (On an internal Tesla benchmark, it was able to process 2,300 frames per second while sucking down 1.25 times less power than its predecessor.) Nvidia — another formidable rival in the space — says Drive Xavier, the system-on-chip at the heart of its Drive AGX Pegasus autonomous vehicle development platform, draws just 30 watts.
But Recogni isn’t a fly-by-night operation. Anand has confidence its pedigreed roster of engineers, managers, and data scientists — who hail from Intel, Juniper Networks, Kumu Networks, Sun Microsystems, Silicon Graphics, Xsigo Systems, NavVis, and Cisco, among others — have the chops to take on the industry’s best-funded incumbents.
“This [funding] round, one of the largest initial venture rounds raised by any AI silicon company in the space, is a testament to our experience and responsible approach,” he said.
Recogni has operations in Munich and its Cupertino headquarters.
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"How Uber is turning everyone in the company into a data scientist | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/how-uber-is-turning-everyone-in-the-company-into-a-data-scientist"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages VB Event How Uber is turning everyone in the company into a data scientist Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Uber’s Director of Data Science, Franziska Bell, would like everyone who works at Uber to have the ability to execute their role with the same insight as a data scientist. “Our vision is to provide data science expertise at the touch of a button,” Bell said during her talk at Transform 2019 this month. By unifying the teams in her organization — the data science ninjas, as she calls them — with their cross-functional counterparts in engineering, product, and design, Uber has built internal tools and platforms that others in the company can leverage, bringing cutting-edge expertise to anyone within the company.
One example she pointed to is the forecasting platform they’ve developed, or as she described it, “platformization at ease.” “The grand vision of the forecasting platform is to provide forecasts at the push of a button,” said Bell. “Absolutely no forecasting expertise [is] required. The only input that’s needed from the user is historical data, whether it’s in the form of a CSV file or a link to a query, as well as the forecast horizon. How far do you want to forecast? Everything else is done completely underneath the hood.” Before developing the platform, Bell mapped out the three questions the team examines to determine if the investment in any kind platformization will be worthwhile. Number one: Is this area of data science going to greatly enhance the user experiences? Two: Are there multiple different use cases across the company? Three: How reusable are the various different methodologies or modules from use case to use case? VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Forecasting was a slam dunk across the board, and she went on to explain its many use cases across Uber, including supply and demand, real-time outage detection, and hardware capacity planning.
“Obviously, we want to provide great user experiences, and in order to do so, we want to accurately forecast supply and demand-related metrics in a spatial/temporal, fine-granular fashion,” Bell explained. With the vast number of metrics, paired with the fact that many of these are supply- and demand-driven, it would be impossible to set up those thresholds by humans and keep them up-to-date over time.
Bell discussed how real-time outage detection is crucial to Uber’s business. The company gets hundreds of millions of signals continuously, whether from back end systems it is tracking or marketplace health indicators. Uber needs to know whether the app is not functioning as it should be, if people can’t sign in or sign up, or if people can’t take a trip as expected.
Hardware capacity planning formed the third leg of forecasting, using the platform to monitor closely how much hardware to purchase and provision for. “Particularly tricky is the fact that we have some very high-demand days, such as New Year’s Eve or Halloween,” she explained. “We’re a fairly young company. These are very much day-of-the-week dependent. Again, our forecasting platform and expertise can be leveraged on this front in order to ensure that we’re not over-provisioning, which would be fiscally irresponsible, but also not under-provisioning, which could cause an outage and erode the trust of our rider and driver partners.” Leveraging its forecasting expertise, Uber has now built a completely automated tool said Bell. “People just have to bring us a list of business metrics they want to track, or backend metrics, and then we automatically and dynamically set these thresholds for them, and also keep them updated.” Check out all the other sessions you missed at Transform as well.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"How Facebook's brain-machine interface measures up | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/how-facebooks-brain-machine-interface-measures-up"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages How Facebook’s brain-machine interface measures up Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn A mockup of a Facebook brain-computer peripheral.
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Somewhat unceremoniously, Facebook this week provided an update on its brain-computer interface project, preliminary plans for which it unveiled at its F8 developer conference in 2017. In a paper published in the journal Nature Communications , a team of scientists at the University of California, San Francisco backed by Facebook Reality Labs — Facebook’s Pittsburgh-based division devoted to augmented reality and virtual reality R&D — described a prototypical system capable of reading and decoding study subjects’ brain activity while they speak.
It’s impressive no matter how you slice it: The researchers managed to make out full, spoken words and phrases in real time. Study participants (who were prepping for epilepsy surgery) had a patch of electrodes placed on the surface of their brains, which employed a technique called electrocorticography (ECoG) — the direct recording of electrical potentials associated with activity from the cerebral cortex — to derive rich insights. A set of machine learning algorithms equipped with phonological speech models learned to decode specific speech sounds from the data and to distinguish between questions and responses.
But caveats abound. The system was highly invasive, for one, and it differentiated only among two dozen standard answers to nine questions with 61% accuracy and questions with 75% accuracy. Moreover, it fell far short of Facebook’s real-time decoding speed goal of 100 words per minute with a 1,000-word vocabulary and word error rate of less than 17%.
So what does that say about the state of brain-computer interfaces? And perhaps more importantly, is Facebook’s effort really on the cutting edge? VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Neuralink Elon Musk’s Neuralink , a San Francisco startup founded in 2017 with $158 million in funding (including at least $100 million from Musk), is similarly pursuing brain-machine interfaces that connect humans with computers. During an event earlier this month timed to coincide with the publication of a whitepaper, Neuralink claimed that the prototypes it’s developed are capable of extracting information from many neurons at once using flexible wires inserted into soft tissue by a “sewing machine.” Above: Neuralink’s N1 sensor.
Electrodes on those wires relay detected pulses to a processor placed on the surface of the skull that’s able to read information from up to 1,536 channels, or roughly 15 times better than current systems embedded in humans. It’s already been tested in mice and primates, and Neuralink hopes to launch human trials with what it calls the N1, a cylinder roughly 8 millimeters in diameter and 4 millimeters tall that can take 20,000 samples per second with 10 bits of resolution from up to 1,024 electrodes. That’s equivalent to about 200Mbps of neural data for each channel.
Neuralink’s solution is no less invasive than Facebook’s in this respect; its team expects that in the near term, wires will have to be embedded in the brain’s motor areas and somatic sensory area under a trained surgeon’s guidance. And while its neuron-reading techniques and technology are state-of-the-art, Neuralink appears to have made less progress on the interpretability side. One of its aspirational goals is to allow a tetraplegic to type at 40 words per minute, according to Musk.
Paradromics and Kernel Three-year-old Austin-based Paradromics , like Neuralink, is actively developing an implantable brain-reading chip with substantial seed backing and $18 million from the U.S. Department of Defense’s Neural Engineering System Design program.
The company’s proprietary Neural Input-Output Bus, or NIOB for short, packs 50,000 modular microwires that can interface with and stimulate up to 1 million neurons, from which it can record up to 30Gbps of neural activity. It’s currently in preclinical development, and it’s expected to enter human trials in 2021 or 2022, laying the groundwork for a solution to help stroke victims relearn to speak.
As with Paradromics, Kernel , which launched in 2016 with $100 million in backing from Braintree founder and CEO Bryan Johnson, is currently focused on developing a surgically implanted neural chip. But the company ambitiously claims its tech will someday “mimic, repair, and improve” human cognition using AI, and it recently began investigating non-invasive interfaces.
It’s not as far-fetched as it sounds — there’s been recent progress to this end. In a recent study published in the journal Nature , scientists trained a machine learning algorithm on data recorded from previous experiments to determine how movements of the tongue, lips, jaw, and larynx created sound; incorporated this into a decoder, which transformed brain signals into estimated movements of the vocal tract; and fed them to a separate component that turned the movements into synthetic speech.
BrainGate Cyberkinetics developed in partnership with researchers in the Department of Neuroscience at Brown University a brain implant system — BrainGate — that’s designed to help those who have lost control of their limbs or other bodily functions. It consists of a 100-electrode microelectrode array implanted in the brain that can sense the electromagnetic signature of neurons firing, and an external decoder peripheral that connects to a prosthetic or storage device.
Clinical trials began in 2009 under the name BrainGate2. And in May 2012, BrainGate researchers published a study in Nature demonstrating that two people paralyzed by brainstem stroke several years earlier were able to control robotic arms for reaching and grasping.
Ctrl-labs New York startup Ctrl-labs is taking a slightly different, less invasive approach to translating neural impulses into digital signals. Its developer platform Ctrl-kit taps differential electromyography (EMG) to translate mental intent into action, specifically by measuring changes in electrical potential caused by impulses traveling from the brain to hand muscles. Sixteen electrodes monitor the motor neuron signals amplified by the muscle fibers of motor units, from which they measure signals, and with the help of AI algorithms distinguish between the individual pulses of each nerve.
Above: Ctrl-labs’ Ctrl-kit.
The system works independently of muscle movement; generating a brain activity pattern that Ctrl-labs’ tech can detect requires no more than the firing of a neuron down an axon, or what neuroscientists call action potential. That puts it a class above wearables that use electroencephalography (EEG), a technique that measures electrical activity in the brain through contacts pressed against the scalp. EMG devices draw from the cleaner, clearer signals from motor neurons, and as a result are limited only by the accuracy of the software’s machine learning model and the snugness of the contacts against the skin.
On the software side of the equation, the accompanying SDK contains JavaScript and TypeScript toolchains and prebuilt demos that give an idea of the hardware’s capabilities. So far, Ctrl-labs has demonstrated a virtual keyboard that maps finger movements to PC inputs, allowing a wearer to type messages by tapping on a tabletop with their fingertips. It’s also shown off robotic arms mapped to the Ctrl-kit’s outputs that respond to muscle movements.
Challenges ahead High-resolution brain-machine interfaces, or BCI for short, are predictably complicated — they must be able to read neural activity to pick out which groups of neurons are performing which tasks. Historically, hardware limitations have caused them to come into contact with more than one region of the brain or produce interfering scar tissue.
That has changed with the advent of fine biocompatible electrodes, which limit scarring and can target cell clusters with precision, and with noninvasive peripherals like Ctrl-kit. What hasn’t changed is a lack of understanding about certain neural processes.
Rarely is activity isolated in brain regions, such as the prefrontal lobe and hippocampus. Instead, it takes place across various brain regions, making it difficult to pin down. Then there’s the matter of translating neural electrical impulses into machine-readable information; researchers have yet to crack the brain’s encoding. Pulses from the visual center aren’t like those produced when formulating speech, and it’s sometimes difficult to identify signals’ origination points.
The challenges haven’t discouraged Facebook, Neuralink, Paradromics, Kernel, Ctrl-labs, and others from chasing after a brain-computer interface market that’s anticipated to be worth $1.46 billion by 2020, according to Allied Market Research. One thing’s for sure: They’ve got an uphill climb ahead of them.
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"Google makes Advanced Protection Program broadly available, launches Titan Security Keys internationally | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/google-makes-advanced-protection-program-broadly-available-launches-titan-security-keys-internationally"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Google makes Advanced Protection Program broadly available, launches Titan Security Keys internationally Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
During Google’s Cloud Next 2019 conference in Tokyo this week, the Mountain View tech giant announced a slew of Google Cloud Platform (GCP) updates intended to bolster data, app, and user security. Among the highlights are the Advanced Protection Program’s broad launch and the expanded retail availability of Titan Security Keys, as well as improved anomaly detection in G Suite enterprise deployments and enhanced support for legacy apps in GCP.
“At Google Cloud, we’re always looking to make advanced security easier for enterprises so they can stay focused on their core business,” wrote director of product management Karthik Lakshminarayanan and group product manager Vidya Nagarajan. “Already this year, we’ve worked to strengthen user protection, make threat defense more effective, and streamline security administration through a constant stream of new product releases and enhancements.” Advanced Protection Program Google’s Advanced Protection Program — which is designed to prevent cyberattacks against business leaders, politicians, and other high-profile targets — will be available in beta in the coming days for G Suite, GCP, and Cloud Identity customers. Enterprise administrators will gain the option to enroll users most at risk of targeted attacks, such as IT administrators, business executives, and employees in security-sensitive segments like finance and government.
As a refresher, the Advanced Protection Program enforces the use of Google’s aforementioned Titan Security Key (or compatible third-party hardware) and blocks access to third-party accounts not explicitly approved by an admin. Additionally, it enables enhanced scanning of incoming email for phishing attempts, viruses, and malicious attachments.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Titan Security Keys On the subject of Titan Security Keys , the sets of physical FIDO (Fast Identity Online) keys used to authenticate logins over Bluetooth or USB, they’ve hit the Google Store in Canada, France, Japan, and the U.K. roughly a year after launching in the U.S. Bundles ship with a USB key, a Bluetooth Low Energy key, and an adapter for devices with USB Type-C ports.
Above: Google’s Titan Security Keys.
For the uninitiated, FIDO is a standard certified by the nonprofit FIDO Alliance that supports public key cryptography and multifactor authentication. When you register a FIDO device with an online service, it creates a key pair of an on-device, offline private key and an online public key. During authentication, the device “proves possession” of the private key by prompting you to enter a PIN code or password, supply a fingerprint, or speak into a microphone.
Since 2014, Yubico, Google, NXP, and others have collaborated to develop the Alliance’s standards and protocols, including the new World Wide Web Consortium’s Web Authentication API. (WebAuthn shipped in Chrome 67 and Firefox 60 earlier this year.) Among the services that support them are Dropbox, Facebook, GitHub, Salesforce, Stripe, and Twitter.
Machine Learning in G Suite At the kickoff of Google Cloud Next this April in San Francisco, Google announced no fewer than 30 security-related upgrades headed to GCP in the coming months. Those were only the start, evidently — beginning today in beta for G Suite Enterprise and G Suite Enterprise for Education customers, admins can opt into automatic anomalous activity notifications in the G Suite alert center. They’re informed by AI models that analyze signals within apps like Google Drive to detect security risks, including data exfiltration and policy violations related to unusual external file sharing and download behavior.
Above: Anomaly detection in G Suite.
The launch builds on Google’s ongoing efforts to block spam, phishing, and malware with sophisticated machine learning techniques. Google in February said that it’s blocking around 100 million additional spam messages every day for Gmail users thanks to its open source AI framework TensorFlow, all while ensuring the share of legitimate mail that inadvertently ends up in spam folders stays below 0.05%.
One-click access to apps Lastly, Google today said that it’ll start rolling out support for password vaulted apps — i.e., legacy apps that require a username and password to authenticate — to Cloud Identity customers this week, complementing G Suite and Cloud Identity’s ecosystem of single sign-on (SSO) apps that tap identity standards like Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) and OpenID Connect (OIDC).
“The combination of standards based- and password-vaulted app support will deliver one of the largest app catalogs in the industry, providing seamless one-click access for users and a single point of management, visibility, and control for admins,” wrote Lakshminarayanan and Nagarajan. “These new features will help strengthen protection and securely enable cloud workloads and business processes.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"DeepMind's AI predicts kidney injury up to 48 hours before it happens | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/deepminds-ai-predicts-kidney-injury-up-to-48-hours-before-it-happens"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages DeepMind’s AI predicts kidney injury up to 48 hours before it happens Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Meet DeepMind Health.
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Acute kidney injury, or AKI, is a condition in which the kidneys stop filtering waste products from the blood. It occurs quickly (in two days or less) and debilitates an estimated 1 in 5 hospitalized patients in the U.K. and 1 in 4 hospitalized patients in the U.S. Worse still, because it’s difficult to detect, AKI kills upwards of 400,000 people annually in both countries combined.
But there’s encouraging news on this front, courtesy Google parent firm Alphabet’s DeepMind. The U.K.-based AI research firm said it’s made progress toward automated systems addressing the 11% of failures to detect AKI deterioration in U.S. hospitals and the 30% of preventable cases globally.
Over the course of two separate joint studies conducted with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and The Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust (RFL), DeepMind’s health care division — DeepMind Health — investigated ways to flag AKI warning signs clinicians might otherwise fail to spot. The resulting pair of papers published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) and Nature Digital Medicine reveal the fruit of the organizations’ labor: an algorithm that can predict the presence of AKI up to 48 hours in advance and an app that cuts missed AKI cases from 12.4% to 3.3%.
“Over the last few years, our team at DeepMind has focused on finding an answer to the complex problem of avoidable patient harm, building digital tools that can spot serious conditions earlier and helping doctors and nurses deliver faster, better care to patients in need,” wrote DeepMind. “This is our team’s biggest healthcare research breakthrough to date, demonstrating the ability to not only spot deterioration more effectively, but actually predict it before it happens.” VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Royal Free The study DeepMind conducted with Royal Free involved Streams, a mobile assistant for kidney specialists that compiles a bedside review of medical information and taps an algorithm to flag AKI patient deterioration.
Although it doesn’t rely on AI, DeepMind reports Streams was saving clinicians an average of two hours a day shortly after its rollout two years ago. Efficiency only improved over time — specialists were eventually reviewing urgent cases within 15 minutes, a process that might normally have taken several hours — as did cost saving. Streams reduced the average cost of admission for a patient with AKI by roughly 17%, according to DeepMind.
Above: DeepMind’s Streams app.
“Critically, these early findings from the Royal Free suggest that, in order to improve patient outcomes even further, clinicians need to be able to intervene before AKI can be detected by the current NHS algorithm — which is why our research on AKI is so promising,” wrote DeepMind. “These results comprise the building blocks for our long-term vision of preventative healthcare, helping doctors to intervene in a proactive, rather than reactive, manner.” DeepMind reaffirmed that it’ll cede oversight of Streams to Google Health in the coming months, as previously announced , and that the development team will work alongside colleagues at Google to create tools designed to support health care practitioners. “The combined experience, infrastructure, and expertise of DeepMind Health … [with] Google’s will help us address critical patient safety issues and … [potentially] save thousands of lives globally,” wrote the company.
But brewing controversy still clouds Streams, despite the promising preliminary results. The more than 1.6 million patients whose records were analyzed in the app’s creation weren’t asked for their consent, leading the U.K.’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to conclude last year that the Trust had breached U.K. law. And critics maintain that Stream’s move to Google constitutes a breach of trust on DeepMind’s part, which had previously said it would operate the project autonomously from its sister company.
In an update on its investigation today, following the Trust’s completion of a data protection impact assessment, the ICO said that it has “no further outstanding concerns regarding the current processing of personal data within Streams.” U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs In the study published in partnership with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, DeepMind attempted to predict AKI using a machine learning system trained on de-identified electronic health record data sets. They claim that the model not only accurately forecasted AKI in patients up two days ahead, but that it managed to identify 90.2% of the most severe cases that later required dialysis.
While making its predictions of deteriorating kidney function, the model highlighted the clinical information it considered most important and provided forecasted results for relevant blood tests. DeepMind characterizes this explainability as an important step toward addressing the “black box” problem of implementing AI in clinical practice.
“This information may help clinicians understand the reasoning behind the AI-enabled alert and anticipate future patient deterioration,” wrote the company. “This could provide a window in the future for earlier preventative treatment and avoid the need for more invasive procedures like kidney dialysis.” DeepMind says the model was designed such that it might generalize to other causes of diseases like sepsis, and it says that it’s in discussions with the Department of Veterans Affairs about the next phases of the project.
Beyond AKI, DeepMind is involved in numerous health-related AI projects, including a trial at the NHS to develop an algorithm that can search for early signs of blindness.
It’s working with the Cancer Research UK Imperial Center at Imperial College London to refine AI breast cancer detection models, an effort that recently expanded to Jikei University Hospital in Tokyo. And in a paper presented at the Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention conference in September, DeepMind researchers revealed they’d developed a model capable of segmenting CT scans with “near-human performance.” For its part, Alphabet has broadly invested in AI health care applications. Google’s Medical Brain team announced last spring that they’d created a mortality-predicting algorithm with 90% accuracy. Google AI researchers working with Northwestern Medicine demonstrated in May a system that can detect lung cancer from screenings better than human radiologists with an average of eight years experience. And last February, scientists from Google and Verily Life Sciences, Alphabet’s health-tech subsidiary, created a model that could accurately deduce basic information about a person, including their age and blood pressure, and whether they were at risk of suffering a major cardiac event like a heart attack.
Verily, a research division within Google parent Alphabet, is separately developing automated systems to tackle sleep apnea, pharmaceutical drug discovery, blood collection, and health insurance.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Cognition IP raises $2.8 million for AI to help patent startups' inventions | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/cognition-ip-raises-2-8-million-for-ai-to-help-patent-startups-inventions"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Exclusive Cognition IP raises $2.8 million for AI to help patent startups’ inventions Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Cognition IP today announced the close of a $2.8 million funding round for its legal services AI. Trained with text from patent filings, its tools are made to augment human lawyers and help startups obtain patents and search existing intellectual property claims.
Cognition IP delivers intellectual property law services at a fixed rate, instead of adopting the hourly approach common among other legal professionals. An hourly pricing model has incentivized traditional law firms to avoid efficiency, CEO Bryant Lee told VentureBeat in a phone interview.
“Law firms just aren’t providing the level of service they could be by using technology. That’s a general problem that we’re trying to solve, trying to bring more technology into the legal world,” Lee said.
Cognition IP was founded in 2018 by Lee, a patent lawyer, and Rutgers University computer science assistant professor Andrew Tjang, who serves as company CTO.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! The funding will be used to power additional AI-enabled resources and ways to search existing patent filings.
“One problem we’re working on is creating a template using AI — training the AI on existing sets of patents and what they look like to get all the background information and structure and then creating a template for that so that the lawyer can put in specific information about the invention,” Lee explained.
Cognition IP is the latest legal business to target AI that reshapes how legal professionals do their jobs.
While companies like LexisNexis have tested automated bots to assist legal professionals , startups like Trellis are making AI using the text of legal decisions to predict payout of class action lawsuits and how judges will rule in a case. Earlier this year, Disco raised $83 million for AI to assist lawyers in the discovery process.
Cognition IP has offices in San Francisco and Washington D.C. and currently has 12 employees.
The $2.8 million seed round was led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from Mayfield Fund and Basis Set Ventures. Cognition IP took part in the Winter 2018 batch at Y Combinator.
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"Amazon's AI helps find answers to complex questions | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/amazons-ai-helps-find-answers-to-complex-questions"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Amazon’s AI helps find answers to complex questions Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
If you’ve ever become frustrated by a virtual assistant’s inability to answer questions satisfactorily, not to worry — researchers at Amazon are on the case. In a newly published paper presented in Paris last week at the ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, a team from the Seattle company’s Alexa AI Natural Understanding group presented a question-answering technique (“ Answering Complex Questions by Joining Multi-Document Evidence with Quasi Knowledge Graphs” ) that demonstrates “clear improvement” over competing methods.
As lead author Abdalghani Abujabal explains in a blog post , most computerized question-answering systems take one of two approaches: They either perform a text search and try to infer the relationships among entities named in the text or they tap a hand-crafted knowledge graph that encodes these relationships. This becomes tricky with complex questions like “Which Nolan films won an Oscar but missed a Golden Globe?” Text search would require a document containing all information required to answer the question, while a knowledge graph would have to represent every relationship implied by the question explicitly.
The researchers sought to combine the best of both worlds with a system that performs a standard text search — an ordinary web search — on the basis of the input question, using the full text of the question as a search string. It retrieves the 10 or so documents the search algorithm ranks highest before applying algorithms to identify named entities and parts of speech within each document, specifically subject-predicate-object triples like “Nolan, directed, Inception” and “The Social Network, winner of, Best Screenplay.” Lastly, it constructs an “ad hoc” knowledge graph of the identified entities and parts of speech on the fly.
Post-construction, the system leverages syntactic clues and data from existing graphs — like lexicons and embeddings — to suss out which names in the graph refer to the same entities. Name alignments are assigned confidence scores, and a search algorithm looks for cornerstones in the graph, or words that very closely match individual words in the search string.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Above: An “ad hoc” knowledge graph (the cornerstones are in yellow).
The system seeks out answers to questions that lie on paths connecting cornerstones, and it evaluates them according to two criteria: their length and confidence scores from the data triples and the name alignments. It eliminates all but the shortest and highest-confidence paths, and it removes all the cornerstones from the graph. along with all the nodes that aren’t named entities.
Finally, the algorithm ranks the remaining entities according to several criteria (such as the weights of the paths that connect them to cornerstones and their distance from cornerstones), and the remaining entity is returned as the answer to the search question.
The team reports that in 36 tests using two different data sets and three different performance metrics, their system outperformed three baselines on 34 and finished a close second on the other two, with an average of 25% (and a high of 80%) improvement over the best-performing baseline. They leave to future work integrating the ad hoc knowledge graphs with existing, curated knowledge graphs and adapting the search algorithm accordingly.
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"Amazon launches Neural Text-To-Speech and newscaster style on AWS Polly | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/amazon-launches-neural-text-to-speech-and-newscaster-style-on-aws-polly"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Amazon launches Neural Text-To-Speech and newscaster style on AWS Polly Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn AWS CTO Werner Vogels onstage November 29, 2018 at re:Invent.
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Not to be outdone by Google’s WaveNet, which mimics things like stress and intonation in speech by identifying tonal patterns, Amazon today announced the general availability of Neural Text-To-Speech and newscaster style in Amazon Polly, its cloud service that converts text into speech.
As Amazon Web Services tech evangelist Julien Simon noted in a blog post, Neural Text-To-Speech delivers significant improvements in speech quality by increasing naturalness and expressiveness.
Here’s an example: As for newscaster style, which makes narration sound “even more realistic” for content like news articles and blog posts, Simon says it was made possible by Neural Text-To-Speech’s underlying machine learning algorithms. “Thanks to Polly and the newscaster style, [listeners] … can enjoy articles read in a high-quality voice that sounds like what they might expect to hear on the TV or radio,” he wrote.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Customers like the Globe and Mail, Gannett, BlueToad, TIM Media, Encyclopedia Britannica, nonprofit education tech company CommonLit, and game developer Volley are already using newscaster style via Polly. And in January Amazon quietly rolled it out to Alexa-enabled devices for daily briefings and Wikipedia snippet narrations.
Here’s what it sounds like: Newscaster style is available for two English voices, while Neural Text-To-Speech is available for 11 voices, including three U.S. English voices and eight U.S. English voices. Both work in real time and in batch mode, and they’re currently accessible in the US East (N. Virginia), US West (Oregon), and Europe (Ireland) AWS regions.
Up to 1 million characters for Neural Text-To-Speech voices per month are free for the first 12 months, starting from the first request for speech (standard or NTTS). It’s a paid affair after that.
Generating humanlike speech using AI Amazon detailed its work on Neural Text-To-Speech in a research paper late last year (“ Effect of data reduction on sequence-to-sequence neural TTS “), in which researchers described a system that can learn to adopt a new speaking style from just a few hours of training — as opposed to the tens of hours it might take a voice actor to read in a target style.
Amazon’s AI model consists of two components. The first is a generative neural network that converts a sequence of phonemes — perceptually distinct units of sound that distinguish one word from another, such as the p, b, d, and t in pad and pat — into a sequence of spectrograms, or visual representations of the spectrum of frequencies of sound as they vary with time. The second is a vocoder that converts those spectrograms into a continuous audio signal.
The phoneme-to-spectrogram interpreter network is sequence to sequence, meaning it doesn’t compute an output solely from the corresponding inputs, instead considering its position in the sequence of outputs. Scientists at Amazon trained it with phoneme sequences and corresponding sequences of spectrograms, in addition to a “style encoding,” which identified the specific speaking style used in the training example. The model’s output was fed into a vocoder that can take spectrograms from any speaker, regardless of whether they were seen during training time.
The end result? An AI model-training method that combines a large amount of neutral-style speech data with only a few hours of supplementary data in the desired style, and an AI system capable of distinguishing elements of speech both independent of a speaking style and unique to that style. “The ability to teach Alexa to adapt her speaking style based on the context of the customer’s request opens the possibility to deliver new and delightful experiences that were previously unthinkable,” wrote Amazon TTS Research senior manager Andrew Breen in a previous blog post.
With Neural Text-To-Speech and newscaster style, Amazon is effectively going toe to toe with Google, which in February debuted 31 new WaveNet voices and 24 new standard voices in its Cloud Text-to-Speech service (bringing the total number of WaveNet voices to 57). It has another rival in Microsoft, which offers three AI-generated voices in preview and 75 standard voices via its Azure Speech Service API.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"AI takes advantage of existing mammography scans to make a cancer diagnosis | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-takes-advantage-of-existing-mammography-scans-to-make-a-cancer-diagnosis"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI takes advantage of existing mammography scans to make a cancer diagnosis Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Though it’s a well-established fact that mammographies (mammograms) reduce breast cancer mortality rates, the high proportion of false-positive recalls associated with such screenings has accelerated development of AI-driven systems from IBM , MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory , and others. But these aren’t perfect, either, because most models operate on a single screening exam.
This shortcoming motivated a team of researchers at New York University’s Center for Data Science and Department of Radiology to propose a machine learning framework that takes advantage of prior exams in making a diagnosis (“Screening Mammogram Classification with Prior Exams “). They say that in preliminary tests, it reduced the error rate of the baseline and achieved an area under the curve (a metric indicating performance at all classification thresholds) of 0.8664 for predicting malignancy in a screening population.
“Radiologists often compare current mammograms to prior ones to make more informed diagnoses,” wrote the coauthors. “For instance, if a suspicious region grows in size or density over time, radiologists can be more confident that it is malignant. Conversely, if a suspicious region does not grow, then it is probably benign.” VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! The team trained an ensemble of machine learning models on the open source New York University Breast Cancer Screening Dataset, with each screening containing at least one image corresponding to the four views typically used in mammography screenings (right craniocaudal, left craniocaudal, right mediolateral oblique, and left mediolateral oblique). They used four binary labels to indicate the presence or absence of benign or malignant findings in the left or the right breast, taking care to consider only the subset of the data set that included patients for which prior exams are available.
The assembled corpus contained 127,451 exam pairs from 43,013 patients, where 2,519 pairs had at least one biopsy performed.
The team trained an ensemble of machine learning models on the data and then compared their performance using only a portion of the training data set. They note that there wasn’t an observable improvement over the baseline for benign predictions, which they attributed to the algorithms’ tendency to focus on regions of scans with significant changes. (Not many changes accompany benign findings.) But they found that one of the models — AlignLocalCompare — showed substantial improvement with respect to the malignant findings, predicting the likelihood of a tumor with 0.97 probability, compared with the baseline’s prediction of 0.73 with about a year gap between two exams for both patients.
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"AI predicts Airbnb prices with 69% accuracy | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-predicts-airbnb-prices-with-69-accuracy"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI predicts Airbnb prices with 69% accuracy Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn A woman talks on the phone at the Airbnb office headquarters in San Francisco.
Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
One needn’t be an oracle to forecast Airbnb listings prices — AI models fed customer reviews and rental features will do the trick. That’s the conclusion drawn by a team of graduate students at Stanford, who investigate in a paper on Arxiv.org (“ Airbnb Price Prediction Using Machine Learning and Sentiment Analysis “) systems leveraging machine learning and natural language processing to anticipate future Airbnb rates.
Alongside the paper, they made available their optimized models on GitHub.
“Pricing a rental property on Airbnb is a challenging task for the owner as it determines the number of customers for the place. On the other hand, customers have to evaluate an offered price with minimal knowledge of an optimal value for the property,” wrote the coauthors. “This paper aims to develop a reliable price prediction model using machine learning, deep learning, and natural language processing techniques to aid both the property owners and the customers with price evaluation given minimal available information about the property.” To train their price-predicting system, the researchers tapped the public Airbnb data set for New York City, which included 50,221 entries with 96 features in total. They inspected each feature to remove those with frequent and irreparable missing fields and change booleans to binaries, and to remove duplicate and “uninformative” features such as host picture URLs. (This reduced the number of features to 22.) In the course of training, the team used 90% of the original data (39,980 samples), reserving 5% for validation and testing (9,996 samples).
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Prior to training, the team tapped the open source TextBlob corpus to analyze the sentiment of listings reviews, which assigned a score between -1 (very negative sentiment) and 1 (very positive sentiment) to each. The scores were averaged across all reviews associated with a given listing and included as a new feature in the training data set.
The team tested several price-predicting machine learning techniques, including linear regression, tree-based models, SVR, and neural networks. But they report that the best-performing model — Support Vector Regression (SVR) — achieved an R2 score (a measure of how well the predictions approximate the real data points) of 69% on the test set.
“This level of accuracy is a promising outcome given the heterogeneity of the dataset and the involved hidden factors and interactive terms, including the personal characteristics of the owners, which were impossible to consider,” wrote the coauthors, who leave to future work collecting more training examples and experimenting with novel neural network architectures.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Qualcomm exec doubles down on the power of 5G and AI at the edge | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/__trashed-14"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages VB Event Qualcomm exec doubles down on the power of 5G and AI at the edge Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
Learn more.
Kishore Chakravadhanula, Qualcomm’s product manager for robotics, believes 5G is the connective fabric that’s going to radically change the landscape for AI at the edge in the coming years. Addressing the audience at Transform 2019 this month, he said it will become as ubiquitous as electricity and Wi-Fi and will bring about massive change.
“5G is unique in that it’s been re-architected from a completely different perspective than regular technologies,” he said. “It’s built for massive data, ultra-reliability, and low latency. It will enable new use cases and applications that we’ve not thought about so far. This will enable new experiences for the end user.” To understand how 5G will change things , it’s important to first consider the challenges in AI at the edge (including the edge cloud). As billions of devices send more and more data, processing all this data in a timely fashion is going to be a massive challenge on the cloud side. Secondly, everything must be done securely while maintaining privacy. The final challenge is achieving all of this in real time.
“That is the biggest hurdle that most of these devices have to clear,” said Chakravadhanula. “The latencies are sometimes not acceptable, going to the cloud and coming back. Here is where on-device processing, on-device sensing, on-device decision-making, and maintaining security is going to change how things will evolve in the coming years.” VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! But the unique requirements of edge devices present their own challenges. Because they operate in a very constrained environment, they have low memory or storage. “They don’t have too much processing power,” he said. “Battery life is always an issue. Finally […] heat dissipation, especially in small form factor devices, is a challenge.” Alongside these issues are the requirements for AI. As Chakravadhanula explained, these are high-compute, multiple concurrency models that happen to run at the same time. They also need to run in real time and need to be always on.
“How do we marry or intersect these two diverging requirements at the edge?” Chakravadhanula asked. He went on to explain how 5G will be a game-changer in solving for these issues — particularly the challenges of massive data, low latency, and better experiences. In turn, this opens up massive opportunity for IoT — the ultra-reliability and low latency that enables machines, manufacturing, and more to benefit from AI without challenges.
“5G enables low-power wide area networks by switching down to narrowband IoT and LTE that is available today, but it’s derivative in the next generation,” said Chakravadhanula. “I’m from robotics, [and] nowhere else is this convergence of AI and 5G happening more, as we see all these kinds of use cases where this takes off.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Self-driving cars are a chance to design a new part of our culture | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/transportation/self-driving-cars-are-a-chance-to-design-a-new-part-of-our-culture"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest Self-driving cars are a chance to design a new part of our culture Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Volvo's 360c concept autonomous car Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Driverless cars aren’t just a new kind of car. They’re teachable machines that come with new ownership models and rules. And we don’t yet have those new models and rules in place yet.
I’m not talking about safety. Yes, self-driving cars still have a lot of learning to do so that they don’t run into people, street furniture, or each other. But beyond that, there are critical choices that still need to be made — complex choices about their aesthetics, the user experience (UX), how they will be leased, owned and paid for, and how they’re introduced to the market.
In short, we still need to define what the experience of not driving a car should be.
The success of autonomous cars depends not only on powerful AI algorithms but also on how well design and creativity are harnessed to create the best experiences for people. The enormity and importance of this task cannot be underestimated, and it is one that will need designers who can address business challenges, the physics of the “device,” and prototyping, as well as communicating these new developments to the world.
Reinventing (everything but) the wheel Developments such as electric motors and drive-by-wire controls mean a mechanical connection to the wheels is no longer necessary. And with no driver required, there is no reason seats have to face forward; passenger experiences could be improved with “social seating” configurations allowing people to face each other, or even recliners like the ones seen in first-class cabins. We can start to imagine cars less like high speed wedges, and more like rooms in motion. The very notion of speed and power — often the default proposition of the auto industry — loses its currency when other benefits like safety, effortlessness, and sustainability become the priorities.
Once the standardized interior layout is disrupted, entirely new design directions will emerge. We can imagine unshackling car interior design from having its own, quite isolated, common language to suddenly being able to borrow from and influence architecture, lighting, textiles, and interiors. We should see vehicles that are hyper relevant to the new ways people live.
When driving is no longer the main activity, time in transit will be spent differently. A long commute to an early morning meeting could become an opportunity to catch up on sleep en route or to rehearse a script last minute. An autonomous vehicle would also have enormous benefits for anyone engaged in confidential work, since they could be completely alone or take private meetings on the move. Imagine booking a car as part of a video conferencing service and taking the call on the move.
Cars could evolve to reflect the purpose of your trip. If this is the case, we’ll see specific apps to facilitate these new uses — a high-spec office suite, entertainment hub, or a comfortable place to relax instead of a clunky handbrake and dashboard. And if cars are designed predominantly around experience and purpose, then hiring a purpose-specific autonomous car from a fleet rather than owning a more generic model could become the norm, with many leading names in the sector already hinting towards it.
This opportunity to conceive of these new interior features — both digital and physical — puts brands in a category defining position.
The new branding Autonomous car brands and services may be chosen on the basis of connectivity, social media, and entertainment content rather than speed, for example. Smart Manufacturers will select their partners and suppliers carefully, knowing when they’re not best positioned to deliver alone.
Established players and startups alike will need to consider branding on a number of levels and take the time to create strong, coherent identities in order to thrive.
Those identities must include creative new experiences, a sense of safety, and the ability to delight.
Given that car will be left unattended, it is not difficult to imagine jumping into an autonomous cab to be greeted by dusty seats, junk food packaging, or worse. Cleanliness and usability will matter a great deal (who would want to rebook a service that previously arrived with someone else’s dinner on the seat?). In effect, every rider will have the power to affect the brand perception the next rider receives. Sophisticated companies will create mutually beneficial relationships with customers, encouraging behaviors by creating in-car messaging, monitoring, and rewards to safeguard their brand experiences. A combination of brilliant messaging, “nudge” psychology, and gamification are ripe for exploration.
Final thoughts It’s no longer a question of whether driverless cars will take off but when.
With big auto and tech teams all racing to get their products to market, we do not yet know if one will dominate or whether the first mainstream vehicle will be developed through partnerships between Silicon Valley tech firms and car manufacturers in Detroit and Stuttgart.
Whatever the case, there will be far more to these cars than the technology itself. Everything from the user experience to the business models to complementary products and services presents an opportunity for innovative design. And the choices brands make won’t just impact their bottom line; they’ll impact everyone and every place that depends on and is affected by the car.
Mat Heinl is CEO at Moving Brands.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Twitter rolls out a notice for tweets from important users that break its guidelines | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/social/twitter-rolls-out-a-notice-for-tweets-from-important-users-that-break-its-guidelines"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Twitter rolls out a notice for tweets from important users that break its guidelines Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Twitter's profile page on Twitter.com Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
( Reuters ) — Twitter said on Thursday it would identify and de-emphasize tweets that broke its rules but came from important sources such as politicians, in order to strike a balance between free expression and accountability.
Twitter said the new rules would apply to politicians and government officials with more than 100,000 followers.
“We’ll now clearly label any tweets which violate our terms of service but decide to keep up due to public interest,” Twitter Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey said.
If flagged, a notice would cover the offending tweet and require a user to click on a link to view it.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Critics have said the social media platform has not done enough to police tweets from politicians that would be removed if a typical user posted them.
Some have called on Twitter to take down vitriolic tweets from U.S. President Donald Trump and other politicians, while Trump and other conservatives have repeatedly accused technology companies of favoring liberals.
Trump boasts more than 61 million followers on Twitter, and many of his tweets are in the news.
The White House declined to comment on the announcement.
Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., tweeted a link to coverage of the announcement by the conservative Daily Caller website and warned: “If they can do it to the Leader of the Free World imagine what they are doing to you and your voice!” A Twitter spokeswoman said a human reviewer will decide which tweets receive the new label, not artificial intelligence monitoring. If a violation were found, a task force of teams would rule whether the questionable tweet should be considered in the public interest.
“There are certain cases where it may be in the public’s interest to have access to certain Tweets, even if they would otherwise be in violation of our rules,” Twitter said in a blog post.
It added: “We’ll place a notice – a screen you have to click or tap through before you see the Tweet – to provide additional context and clarity.” The notice will appear in the home timeline and across other areas such as search, Twitter said.
Trump was criticized last month when he tweeted: “If Iran wants to fight, that will be the official end of Iran. Never threaten the United States again!” He referred to a former FBI agent last year as a “sick loser”.
In another example of a tweet than many critics found offensive, Trump wrote in 2018 that North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un stated the “Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times” and asked if someone would “inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!” Twitter added that “there are cases, such as direct threats of violence or calls to commit violence against an individual, that are unlikely to be considered in the public interest.” A Trump spokesman said this week that the White House is planning a July 11 social media summit but has not identified participants.
Trump said in a television interview on Wednesday without evidence that Twitter makes it “very hard for people to join me at Twitter … and they make it very much harder for me to get out the message.” He added, “Twitter is just terrible what they do.” Twitter declined to comment.
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"Hitman 2's first DLC level is a quirky and thrilling bank heist | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/pc-gaming/hitman-2s-first-dlc-level-is-a-quirky-and-thrilling-bank-heist"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Hitman 2’s first DLC level is a quirky and thrilling bank heist Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Developer IO Interactive has launched the first new level for Hitman 2.
The studio added the New York destination to the assassination simulator earlier this week. It introduces the Golden Handshake campaign mission, which takes place in a Wall Street bank.
Naturally, this introduces a lot of opportunities for Agent 47 to get into some heist-based hijinks (heist-jinks). But Golden Handshake is actually a great example of what makes Hitman 2 so wonderful. The game straddles a number of different tones, but none of them feel cheap or unearned. The action oscillates between slapstick and Val Kilmer in Heat.
And it does so without effort.
In my time with Golden Handshake ( you can watch some of that in the video above ), I think a couple of moments really highlight that dynamic.
The IT crowd Early on in my playthrough, I walked into a room covered in geeky posters. I knew where I was even before I found a pair of IT guys sitting in the corner playing Freedom Fighters and cursing at one another.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! To take them down, I picked up one of the hamburgers they left sitting on a desk. I then finished them off with a giant sea bass I hid in my shirt. I also discovered that I could get access to the main target of the level by powering off the building’s Wi-Fi, dressing up as one of the IT guys, and going up to the office to fix it.
It was only after I put on the IT guy’s clothes that I noticed he was wearing clown shoes for some reason. I’m guessing this is a reference to television comedy The IT Crowd.
Heat A few beats after my funny run in with the dorks, I found myself in a bank vault with the alarm going off. I grabbed the giant data tape that was crucial to my mission, but I had to drop it when some guards started rushing me so I could blast them with my shotgun.
After discovering that I could not use a nearby truck to escape because I didn’t have the keys, I decided to make a run for the front exit. The problem is that carrying around the giant data tape makes everyone in the world suspicious of you. Guards will begin shooting you on sight, for example.
Thankfully, I found a solution to this in a pair of concussive grenades. I took a staircase up to the side of the lobby. I found a corner where I could drop the data tape, pull out the flashbangs, and then toss them into a crowd of guards. This disoriented everyone long enough for me to slide past them and right out onto the street.
Comedy and tension And this is why I love Hitman 2. It effortlessly moves between two extremes that complement one another. One moment you are beating up some nerds in the IT department. The next, you are shotgunning your way out of a bank vault and dropping concussive grenades into a crowd as an exit strategy.
The comedic moments don’t take anything away from the more intense and thrilling parts of a level. They instead act as crucial components in the stories players end up telling about their time in IO Interactive’s world of assassination.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Google announces Equiano, a privately funded subsea cable that connects Europe with Africa | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/google-announces-equiano-a-privately-funded-subsea-cable-that-connects-europe-with-africa"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Google announces Equiano, a privately funded subsea cable that connects Europe with Africa Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Google's Equiano subsea cable will run from Portugal to South Africa, with an additional touchpoint in Nigeria Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Google has announced its fourteenth subsea cable investment — the third international cable funded entirely by the internet giant.
Equiano, as the cable is named, will have three touchpoints, starting in Portugal’s capital of Lisbon and running down Africa’s west coast to connect with South Africa. This will be Google’s first cable stretching from Europe to Africa.
Moreover, Google is building nine “branching units” into the system, which makes it more extensible so that it can connect with other African countries at a later date. The company said it expects to connect with Nigeria after South Africa.
Above: The Equiano subsea cable is Google’s first to run from Europe to Africa Google has enlisted Alcatel Submarine Networks to build the cable, with phase one (Portugal to South Africa) expected to be completed sometime in 2021. The company said Equiano will be the first subsea cable to “incorporate optical switching at the fiber-pair level,” rather than the traditional approach of wavelength-level switching.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! “This greatly simplifies the allocation of cable capacity, giving us the flexibility to add and reallocate it in different locations as needed,” the company wrote in a blog post. “And because Equiano is fully funded by Google, we’re able to expedite our construction timeline and optimize the number of negotiating parties.” Moreover, Google claims Equiano will offer roughly 20 times more network capacity than cables that currently serve the region, thanks to the space-division multiplexing (SDM) technology it’s based on.
Connectivity Google parent company Alphabet, among other technology companies, has increasingly invested in internet infrastructure projects, spanning balloons , public Wi-Fi hotspots , and “last mile” initiatives that link cities’ broadband into long-distance fiber networks. Elsewhere, Amazon is planning a network of satellites for high-speed broadband, while Facebook is working on similar infrastructure projects.
In fact, Facebook is reportedly in the early stages of planning an underwater cable that encircles the whole of Africa.
The goal for all of these programs is the same: to enhance connectivity around the world and improve the companies’ bottom line. Google’s myriad services, which range from cloud computing and maps to video-streaming and email, depend on reliable infrastructure, which subsea cables play an important part in when it comes to increasing data transfer speeds and reducing latency.
Microsoft, which is also investing in underwater cable systems , recently became the first of the “big three” public cloud companies to open a datacenter in Africa , and Amazon’s AWS is due to open one soon.
With the first phase of Equiano expected to be completed within a couple of years, we can perhaps expect Google to announce its own African datacenter plans in the not too distant future.
Named after Olaudah Equiano , a former writer, slave, and abolitionist born in Nigeria, Equiano is the latest in a long line of subsea cable investments Google has made — dating back nearly a decade. The company’s first project was Unity, which stretches 9,620km from Chikura, Japan to Redondo Beach, California and went into service in 2010 — it’s co-owned by a number of other well-known companies, including Elstra, Singtel, KDDI, and Airtel (Bharti).
Above: The Unity cable, which went into operation in 2010, is co-owned by Google, Telstra, Singtel, KDDI, Airtel (Bharti),and TIME.
Google’s first fully privately funded cable — known as Junior — went into service last year. It runs just 390km from Rio de Janeiro to Santos in Brazil. And the company’s first privately funded intercontinental cable, Curie, was completed just a couple of months ago , running 10,000km from Los Angeles all the way down the Pacific coast to Valparaíso, Chile.
Above: Google-funded Curie cable runs from Los Angeles, USA to Valparaíso, Chile Google previously announced another fully self-owned international subsea cable , called Dunant, which runs from Virginia Beach in the U.S. to Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez, France — this one is expected to launch in late 2020.
There are currently more than 400 undersea cables in service around the world, stretching some 1.1 million kilometers (700,000 miles) — and Google is directly invested in around 100,000 kilometers (62,000 miles) of these cables. That works out to about 10% of all subsea cables globally. Combined with its various other programs, spanning datacenters and quirky balloons that beam down internet from the skies, it’s clear Google’s priority is getting everyone online and using its services.
“Over the last three years, Google has invested $47 billion to improve our global infrastructure, and Equiano will further enhance the world’s highest-capacity and best-connected international network,” the company said.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Tetris is getting a battle royale mobile game | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/tetris-is-getting-a-battle-royale-mobile-game"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Tetris is getting a battle royale mobile game Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Tetris 99.
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The Tetris Company and N3TWORK announced today that they are starting a new partnership to create mobile games.
Tetris Royale will be the first project from this duo. It will be another Tetris game with a battle royale twist, similar to Tetris 99 on Switch. Tetris 99 is an exclusive for Nintendo’s platform, so Tetris Royale will give that experience to a larger audience. It is coming to iOS and Android with a beta test starting later this year.
“The Tetris Royale mode is a 100-player competitive mode where players will battle their way to the top of the leaderboards every season,” N3TWORK details in a press release sent to GamesBeat. “Players will have the ability to complete daily challenges while competing in the Tetris Royale mode to earn rewards including customization options as well as power-ups and boosters that can be used in battle.” N3TWORK is a games, media, and technology company best known for the mobile title Legendary: Game of Heroes, a puzzle-based role-playing game similar to the Puzzle Quest series.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Manus VR reveals new Prime series with haptic feedback | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/manus-vr-reveals-new-prime-series-with-haptic-feedback"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Manus VR reveals new Prime series with haptic feedback Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Manus has some new haptic gloves for VR.
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I originally tried out the Manus VR gloves almost three years ago.
In VR years that’s basically an entire lifetime ago. Back then it was rudimentary at best and we’ve seen several other solutioins from companies like Contact CI , Tactical Haptics , and HaptX.
Now it looks like Manus is back with a new evolution of its controller design called the Manus Prime Series.
The Manus Prime Series has three variations: the Prime One, the Haptic Prime (shown in the featured image up above), and the Xsens Prime.
According to a company representative via email, the differences are as follows: The Prime One is the core of our product line, an all-round wireless data glove that tracks individual fingers on two joints, and that can stream the data directly into Unity, Unreal, Motionbuilder or one of the large enterprise software platforms such as IC.IDO or Vizard.
The Haptic Prime is a Prime One with linear resonant actuators. It provides unique haptic signals depending on the type of material and how much virtual force is applied. Haptic feedback is fully customizable in the user interface, with an integrated material editor and adjustable signal strength, frequency and resonance.
Finally, the Xsens Prime is a glove designed for integration into a Xsens motion capture suit, to complete the hand with finger data on their IMU suits.
We have zero experience with any of these three new products so we can’t comment on their quality or effectiveness, but it’s certainly exciting to see a company continue iterating on and improving their technology. Glove-based interaction has a lot of potential for the future of VR, especially if we’re looking to pop fiction as inspiration. Hopefully we get a chance to try these new versions at SIGGRAPH later this year to provide hands-on accounts.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Doctor Who: The Edge of Time -- Daleks and Weeping Angels come to life in VR | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/doctor-who-the-edge-of-time-daleks-and-weeping-angels-come-to-life-in-vr"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Doctor Who: The Edge of Time — Daleks and Weeping Angels come to life in VR Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Hopefully you enjoyed the first look at Doctor Who : The Edge of Time at our E3 VR Showcase this month. Today, though, developer Maze Theory is taking you a little deeper behind the scenes of the VR game.
The developer’s just unleashed a range of new making of videos. There’s a main one in which members of the studio are on-hand to talk about working on the game and then some brief looks at bringing some of the series’ iconic villains to virtual life.
Doctor Who: The Edge Of Time is due for launch in September on PSVR, Rift, Vive and Quest.
In The Edge of Time, you play as a new companion to the Doctor that must track down the Tardis and set off to rescue her. A new villain has trapped the Doctor at the (you guessed it) edge of time. To save her, you’ll travel across different times and come into contact with some of the best-known baddies from the TV series.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! That includes the Weeping Angels, a terrifying brand of beast made famous in a more recent series. They’re stone statues that only move when you can’t see them. That creates a frightful mechanic where you’ll want to be looking at them at all times. And yes, you’ll meet a Dalek or two too. Current Jodie Whittaker also lends her voice talents to the game throughout.
Maze Theory also got to design a new villain named the Hydrorks for the game. They’re sludgy-looking monsters that you can see in the first video below.
This story originally appeared on Uploadvr.com.
Copyright 2019 GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Cory Barlog: The struggle of making God of War | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/cory-barlog-the-struggle-of-making-god-of-war"
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"Game Development View All Programming OS and Hosting Platforms Metaverse View All Virtual Environments and Technologies VR Headsets and Gadgets Virtual Reality Games Gaming Hardware View All Chipsets & Processing Units Headsets & Controllers Gaming PCs and Displays Consoles Gaming Business View All Game Publishing Game Monetization Mergers and Acquisitions Games Releases and Special Events Gaming Workplace Latest Games & Reviews View All PC/Console Games Mobile Games Gaming Events Game Culture Cory Barlog: The struggle of making God of War Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn God of War.
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Cory Barlog has been on a year-long victory tour since the release of God of War, the acclaimed title that has had tremendous success on the Sony PlayStation 4. And his latest stop was at Gamelab, the game event in Barcelona this week.
Stuart Whyte, head of Sony’s London studio and creator of the virtual reality game Blood & Truth, moderated a discussion with Barlog that produced both familiar and novel stories. Barlog told tales about the hard work, self-doubt, and false starts that the project had, as he did in an earlier interview with GamesBeat.
Barlog said that early on, some members of the team wanted to get rid of Kratos. But Barlog fought to keep him. And others didn’t think that Kratos’ companion, his son Atreus, was a good addition. But Barlog wanted the game to be a father-son story.
And the game went on to greatness. The game received a rating of 94 out of 100 on review aggregator Metacritic, and it sold more than 10 million copies. It won Game of the Year at The Game Awards and many other awards.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! That was a big achievement since God of War was made at Sony’s Santa Monica studio with a team of 300 people over five years. By comparison, as many as 2,000 people worked on Rockstar’s rival Red Dead Redemption 2 for as much as seven years, but God of War handily beat [the higher rated] Red Dead in awards.
During his conversation with Whyte, Barlog confessed, “I don’t know if I’ve fully processed all of it yet. It’s been a wild year afterward. It’s one of those things where–we had our heads down, working so hard for so long, and there was a point in time where, while we were happy with what we had done, a lot of us still had that possibility in our heads that this wasn’t going to be received well.” Here’s an edited transcript of their fireside chat.
Above: Cory Barlog, creative director at Sony Santa Monica, and director of God of War.
Stuart Whyte: The first question is, you were game director of God of War. Can you talk about what that role involved and your approach to that? Cory Barlog: A game director, in my mind, is somebody who makes everybody on the team miserable for the duration of the project. Honestly, the majority of the job is about putting yourself in uncomfortable positions every single day. It’s about not knowing at all what you want to do, but also knowing exactly what you want.
You have to have this straddling balance of realizing that games are incredibly complex. You can have an idea of where you want to go with something, the structure of something, but the actual moment to moment figuring all this out–it unravels over the course of, in God of War’s case, about five years. You talk to people, get them excited. You’re sort of selling everyone a car for two years, because there’s really not much there. You’re just convincing them, “You should try this. This is going to be great. Trust me.” Even when it’s a crazy idea or something way too big initially.
The first year of the game I kept telling everyone the game was only going to be 10 hours. Don’t worry! It’s gonna be small! It’ll be fine. Then I grew into, 10 hours in the critical path and 10 hours in the exploration. Yeah, it’s 20 hours, but don’t worry, it won’t get any bigger than that. And then it was — okay, it’s going to be about 40 hours.
Above: The audience watches Cory Barlog and Stuart Whyte at Gamelab.
To be honest, everybody was always surprised when the game was finished. “We’re really surprised by how long it was!” I don’t think I’ve ever worked on anything that wasn’t way bigger than we expected. That’s all the way back to working on fighting games at Paradox. Everything seems to balloon when more and more people get involved.
From my perspective, the director is just somebody there constantly keeping an eye on everything, overlooking the entire project. At Santa Monica we do it slightly differently than other studios. I’m working with the marketing groups to make sure the game’s message is consistent throughout, and working with licensing groups to make sure there’s consistency. There’s one view over the entire thing. But I really don’t produce anything during the day, except hot air.
It’s crazy. All I do is talk. I used to animate. I started in animation, and you’d end every day with at least one substantive contribution. I created an animation and it’s awesome. Sometimes I’d create three or four in a day and feel really productive. Now all I do is go to meetings all day and beg, mostly. Please, just do this! Trust me on this! You’re constantly trying to convince people that it’s just a little bit further. Like when you’re low on gas. “Let’s pull over and ask for directions.” “No, no, it’s just up ahead!” I feel like that’s all I’m doing. It’s just up ahead, don’t worry.
Whyte: You mentioned that 30 to 40 hours of gameplay length — Blood and Truth was five to six hours, and even that was challenging to review. How the hell do you approach a 30-40 hour game, constantly reviewing it during development? Above: God of War.
Barlog: It’s very challenging, especially when the game isn’t actually put together until that last six to eight months. A lot of the time you can’t even see the entire experience. You know what the whole experience needs to be, but it’s all in broken pieces all over the place. I think it was the Christmas before release in April where we had everything fully assembled, all together, and people could take the game home and come back and say what they thought.
That is weird, because it felt like every God of War I’ve ever made, Christmas was the time everyone would take the build home and come back right before release, and either say really good things or just have a lot of very bad things to say. This was a nice mixture of — there were a lot of bad things, because we had terrible balance. We’d just gotten the economy online for all the upgrading. It was a disaster. But that was the first pass. That’s how it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to be terrible.
A lot of other stuff, like the camera, the no-camera-cut thing we were trying out — that was something a lot of people didn’t believe throughout the duration of the project. It was a lot of work. To be totally respectful to the team, I put a lot of work on the animation and cinematics group, even though in the beginning I said, “Aw, don’t worry, it’s gonna be fine. It’s not that big of a deal.” It was a really big deal. The AI group, the animation group, everyone had to do all this extra work. We had to invent new rules, new ways to set up cinematics, new ways for characters to navigate the world and hit their marks.
Above: Stuart Whyte (left) and Cory Barlog discuss God of War.
But it paid off. At the end these people came back after Christmas and said, “Now I get it. I get why it was important that we did this.” It just felt different. Actually attacking something like that and testing it — I struggled. At the end I was trying to get people to — I’d say, “I can’t go to meetings right now. I need to play the game.” But you’d get maybe three hours before there was a fire. There’s a fire every five minutes on one of these projects. It’s ridiculous.
Whyte: It’s even more challenging in VR. At least when you’re playing the game, you can see in the peripheral vision someone coming over to ask a question. In VR you’re trapped.
Barlog: When you do character interactions within VR, part of the magic of that is to feel like the person is looking directly at you. That’s not on the performance, is it? You’re doing some extra stuff. What do you do to get that to work? Whyte: I think we found — VR is such a new medium. I think one of the biggest learnings we’ve found is, there’s a design language that we as an industry have created over the last few decades. Thinking about health systems, locomotion systems, cutscenes, cutaways. Even PC control systems like WASD iterated over a very long time. Some of those things work brilliantly in VR and some of them just do not work at all.
For us it was an exciting time to try and play around with that. One thing was within our drama and our story elements, where the player is the camera. You have no control over where the player looks. You have a scene with seven or eight characters, and the player could just spend the entire time fixating on one character.
Barlog: I kept trying to look under the table when people were talking to me.
Above: God of War has a father-son story.
Whyte: Bizarrely enough, there was some chewing gum hidden under a table that I found one day. That’s why the game took longer. A lot of attention to detail there. But we had to create some eye- and head-tracking tech, so that when you’re moving back and forth like this, the characters’ eyes keep following you. Their heads subtly move. As soon as we didn’t have that enabled, as soon as you start moving around, you just feel the character is talking through you, rather than at you.
That kind of personal interaction, you’ve gotta have someone looking at you and paying attention to you. It was tech like that which I think you only need to do in VR, but it was super complex to get right.
Barlog: Did that come on early or late? Whyte: It came together quite hot at the end. I think the whole — games can come together hot. There’s definitely elements where you think this is going to work really well, and then you start trying to implement it. It doesn’t work well. You think, “I’ve gotta keep the faith, gotta keep with it.” Then you try over weeks and months more, doing user testing, and it’s still coming back — but you’ve got to crack this. It’s so important.
For example, our inventory system. You wear a headset. The PlayStation can track the headset and track your left and right moves. But it has no concept of where the rest of your body is. We started to have ammo kits here and holsters down here. It worked most of the time, but if you started leaning forward and reaching down, what is the player going for? It gets very confusing.
Barlog: I found that if I was moving around, I’d think, “Wait a minute, something’s happening!” It’s interesting. All games — maybe there are people out there who do not adhere to this, but every game I’ve ever worked on, and every game I’ve ever talked about, is ugly as hell until it’s not ugly, which is usually in the last six to eight months. It’s usually a disaster. It’s all in pieces everywhere. It’s constantly about keeping the faith. That’s very hard. When you start getting teams that range anywhere from 20 to 300 people — you have 300 individual human beings with different levels of stress and anxiety who are saying, “I’m not confident in this.” That permeates the people near them. You’re constantly spinning plates.
Whyte: And even different — people like different types of games on teams. It’s impossible to make a game that can appeal to everybody on the team. Some people like certain elements more than others. I went to a conference last year, a Sony internal conference, where you talked about the challenge of keeping the faith. You talked about Atreus. Can you talk about the challenges with having the boy? Barlog: I talk about this a lot, but that was not a popular decision in the beginning. It was, “Hey, that’s cool. Kratos is a dad.” But a lot of people on the team were the old guard. These are people who worked on God of War back in 2003 when I first started there. We were making the original God of War. To them, they were like, “There’s a kid running around? That’s really annoying.” They were remembering games that had escort missions and companions that were not so good.
Above: God of War for PlayStation 4.
For me, even though I was aware of those games, I thought there was a really great example in The Last of Us, where they actually pulled off something really amazing, and they did it in a way where — they threw out most of their work six months before ship. That’s who they are. That’s what they do. They realized it wasn’t working, and it doesn’t matter if the schedule isn’t there. Throw it out and start over.
It was actually simpler. They were making something really complicated, which is what we do. When you start at the beginning you’re going to make something that’s the most amazing PhD dissertation in companion AI. In the end it really needed to boil down to a few simple rules, to prevent the player experience from sucking. For us, we looked at that, added a few rules to the ones they had, and really made it around this idea of, let’s make it really simple.
We didn’t have it figured out in the beginning, but we at least understood right at the beginning that it should be simple. We should have a single button. Only one button dedicated. Now that we had the new camera where we could look around, we could use the camera for intent, and then the button for action. If I’m looking at a door, the action changes based on wherever I’m at. It’s contextual without putting icons or anything in there. It allows you to get more immersed in the world.
But even then, Atreus did not intelligently come online until probably September the year before we released. So much went into this. We kept kicking the ball down the field every time. “Oh, this isn’t working. Well, it’s fine, we’ll figure it out later.” That’s a huge thing in development. When something is scary or very hard, well, figure that out later. I realized that somebody has to figure that out at some point. When the people who had to figure it out started telling me they were going to figure it out later, I thought, “Oh, man, I’m screwed.” I’m the one usually saying this. If they’re saying it, it’s not gonna get done.
There was a point where we were going to cut Atreus completely. It was mostly just due to budget, where we were realizing — in the beginning, you look at the problem and you say, “Oh, this is very complicated,” and you pad it. You pad it tremendously when it’s a problem you haven’t solved before. Nobody at the studio had done companions at all. They ended up padding it so much that it was — 2030 was when the game would eventually release, with how much it was going to take to do this. Or we’d have to cut a ton of stuff from the game.
I said, “Guys, we can’t do that.” Finally, we realized we were struggling to hire engineers who could do this. I ended up writing a pitch for a game without Atreus, just as a backup. Thankfully I never had to use it, because we ended up hiring a few programmers. I ended up convincing some people. “Hey, don’t worry. We can figure it out. This will be fine.” But it’s a lot of begging, being a director, and a lot of dealing with the fact that 50 percent of the time, 50 percent of the team is not supporting the idea you’re talking about. And then another 50 percent isn’t supporting a different idea. You multiply that by a different thing every day. It’s not because they’re malicious or anything. They just don’t see it, and they’re focused on another thing. They’re thinking, “I don’t know if I agree with that.” Or it’s conflicting with something that they want to do. It’s a lot about relationships.
Above: Kratos character model is filled with detail.
Whyte: God of War was incredibly well-received. You won so many awards. How have you processed that? Coming up to release, it was a hard finish, but following that, how did it feel? Barlog: Exhausting? I don’t know. It’s interesting. I don’t know if I’ve fully processed all of it yet. It’s been a wild year afterward. It’s one of those things where — we had our heads down, working so hard for so long, and there was a point in time where, while we were happy with what we had done, a lot of us still had that possibility in our heads that this wasn’t going to be received well.
Whyte: You start to lose perspective.
Barlog: Yeah. You get too close to it. You don’t have any sense — because everything is so insular, and we had to keep everything pretty secret, we only had ourselves to talk to. There’s always these champions on the team, people who are just incredibly positive all the time no matter what. They’re good people to feed in. But if you’ve heard them for five years, you start to not believe them either. You get into this negative cycle.
When the reviews came out, when people started talking about it, it was very exciting. But as it progresses on, maybe six months after release, then it’s just a lot of pressure. Then it’s just, “Oh my gosh, what am I doing here?” It’s like that story people tell about Dave Chappelle, where he had done the second season of Chappelle’s Show and it was absolutely hilarious. I think he felt such a tremendous amount of pressure — how do you top that? I guess I’m just going to play World of Warcraft a year. That’s what I feel like doing.
Whyte: God of War was a reimagining of the franchise, kind of a reinvention of the franchise. What were the core elements you wanted to keep and what was the stuff that was more on the periphery, that was less important? Barlog: We had a lot of discussions in the beginning where we went into a conference room and just wrote every sort of load-bearing concept for the game on the wall. Every possible thing we could think of that represented the game, from Greek mythology to the Blades of Chaos to the double jump to platforming. All this stuff. We listed it out and we went through point by point and started talking about each one. If you remove this, does that make it not God of War? Even the early discussions, people said we had to get rid of Kratos. A bunch of people were in the camp of, no more Kratos, he’s annoying, he’s done. I had decided from the beginning that I wanted to use him, because I wanted to see if we could make a turnaround with the character. I wanted to see if we could take somebody that people hate, or they like to hate….
Above: Cory Barlog accepts best story award at DICE Awards for God of War.
Whyte: Less angry.
Barlog: Yeah. Figure out if we could take that backstory and change it a bit. But there were several people who said, “You gotta get rid of this. He’s not God of War. Greek mythology is God of War.” And I thought, “Really?” We had a long discussion back and forth about this. “People associate Greek mythology more with God of War than they do Kratos.” I thought that was a bummer, because it meant we could never leave Greek mythology, if we were tied to that, as opposed to the character.
I think it was just that they really did not like the character. They wanted to see a new character. I think what they really wanted, though, was to see him change. That’s a lot of convincing, to say, “No, I really think this is a good idea. We need to stick with this.” But the jump, surprisingly, was not a hard thing to get rid of. I was nervous at first, but when I weighed it against the new camera system, the systems guys — Eric Williams is a guy I’ve worked with for more than a decade and a half, probably. He was the one that basically said, “Look, do you want to tackle the camera or tackle the jump? The jump is something you’ll figure out after you figure out the camera, and the camera is going to be really difficult. If you don’t want to cut the camera, you should cut the jump.” As we started progressing through I would hear people publicly talking about the new God of War and saying, “I can’t believe they got rid of the jump. I’m really disappointed. #NotMyGodOfWar!” For getting rid of the jump? Really? That’s the thing that broke the deal? Whyte: Probably best to avoid Twitter during development. [laughs] And then you added Atreus. That was quite a departure. You’ve talked in the past about God of War being your most personal experience, with being a father. What did you bring to the story with regards to that? Barlog: That was a thing I’d learned — I’d been working with a bunch of film directors. After I left Sony in 2007, I was doing a creative walkabout, just meeting a bunch of people and trying to learn. I felt like I’d learned a lot at Sony, but I was very much an infant in my abilities. I needed to understand a lot more.
Some of the people I was talking to were echoing something that Sam Mendes once said. He talked about finding your own way into a story. If somebody else writes your story — if you’re a director who’s taking a script off the shelf, or you’re adapting a book, or you’re brought on a project a bit late — regardless of what that is, find your personal way into the story. There is a connection to every story that is personal to you. If it isn’t, it’s going to read on the screen. If it doesn’t mean something to you, if there isn’t a connection, you’re going to feel it.
Above: Cory Barlog is … Kratos.
You can make a lot of really cool things, but the thing that we aspire to as creative people is to connect to the audience. Make them feel something. That lesson took a while for me to get. It took a few years for me to really sink in. When I came back to Sony I realized that the biggest thing that happened in my life — I was shipping Tomb Raider, and my son was born. I was either going to make a ripoff of Tomb Raider or incorporate my son into this story.
As I started thinking about it, I realized that there’s a lot that changes. Everybody says a kid is life-changing, but your perspective on things changes. It made me think about this idea that — okay, here’s a character that everybody dislikes. We built him as an anti-hero. The whole goal — at the time there were not a lot of anti-heroes in games, so that’s what we leaned into. But it was this idea of giving him a reason to want to change.
He already has a reason, of course. Spoilers, but at the end of God of War III he doesn’t get to die. He’s kind of tormented. He’s cursed. He’s a guy who’s going to walk the earth forever. He started the first game, way back in 2005, jumping off a cliff and not being able to succeed. Spoilers again, sorry. And he ends God of War III not being able to kill himself with the most powerful weapon that’s supposed to be a god-killer. Clearly he’s cursed to walk the earth forever.
Giving him this external motivation to change was very interesting, because I was aspiring to the same thing. At the time I thought, “I’m gonna work a bit less. I’ll have a bit more focus on my home life over my work life.” He was this reminder, as I was working, that we were both struggling with our own lives. We were both motivated by similar things.
That idea, bringing that personal aspect into the game, meant that we could start pulling in from everyone in the studio. A lot of people that I worked with had worked on the earlier God of War games, and were all old now. We all had families. We were all in a similar place. When we made the first God of War we were in our college years, right? We were like, “Screw you, we’ll top everything. We’re better than everyone else.” Now we’re more like, “We want to make something we’re proud of. We want to make something we can tell our families about.” That gave us the opportunity — so many moments throughout the game are from interactions with various people on the team and their kids, or people on the team and their parents, or people on the team and their significant others. Everyone has these personal stories. As I walk into the studio and have a random conversation, I’m realizing, “I’ll steal this. I’ll steal that. We can incorporate that in the game.” Being open to that is a huge aspect of this job, just being able to say, “This is very interesting. We should use this in some way.” Above: God of War Whyte: Am I right in thinking that the novelization was written by your father as well? It’s like a full-on….
Barlog: Yeah, it’s a family affair. It’s like the Trump administration. But basically, for me, there was this idea that God of War II — my father and I broke that story first. We were originally writing the script together. The direction I was steering him in was a really bad direction. We kept pushing toward this thing until the story just was not working. It was collapsing under its own weight. We realized that it just wasn’t there. We were fighting, because it’s family. When you write a script with your dad, you’re gonna argue a lot.
Whyte: Did he call you “boy”? Barlog: [laughs] “Boy” came about because I didn’t have a name for him. That was all because, in the beginning of the thing — I’m very obsessive about names. I can’t put in fake names. A lot of writers will just put in Mr. White and Mr. Pink and Mr. Brown. They’ll write in random names and move on. I can’t do that. I have to have the actual name. Otherwise I don’t want to put it in there, because then I’ll become distracted by the fact that it’s not the right name, and I’ll obsess over that one detail.
I thought, “Okay, we’ll just call him ‘boy.'” Then Chris really got into it. He started throwing “boy” everywhere. Literally every scene we shot was ended with “Come, boy.” To a point where we had to tell him, “Hey, don’t say that anymore. I think we’ve got a lot of takes of that, and it feels like every time we leave, every scene ends with that.” Whyte: He much get that all the time, walking down the street. People shouting that at him.
Barlog: I’m pretty sure he gets to say it like 10 times a day.
Whyte: You directed the motion capture shoots on God of War. How many days did you guys do that? Barlog: Oh, wow. It was a big shoot, but we do shoots differently in games. I’m hoping we can figure out a way to make shoots different, because I think shooting a nice chunk, doing a 15- or 30-day shoot to get all of your mocap work done, is a really good way to do it. We shot one day at a time, spread out over like four years. We’d do one day, two days, or three days. It was hard, because by the time you get to a three-day shoot, by the third day you’re really into it. You’re ready to go. Then you stop and you don’t see the actors for six months. It’s also very hard to book everyone. If you have seven people, trying to get all of them aligned on the same three days is a nightmare. That was a logistical nightmare.
I was hoping to figure out better ways to do that, but for me that’s as close as I can stay connected to everything. We did the audio and mocap separately in the early God of War games. I would go into the V/O booth and direct the actors there, and then we’d go and shoot with somebody else, a stunt actor. Then we’d assemble all of it, because most of it was done with hand animation in the game.
Now, in order to get what we wanted from the scenes, to get the characters to actually connect, we wanted to do everything on the set, plus with no cuts, which was way harder than I imagined on the set. I had to deal with it. It wasn’t just this big idea where I said, “Somebody go figure this out!” We had to go on the set and do these seven-minute single-take shots with a nine-year-old. We’re giving him three pieces of his direction and he’s saying, “Uh, okay?” And then I’m here saying, “Do something different at 1:03 of this scene.” It’s very interesting. My favorite times are on the set, but it’s also the more stressful time. You have to get everything. On the floor, when you’re working with everyone, you try something and it doesn’t work? All right, that’s cool. Come back tomorrow and we’ll mess with it again. You can tinker and finesse things for days. Whereas on the set, just to get everybody in there and turn the lights on for that one day is a cost. If you screw up and you don’t get everything that you need, you have to do all that over again and bring everybody back in. That’s not good. I tried to not screw up as much as possible.
Above: Oh no. Up ahead. It’s a bunch of gamers.
Whyte: From a casting perspective, how did you approach casting? Barlog: Poorly, I think, mostly. I struggled with that. I had specific people in mind that I wanted to work with, but in the beginning we wanted to see if we could figure out how to do the mocap the old way. We hadn’t decided whether we were going to have a new actor for Kratos. We were going to have performance capture, but we needed a bigger actor in the suit to perform. We were looking into tests as far as how we could modify the animation and mocap data, as well as bring in the audio. Those tests didn’t work out. Then we said, “All right, now we have to find a very large actor that has the voice of Kratos.” That took two years. I had almost lost faith. When we found Chris Judge, I was getting meeting requests from Shannon and Yumi on a daily basis to say, “All right, let’s talk about this. If it doesn’t work out we’ll have to go back to this. We’ll have to scale this thing down. We’ll have to cut back.” I was very anxious about that. We found the kid so easily. Atreus was found on the second set of auditions. I think he was the first kid that came in on the second set of auditions. I thought, “Oh, this is great, this will be so easy.” And then it was not easy after that.
Whyte: He thought he was auditioning for a movie, right? Barlog: I think they all did. Danielle, who played Freya, she thought she was auditioning for Game of Thrones. She tried not to be disappointed when she realized it wasn’t Game of Thrones. Chris was the same. He said, “This isn’t a game. This is a movie, right?” I thought, “Should I tell him, or is he not going to want to do it?” How long can I hold the lie until I have to tell him, “By the way, Chris, this is a game and we just shipped it”? But he was very happy. I think his son was a God of War fan, so he was able to get into it.
Baldur was a very hard character to cast. I did a lot of director letters initially. Jeremy Davies, the guy who ended up playing Baldur, was someone I thought about in the beginning, because I’d just finished watching Justified, and I thought he was absolutely brilliant. I thought, “Aw, we should get this guy. But he’s not gonna talk to us.” We had bad experiences with actors on the earlier games. We had contacted several actors that are fairly well-known who came back to us and said they wanted $10 million. Our budget’s not even $10 million, what are you talking about? It was just that they’d had a bad experience on a game, so they didn’t want to do it. That was their way of saying no, just asking for a lot of money. Other people flat-out said they’d never work on a video game.
Other people who I fought really hard for ended up not working out. You get really excited about bringing in somebody where you’re familiar with their work, only to find out that they have some baggage that comes with that. It makes it hard to get what you want. Your experience — you’re bringing in actors that are fairly well-known as well, right? Whyte: We’ve historically — I guess like a lot of people in the industry, you just hire V/O artists. You get the right voice, put them in a booth, and it’s all fine. With Blood and Truth we wanted to try and scan in the artists and try photogrammetry. We suddenly created a much higher bar from a casting perspective, because we had to find something that obviously had the right voice, but also looked the part and could physically act. Particularly within VR and the motion capture there — because the player is the camera, it’s much more of an ensemble feeling. It’s almost like theater direction.
Trying to get that combination where — again, we’d had some show reels coming in where they had great acting chops, and they definitely sounded the part, but they didn’t look like the kind of character we wanted to put in the game. Trying to those three combinations made it more challenging, definitely.
Above: Cory Barlog, creative director at Sony Santa Monica and creator of God of War.
Barlog: It’s great, because I think VR is helping to usher in more comfort on the game side. I look at actors to be in the game. For a long time people said, “Oh, we don’t need to have the likeness of the actor in the game. We don’t need celebrities. Just bring in voice actors.” I like to have a good balance. There are certain performers where this person is just perfect. I get that they’re a name, but they’ll be perfect for this. You end up battling a lot of game understanding. “That’s not necessary!” But clearly it’s becoming more accepted when you see something like Keanu Reeves playing Johnny Silverhand in Cyberpunk. The entire cast of Death Stranding is amazing. I think that’s a really exciting aspect. We’re starting to see more of a connection between these industries. There was pretty much a wall for a while. I felt like in the beginning there was not this connection between these two industries, but we’re seeing a lot of younger directors on the film side that play games. They’re more aware of this. A lot more actors are fully aware of what this is. We’re able to give them meaty performances, as opposed to just doing voice.
Great voice actors are a treasure. When you find an incredible voice actor, it’s absolutely amazing. But also being able to have someone who can perform completely, who can take over that character, even in those ridiculous helmets and unitards — it’s very difficult. I don’t think I could do that.
Whyte: Similarly, we went into the Hollywood route with our performance director, Rick Porras. Really early on, we knew we wanted to have a solid story for our game. Typically I would say, as an industry, we’re not great at stories. We partnered with someone who had been a producer and director, worked on Lord of the Rings movies, Contact, Forrest Gump, to come and help with character development story development, which was super useful.
Then, when we came to do our performance shoot, we were like, “We need someone to direct this stuff.” We didn’t feel super comfortable directing ourselves. We had to try and findthe director for our mocap shoot. Then we thought, “Rick knows the characters really well. He directed the second unit scenes in Lord of the Rings. He knows his stuff.” We brought him on board for that. But I think for him as well — within VR, because you have no closeups, no cutaways, it’s definitely challenging. It was great to have him on board and helping bring out the performances from our cast that I think we might not have gotten otherwise.
We were trying to ape an action movie. The whole thing is being an action hero, John Wick, James Bond, John McClane. You don’t need to have amazing complex stories with an action, but they have to be solid. The characters need to be solid and believable to bring you into their world and immerse you. That was super important.
Barlog: Some of the best stories are simple. For me it’s this adage of simple stories with complex characters. Your characters having layers and depth and dimension. They feel like they’re having an interesting arc that they’re going through in this. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a complicated story. The story I kept pitching people in the beginning was, Kratos and Atreus go to the mountain. Spoilers, to scatter mom’s ashes.
Whyte: That’s pretty much the opening cutscene.
Above: Hey boy, what’s your name? Barlog: That actually wasn’t even the first story we did. The first story we did, we spent a year on it. I was trying out something different, where I was going to say, “You know what, I’ll let the writers run with this.” I had a high level idea of what I wanted, but I was going to give them a lot more control. I realized that I’m terrible at giving up control. What it did was it made me farther and farther away from connecting with the story.
They were doing a great job. No judgment against whether the story they were coming up with was a good story. It was just that it happened to be better suited for a later story. We were assuming the relationship between the two characters was already what it was, and we were focusing more on the interesting elements of Norse mythology. It was one of those situations where it’s very easy, I think, as creators to go, “Wow, there’s all this cool backstory and this cool world-building we can do.” You lose sight of the core of what you wanted to do. I had to shelve that story and figure it out, get deep into it myself, so at least I could be connected to it, and then start working with them again.
It was definitely, for me, a huge learning experience. At first I felt like, “Oh, I can let other people take care of this stuff.” But the reality is that I needed to be involved. They were still the ones doing it, but I needed to be, on a day to day basis, getting involved. The connection between the play experience and the story experience is so intertwined. It’s like a soup. You can’t separate the elements out of it. They’re all one thing together.
This idea of someone writing a story over here and somebody making the game over here is such an old way of thinking. It all really needs to fit together in the sense that — it’s not just questioning every decision and saying, “Should this be interactive?” It’s really trying to find the things that drive the character forward in a way that feels like it’s cohesive with the interactive experience.
One thing I was amazed about while playing your game was trying to understand — how do you test for timing? For us, we can understand the pacing between walking and combat and talking and being in a menu. We understand these limits. You don’t want to go over this too much. You want to integrate these things to ensure that you’re getting a good variety and a good pacing. But from a VR perspective, how do you find people’s attention span for story and interaction and combat? Whyte: One of the things that we’ve — VR is super intense. VR is a really young medium. Compared to the 90 million PlayStation 4s, there are 4 million PlayStation VRs out there. It’s still really new. One thing that we found early on was that a gunfight in a standard console game, which can be intense — if you put that in a headset, it can be crazy intense. And it works really well, but we also found that an intense fatigue can creep in.
My example is, if you’re in a VR experience and you’re escaping a building that’s collapsing around you, and it’s a 30-second sequence, that’s awesome. It’s super intense. It’s a really good payoff at the end when you escape. But if you do that same thing for five minutes, about three minutes into it your brain is just screaming to get out of here. It’s too much sensory overload.
We had to break our combat up. Combat is a key component of being an action hero, but we had to put drama scenes in there. We had to put in object interaction stuff and more peripheral things, which were much lower-intensity, but also really worked well in VR. Just picking up objects and interacting….
Barlog: The ladder stuff.
Above: Here’s my sage advice for you.
Whyte: Yeah, yeah. We knew from PlayStation VR Worlds: The London Heist, which was kind of the spiritual predecessor to Blood and Trust, that that stuff was really powerful. But even in the development in Blood and Truth we found problems there. We loved how, in VR Worlds — there was a scene in a pub where you had Mickey giving you a lighter and a phone and a cigar. You could light the cigar. It was really cool.
We kind of think of those objects as being toys. When we were in development with Blood and Truth, we put toys everywhere. You could reach into the environment and pick stuff up and play around. It was great.
Barlog: Were people in playtests doing unexpected things? Whyte: Well, this is what started to happen. Our third level in the game is a casino. There’s a really light tutorial for a CCTV mini-game. We found that players had found some scrunched-up balls of paper, and there was a basket in the corner. They were getting the paper and trying to throw in the basket over and over again. By the time the tutorial had finished, they’d paid zero attention. Similarly, we had these really intense drama sequences where people would just spend the entire time trying to juggle or throw things all over the place.
Barlog: Yeah, I was throwing the papers back and forth the first time in that interrogation.
Whyte: We had to pare that back, but we knew we couldn’t delete it, because there was an expectation and it was cool. But we definitely — if we’re ever teaching the player something, we’d make sure there was nothing to distract them. You pay attention. Similarly, when we’re in some of the drama scenes or whatever, we try to keep the props relevant to the scene. The opening of the game has a clipboard with the character’s photo on it. You can look at it or whatever and get that vibe. It’s much more in keeping with the scene.
There’s definitely something that became emergent during development. What did emerge for you during development? Was there any kind of feature that you didn’t have planned early on that came out as you were developing the game over five years? Barlog: Throughout the development of any game, there are always these sparks, things you’re not expecting. The size of the exploration spaces definitely became….
Whyte: It opens up when you get the boat, yeah.
Barlog: There was always a temptation, especially for the Lake of the Nine, for you to really not understand what type of game you were playing for a while. So much so that we didn’t even show it to the press. There was an initial plan to show the press the Lake of the Nine for the demo right before the game was going to release, but then I pulled back and said, “I don’t think we should show them. It needs to be a surprise when they play it for the first time. If we let them play it and show it to everyone, everyone will expect it, and they’ll be playing the game wondering when it’s going to happen.” Above: The Norse world is scarier than the Greek world.
That always annoyed me about games, when you feel like you know exactly what’s coming up. Well, when is that coming up? That’s why the Blades were such a big deal, to try to keep that secret. If everybody thought they weren’t in there, they’d let it go from the beginning. They’d embrace what was happening. Then, when it pops up, it’s a great surprise.
Throwing the axe was the thing that was probably the most surprising. We didn’t plan on that from the beginning. I wanted to have the axe in the hand. We’d do a bit of throwing, but it wouldn’t be the full-on hunky Australian throwing things. But as we were getting the core down and I was not letting anybody on the combat team do any of the crazy — I said, “Look, I want to feel like, when you impact somebody, it feels like it sticks.” As opposed to when you’re playing fighting games — this is a technique we used throughout all the other God of War games and all the fighting games I worked on. You do an attack, like if you’re gonna punch somebody, you’re basically following through. When the hitbox is detected you continue doing the follow-through. There’s a bit of a pause, and then they react. But there’s not a real sense of connection, pushing through, and a change in the animation.
With an axe we had a good opportunity to do something nobody had done before. We invested eight or nine months into really prototyping that. Everybody on the combat team was getting so angry. They were like, “We want to do all the cool stuff! You’re not letting us do the cool stuff! You’re shackling us!” This was just the core of it, keeping the axe in his hands. I knew we could do all the crazy throwing and the magic stuff, but let’s nail this and move on to the next thing.
I think that frustration boiled over until a few of the guys basically said, “Screw it, I’m gonna do this.” They ended up prototyping — George Mawle and Vincent Napoli prototyped the initial axe system, where you could throw it anywhere. It would stick. You could recall it from anywhere. It was a 100 percent programmatic solution. That was probably the coolest surprise of anything.
I would spend every review — we review the levels and walk through the levels. I’d just be throwing the axe. Can I clear this tree? Is there collision on those rocks up ahead? I really annoyed people, big time, by throwing the axe constantly. At one point they said, “We need to take this out, because it’s really getting on my nerves.” When I was testing the earlier games, God of War and God of War II, I’d just jump everywhere. I’d go somewhere and jump, jump, jump. The combat guys were like, “Stop jumping! You’re annoying me!” And the new jump was the axe throw.
Whyte: You found a new way to annoy your team.
Barlog: I looked for ways to annoy different groups on the team in different ways. I don’t want everyone to be annoyed by the same thing. I want to switch it up.
Whyte: The emergent stuff is interesting there. During development of Blood of Truth — we showed the game at Paris Games Week, which was our announcement. We had this cinematic slow-mo happening a couple of times. It was all completely scripted by us. It was when you jumped out of a window, to give you a chance to see what was going on. Also, if you shot red things, red barrels or red fire extinguishers, they blew up and we slowed stuff down.
We saw people playing it at Paris Games Week, and we saw they were really loving that cinematic slow motion. We went back to the office and started trying to iterate as to whether we could make it player-controlled, which is on the two Move buttons in the final game. Once we had that in, it was thinking about, well, what else can we do with this system? We started with some of the bigger enemies or some of the vehicles in the game. You press down the precision mode, as we call it, to slow down the game world, and you get targets to aim at, weak points. You can even chain to extend the thing. It’s fun how you can explore that idea space and pull stuff out.
Above: Sony’s God of War (2018) uses raw emotions to differentiate itself from other big-budget games – and all of its predecessors.
Barlog: The awesome thing about games is very similar to television in the way that they’re doing several episodes and then testing what the audience thinks. Getting the real audience, not just a focus group. Everybody’s watching it and they say, “I’m not liking this. I’m liking that.” They’re able to react more. We’re able to do the same thing, getting people to play and then react.
The hardest thing to do in making video games is to know what to listen to and what not to listen to when you’re playtesting. That’s probably the most difficult thing that I’ve had to figure out over the years. You can go very wrong by listening to the wrong advice. Being able to discern between subjective and objective. Understanding that somebody’s not having a good experience and I need to improve the experience, versus somebody just playing this game and they want to shove this thing they really like in another game into our game.
Figuring out how not to get caught in that loop is very hard. I still get caught in it when we do playtests. You’ll hear something that just gets under your skin, because they’re pretty brutal. When people playtest they’re very honest.
Whyte: And also, you’re crafting a story, a story where you get to know characters. Then suddenly you drop people in midway through the game, and they haven’t got that emotional connection.
Barlog: Or if it’s the writers and the animators doing the voices temporarily and the animations are really bad, then everyone says, “This story is terrible!” Well, are they reacting to the fact that it’s presented terribly, because they’re seeing it in a very rudimentary form, or the sound is dropping in and out? One person could not get over the fact that Kratos was played by a different person.
Throughout the experience we were testing in probably four- or five-hour segments. We just had temp voices. Sometimes it was one of the animators. Sometimes it was the writer. It’s difficult to test something that’s not done and fight that urge that says, “Just relax, it’s not done!” Instead of listening and saying, “I get it. They don’t like that. I’m not going to listen to that. But they don’t like this here, and that’s really important. Fundamentally they’re not going to have fun if we don’t fix this.” Or they don’t understand something. That’s the other thing. We found playtesting helps us a ton in finding areas that we took for granted. We had the idea of Freya giving herself up to Baldur, to say, “Look, if you want to kill me, kill me.” We took that for granted, because it’s a small group of people who thought, “Yeah, for my kid I would do that.” But a lot of the people who were playtesting were 18 or 19. They didn’t get it.
Above: God of War wins GOTY We thought that maybe we’d failed. Maybe this element of the story sucks? But then we playtested it again and it got even worse. People were really angry, capital letters in the feedback angry, about how we’d ruined it. She was a good character. We’d screwed it all up. I thought, “What is happening?” I ended up talking to one of them and explained what Kratos ended up saying in the game, in a conversation. We realized that we’d never explained it. We took it for granted. We assumed everyone would understand that she would rather lose her life and let her son live.
For people who’ve not been in that place in their life, they didn’t understand that. They needed it explained. When we explained it they said, “Okay, I totally get it. That makes sense.” We ended up having a great opportunity for Kratos to open up to Atreus, which we didn’t have at that time, all because we needed to plug a hole that we had left open.
Whyte: I watched the documentary last week. That was no holds barred. You guys were pretty much showing how it was. That’s a brave move. What was it like being followed by a camera crew for five years? Barlog: It’s weird. It’s weird. Initially we had talked about — I wanted to shoot a bunch of footage when we first started, back in 2013. Let’s just shoot something. We didn’t know if we’d use any of it, but I think it’s cool. I love watching behind the scenes documentaries. I love to see what it’s like in the inception of creating things. The making of The Dark Crystal, if anybody’s seen that movie — there’s an amazing 60-minute documentary that shows Frank Oz and Jim Henson and all of them on these sets using these puppets. It’s just brilliant. To me it’s almost better than the movie. It’s such an incredible slice of that creative life.
Initially, when we were talking about it, I said, “If we do this, we should show the reality of it. Which is something nobody’s gonna let us do. They’ll never let us do this. It’s going to be crazy.” I thought that if we just did a bunch of vignettes behind the scenes, it wouldn’t be worth it. We had worked with Brendan Aiken from creative services at Sony, and he said, “I want to do this. I want to make a full feature.” And I said, “Yes, let’s do this!” Because our job isn’t hard enough trying to make a game. Let’s make a feature-length documentary at the same time, with a bunch of people who don’t want cameras following them around. There was a lot of resistance from people on the team. They didn’t want cameras all over the place. It took years to get people comfortable. Some people were just never that comfortable with it.
But for me I thought it was important, because I think — it’s an interesting thing to look back on. It’s an interesting way for audience members to understand what it takes to make a game. As much as it seems like it’s about playing games and having fun, it’s not. It’s exhausting. It’s stressful. There’s a lot of doubt and a lot of worry. That’s every project. Everything I’ve ever worked on is always this soup of doubt. You’re just wondering — this isn’t going to be good enough.
I was surprised that we were able to put it out. I was surprised that we finished it. But I’m surprised every day when we finish something. I’m easily surprised.
Whyte: I totally get the doubt thing. I said earlier that creating in VR is such a new medium that doubt is even more accelerated. You make decisions about how you approach your locomotion or your AI or other design issues, and you know that you feel that you’re making the right decision, making it right for the experience you’re making, but you have no idea whether people, when you release it, are going to feel the same way.
Above: God of War team celebrates victory after the Game Awards.
Barlog: The pool of expertise is a lot smaller, too. For making a game on a console, you bring people on and they have experience. Even when you’re trying something new, people have experience. But from a VR perspective, everyone’s still figuring it out.
Whyte: One of the things that we knew really early on was that — we definitely didn’t want to make the game realistic. But we came up with this phrase of “reality through an action movie lens.” The whole thing was about — running out of ammo isn’t fun. Having a gun that runs out of bullets really quickly isn’t fun. We increased that, because when you’re watching a movie — you see Die Hard, he’s just shooting the gun forever, but it doesn’t matter. It just works.
We actually partnered with — we found an ex-SAS soldier that came in and really helped us with some of our dialogue. Certainly between the soldiers in the game. Our cast, particularly Amy Bailey, who plays Kayla, who’s a psychotic kind of highly-trained individual — how she would carry herself in a situation so Kevin, our SAS guy, would know not to try and mess with her. He also showed our mocap lead seven different ways that he could disarm a gangster with a gun pointed at him. It was pretty intense.
That was really cool, to bring that onboard. But it was more about authenticity than realism. We didn’t want to have realistic levels of gunplay or whatever. We wanted it to be a game fundamentally. It’s a fun experience.
Barlog: Realism is great. It’s not that realism is bad. But you can have realism and authenticity. To have realism without authenticity — the authenticity is such a huge part of it, getting that feeling of legitimacy. We took a lot of the actors out on some survival stuff. We taught people how to carry swords and studied medieval warfare and stuff like that, just to get a bit of extra information. Even if it wasn’t exactly what they were using, it was this idea that they’re getting little slice of what it’s like. It isn’t so crazy that we’re all learning how to fight with swords and stab each other. But being able to at least understand — even when it’s not the same fighting style, it gives you a better sense of grounding in the world.
Disclosure: The organizers of Gamelab paid my way to Barcelona. Our coverage remains objective.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Borderlands 2 VR PC gets rating, release date may not be far behind | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/borderlands-2-vr-pc-gets-rating-release-date-may-not-be-far-behind"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Borderlands 2 VR PC gets rating, release date may not be far behind Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Borderlands 2 VR is 2K's first foray into triple-A VR.
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We’d always pegged Borderlands 2 VR for an eventual release on PC headsets. Gearbox Software made it clear that the game’s exclusivity for PSVR was always timed. After its window is up, the developer is free to bring it to other headsets. It looks like it’s doing just that. We’ve reached out to Gearbox for comment.
We missed this in the hassle of E3 but Borderlands 2 VR has been rated for PC via the ESRB. That’s not official confirmation the game will make its way over, but it’s about as close as it gets without an announcement. Presumably this version of the game will support the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and Valve Index headsets at the very least. We wouldn’t be surprised to see Windows VR support too.
Borderlands 2 VR (PC) rated by ESRB pic.twitter.com/WBvzqdVG8r — Wario64 (@Wario64) June 14, 2019 Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Borderlands 2 VR brings the entire original game into headsets, though it doesn’t support cooperative play. Later this summer the PSVR version of the game will be getting all of the original title’s DLC for free.
Hopefully the PC VR version of the game will also be getting that content.
We think this is a pretty good port of a fun game, though the lack of multiplayer definitely stings. “The small gameplay tweaks aren’t enough to rewrite a game that was designed around four-player co-op, but the core of the experience is so strong, rewarding, and entertaining that it serves as a feature-rich and exciting VR shooter in its own right despite its flaws,” we said in our review.
As for Borderlands 3 ? Gearbox says VR has been discussed but nothing’s been announced so far. Today the company also launches a new Penn & Teller VR experience.
This story originally appeared on Uploadvr.com.
Copyright 2019 GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Anne Frank House VR is now on Oculus Quest for free | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/anne-frank-house-vr-is-now-on-qculus-quest-for-free"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Anne Frank House VR is now on Oculus Quest for free Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn A bookcase opens into the secret annex of Anne Frank's house in Amsterdam.
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Just over a year ago now Oculus and Force Field VR released a VR experience based around Anne Frank.
The piece was released on Frank’s 89th birthday on Oculus Rift, Go, and Gear VR. And just after Frank’s 90th birthday passes, the app also arrives on Oculus Quest.
Anne Frank House VR is now available on Facebook’s standalone VR headset.
The piece, produced in partnership with the Anne Frank House charity, allows people to explore the house in which the Holocaust victim hid from Nazi occupation in Amsterdam from 1942 to 1944. Anne Frank House VR is available to download for free.
You’ll be able to tour every room of the “Secret Annex” in which Frank and seven other Jewish people hid. Quest’s six degree of freedom (6DOF) tracking allows you to walk around and interact with environments like they would on Rift with the freedom of a headset like Go. Each room of the building has been painstakingly recreated in virtual form to provide an authentic experience. Notes, pictures and other items are scattered about the environment to give you a deeper understanding of what life was like.
Overall it’s a powerful example of how VR can transport us around the world and bring us closer to experiences we might otherwise never have. It lasts around 25 minutes.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! The piece is currently up for the VR Social Impact Award at this year’s VR Awards.
For Quest, it’s one of the first educational apps we’ve seen for the device. So far the headset has been treated mainly as a gaming console, an approach that’s drawn criticism from the wider VR community.
This story originally appeared on Uploadvr.com.
Copyright 2019 GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Vice Ventures wants to fund 'bad' industries like weed, booze, and vaping | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/entrepreneur/vice-ventures-wants-to-fund-bad-industries-like-weed-booze-and-vaping"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Vice Ventures wants to fund ‘bad’ industries like weed, booze, and vaping Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Cropped illustration of person smoking marijuana Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Many venture capital (VC) firms set out with an investment strategy targeting specific kinds of companies — it could be mobility and robotics , deep tech , region-specific startups , or any number of niches and verticals.
Vice Ventures is no different, but its focus lies squarely on areas where investors have traditionally been less inclined to venture — including cannabis, alcohol, “sex-tech,” gambling, tobacco, psychedelics, and more.
New York-based Vice Ventures was formally launched back in January by founding partner Catharine Dockery, who was previously chief of staff and head of private investments for Andy Dunn , a prominent investor and cofounder of men’s clothing brand Bonobos , bought by Walmart in 2017.
She joined Walmart’s digital consumer brands’ arm, with a focus on M&A, after the Bonobos acquisition.
Vice Ventures today confirmed the fund’s first close at $25 million, with big-name backers including investor Bradley Tusk and Marc Andreessen , the entrepreneur and cofounder of esteemed VC firm Andreessen Horowitz.
And the fund’s final close will likely be higher. “We remain open for additional investment,” Dockery told VentureBeat.
The fledgling VC firm plans to invest around $500,000 in each of its portfolio companies, and has in fact made a handful of investments already, including in Recess , a beverage brand that infuses CBD and adaptogen into sparkling water; Bev , which sells California Rosé in a can, and also claims Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund as a seed investor; and Indose , a precision-focused cannabis vaporizer.
Above: Catharine Dockery The ‘vice clause’ While there is nothing technically preventing any VC firm from investing in “bad industries” so long as they’re legal, many are precluded from doing so through so-called “vice clauses,” where fund backers stipulate where their money shouldn’t be invested. There have been some notable divergences from this norm in recent years, however.
Back in 2015, Founders Fund became one of the first institutional investors in the cannabis industry when it joined a $75 million investment in Privateer Holdings, a company that makes acquisitions and investments in pot startups. One of Privateer’s investments was in Canadian medical marijuana company Tilray , which went public last July, leading to Privateer’s 76% stake hitting a valuation of $12 billion.
Pot can now be legally consumed in 10 U.S. states (plus D.C.), while Canada also joined the fray last year, legalizing its use for both medicinal and recreational use. What this helps to demonstrate is that what constitutes a “vice” is not only subjective, but is prone to shifting attitudes and legal landscapes.
Founders Fund has previously touted its investment rationale in terms of backing “contrarian” industries, with specific reference to vice clauses. Last September it said : The problem with a vice clause continues to be how often the popular conception of “vice” is wrong, and how quickly that conception changes. We don’t invest in what’s popular. We invest in what’s right.
Elsewhere, San Francisco-based weed delivery platform Eaze has raised north of $50 million from prominent investors including DCM Ventures, while Silicon Valley investment giant Sequoia Capital has invested in beer.
For extra context on the potential out there for VC firms to invest in vices, San Francisco vape-maker Juul has raised a whopping $13.6 billion, and is now valued at $38 billion.
“Black and white approaches like fund vice-clauses completely ignore that many companies approach their work ethically and responsibly, leaving some exceptional operators struggling to get funding,” Dockery said. “Ignoring the role of vices in our society is not productive, and we believe progress can come from increased legitimacy of the best operators and an informed discussion on their impact.” Freewheeling The fact that Vice Ventures has secured respected backers such as Tusk and Andreessen lends extra credence to its cause, but it also indicates that some investors are still hesitant — or unable — to invest in certain types of companies through their own investment firms. Thus Vice Ventures serves as a vehicle for these investors to freewheel.
“I have met him [Andreessen] in person and he is an investor who likes contrarian ideas,” Dockery said. “The thesis resonated with industry insiders who are aware of how much vice clauses affect investment.” Dockery is quick to stress that Vice Ventures isn’t going all-out to find the biggest badasses to invest in — it will follow the same sound principles that other VC firms adhere to. It’s all about “growing good companies that operate in bad industries,” as the company puts it. And it will also focus on many positive movements within these industries, including addiction recovery.
“It is essential that we approach these investments with a strong moral compass,” Dockery added. “We care deeply about finding the highest quality operators in vice industries, and that includes a serious focus on harm reduction, informed consumption, and safe products.” At its core, Vice Ventures is more about ensuring that not all “vice companies” are tarred with the same brush — there are good and bad players in every industry throughout the world. In her launch blog post back in January, Dockery drew parallels with other more VC-friendly tech companies such as Facebook and Google, which have demonstrated more than questionable practices in terms of enabling improper access to customer data , providing propaganda platforms for terrorists , and undermining democracy.
“In a world where the most mundane of companies can cause social harm, is it simpler for us to look for evil in companies which make products that society disapproves of?,” Dockery asked rhetorically. “The hunt for morally satisfying investments is challenging enough without reducing all vice companies to the same level.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Is agriculture ripe for a Tesla moment? | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/entrepreneur/is-agriculture-ripe-for-a-tesla-moment"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest Is agriculture ripe for a Tesla moment? Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
It’s hard to believe electric vehicles were still considered the stuff of science fiction as little as 13 years ago.
As documented in the 2006 film Who Killed The Electric Car , the tech needed for battery-powered electric cars has been around for nearly 100 years. Yet well into the 21st century, popular opinion held that EVs would never make it to the mainstream. At best, they’d be slow, expensive, impractical vehicles for those willing to compromise on power, speed, and convenience for the sake of sustainability.
Then Tesla Motors burst onto the scene. Its Roadster wasn’t just the first high-performance electric vehicle to capture the attention of the masses; it jump-started a commercial market expected to reach $567 billion by 2025.
With nearly every major car manufacturer now producing EVs, Tesla did what many thought was impossible: jolt a traditional industry out of inertia and prove the sustainable option could also perform powerfully and be the object of desire, not of compromise.
The next industry in line for a tech transformation will be food and agriculture. Yes, as recently as 2016 farming ranked dead last in terms of adopting digital technologies. But today it’s drawing outsized interest from investors who see a clear and pressing need to bring farming into the future. Investment in AgTech firms reached $ 16.9 billion in 2018 , up 43% from the previous year. Even luminaries like Kimbal Musk (Elon’s brother) and Bill Gates are getting in on the AgTech game, investing and driving solutions for sustainability without compromise.
But while investors, big producers, and progressive farmers are getting on board, we’re a far cry from seeing sophisticated technologies like computer vision, robotics, data science, and machine learning make the critical leap from the labs to ordinary farm fields.
At stake is more than just market share. Like the automobile industry before it, farming desperately needs a digital overhaul to remain sustainable in the face of a growing global population and climate change. The question is: What’s it going to take for AgTech to have its Tesla moment? Capture the mouths (and minds) of eaters Behind the rise of EVs came with a groundswell of public interest: The increased awareness of climate change was driving a critical mass of conscious consumers to rally for better, environmentally friendlier alternatives to gas.
The same thing needs to happen in agriculture. But unlike cars, farming is a process most consumers are disconnected from.
Still, momentum is on our side. From Beyond Meat’s popularity and stock market success to the meteoric rise in demand for organic produce and the popularity of vegan and gluten-free diets, interest in where our food comes from has never been higher.
The challenge for AgTech is to take that one step further and help the general public connect the dots between what they buy at the grocery store — and put in their bodies at dinner — and the complex growing processes they rarely see. Further still, we need to show people how deeply AgTech and global health are intertwined. Currently, agriculture accounts for 70 percent of freshwater consumption on the planet. In the U.S., farms use a billion pounds of pesticides every year. The potential impact on everything from cancer rates to affordability and water safety is profound.
Growing healthy, sustainable food for the 9 billion people expected to be on the planet by 2050, requires rethinking this approach. This isn’t about adding GMOs and harmful chemicals to our food. It’s about applying technology to enhance what nature already offers. In short, to move forward, we need to bust the lingering myth that technology is the enemy of natural, abundant, and affordable food. In truth, AgTech is the only way we get there.
Focus on integration, not invention Tesla didn’t invent the car — or the electric battery, for that matter. It improved and integrated existing technologies and brought them together into a cohesive package that became a symbol of sustainability and prowess — a symphony of clean power and advanced performance that’s a pleasure to drive.
The same thing needs to happen in AgTech. From facial recognition software that identifies individual cows and tracks herd health to robots that use machine “vision” to pick fruit and smart sensors that track everything from plant nutrients to soil moisture, the technology needed to revolutionize agriculture already exists. The trouble is it’s being developed in silos with limited integration.
Right now, what we’re doing is the equivalent of handing users an electric battery and some fancy apps and asking them to make their own electric car. What’s needed is a platform that unifies these disparate technologies into something intuitive and affordable for average farmers. So all it takes is calling up a single app on your iPad to monitor crop health, tweak everything from water flow to fertilizer, and secure the best market price at harvest. In short, we need to put our heads together — through collaboration and likely strategic acquisition — to create AgTech’s answer to the Roadster.
Enlist and convert end users At the end of the day, Tesla’s Roadster took off not because it was carbon neutral but because it drove better and provided a better experience than pretty much any gas-guzzler on the highway. To win the market, the company didn’t have to win over environmentalists. It had to win over drivers interested in using its product day in and day out. It made it cool to drive clean.
The comparable challenge for AgTech is in appealing to its end users, farmers. We’re not quite there yet. Robotic machinery is still prohibitively expensive. Point solutions like drones or IoT-enabled fields are costly and come with a steep learning curve. Right now, AgTech-enabled yields aren’t necessarily greater and certainly aren’t cheaper than conventional alternatives. Better options will have to come forward.
The good news is, farmers are already comfortable with technology in the form of machines like combines and chemistry-like fertilizers. The onus is on AgTech to prove digital advancements aren’t just eco-friendly bells and whistles. We need to show they make economic sense by enabling growers to get more yield with less. Only when we prove digital solutions are more practical, more efficient, and more affordable than anything else on the market, will we have our Tesla moment.
Balance near-term viability with long-term vision From the very beginning, Elon Musk’s vision went far beyond creating a fun-to-drive electric car. Tesla’s real mandate is to electrify the world and build a zero-emission future of “infinitely scalable clean energy.” Selling cars is merely a stepping stone.
AgTech can take a lesson here, as well. Precision agriculture and digital technologies can change the world. (My goal, for example, is to reduce synthetic chemical loads in agriculture by 80%, increase global crop yields by 20%, and help feed a billion people by 2028.) With not only a nascent industry, but the health of the planet at stake, AgTech needs to think near-term and long-term at once, embracing a very pragmatic kind of idealism. The industry needs to work with partners in conventional agriculture, as well as everyday farmers, to generate buy-in and commercialize products that push us in the right direction.
This requires embracing the same spirit of iteration and experimentation that has enabled other digital sectors to leapfrog dramatically ahead. Waiting for perfection or working on the ultimate platform in isolation is not an option. After all, Tesla’s progress has hardly been seamless. They’ve faced persistent production challenges and delays. Their early models look positively primitive compared to the semi-autonomous supercars of today. Even now, their stock is volatile. But Musk has continued to iterate to the future, not allowing perfect to be the enemy of good.
Give it time For all these parallels, AgTech does have to clear a higher bar in going mainstream than electric vehicles did. After all, we’re dealing with living organisms and complex biological systems as well as sophisticated algorithms, software updates, and sensitive machinery.
But — with all due respect to Tesla and other automakers — the sector also stands to make a much bigger impact. We need to find ways to increase global crop yields and reduce — or possibly even eliminate — the environmental impact of agriculture at a critical time in human history. It’s a noble goal and one that’s worth crossing the chasm to reach.
Karn Manhas is Founder and CEO at Terramera , a company trying to eliminate chemical pesticides.
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"Blockchain blossoms in Haiti | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/commerce/blockchain-blossoms-in-haiti"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest Blockchain blossoms in Haiti Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Haiti, Port au Prince, Petionville, informal hillside housing Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
The technological revolutions that have shaped the modern world have thus far all taken root in rich countries. Today, a new disruptive technology is breaking that mold – blockchain.
Nowhere is this plainer than Haiti, the poorest country in the Western hemisphere and home to a blossoming range of projects using blockchain technologies to solve problems in ordinary people’s lives.
As a developing economy, Haiti faces unique challenges — the country is more traditionally associated with earthquakes than with tech innovation. Haiti today is a hotbed of applied blockchain projects, projects that are expanding our understanding of the technology’s potential.
In agriculture, an empowering initiative called AgriLedger founded by Haitian entrepreneur Genevieve Leveille and rolling out in Haiti this year is set to transform the food supply chain landscape. A custom-built platform powered by blockchain allows international buyers to scan a QR code and immediately access data on produce origin, transport, and costs in each step in the supply chain. Logistical data – sale documents, certification, and transportation – are made immutable and visible on the web. The payment system then makes data available to all participants in real time, and only vetted endorsers can validate transactions. This process makes it possible to certify product quality, thereby tackling a longstanding challenge preventing many buyers from entering the Haitian market. Furthermore, farmers themselves are safeguarded against price fluctuations, as the market price is determined by supply-demand principles rather than bargaining power.
Similarly, the Blockchain Cotton Project (BCP) is set to have a big impact in the cotton industry. Haiti has not produced cotton for years, yet if all goes to plan, it will soon be supplying millions of pounds of organic cotton for shoes, shirts, and other items sold in US stores. Haiti’s smallholder farmers face challenges tracking the production process of organic cotton. Using blockchain technology, cotton buyers have access to information about the full cultivation process, starting with the farmer’s name and GPS location of the farm and down to the exact fertilizer applications and impact of a specific batch on the environment. Without blockchain it is nearly impossible to verify whether products from Haiti are organic or fair-trade. The BCP employs RCS Global Better Sourcing Program’s technology — an on-site traceability and due diligence tool that guarantees the quality of the cotton and ensures farmers are paid a fair price for their crops. This pilot, which in 2019 involves a handful of farmers, could involve as many as 17,000 within five years. That would revitalize the entire industry, which has seen a 30-year standstill.
Applications go far beyond farming and food production. Blockchain is also changing the recycling process in Haiti, which had for years been plagued by corruption and price fluctuations. In order to counter these challenges Plastic Bank teamed up with IBM to launch a recycling initiative, which today has 32 branches around Haiti. The initiative pays for recyclable plastic with a crypto token system custom-made for Haiti. it operates on two tokens, one tied to the dollar and the other that can be exchanged for goods through Plastic Bank. Fair price for the plastic is ensured through a digital weighing system, making sure collectors are paid the right amount proportionate to the plastic bulk. Previous plastic collection programs bore risks for plastic collectors when redeeming their cash, but by taking the human bias out of the system, collectors’ earnings will stabilize. Today, there are about 3,500 recyclers in Haiti, with top recyclers bringing in about 200,000 pounds of plastic per month. The Plastic Bank project also ensures collectors’ security in case of price fluctuations in the plastics market. The approach benefits the most disadvantaged in Haitian society – poor women and children — who now have assurance they won’t be cheated out of their hard-earned wages.
The ecosystem in Haiti is preparing for the changes wrought by blockchain by building infrastructure and educating businesses. Haiti’s first accelerator Banj , created together with Google Launchpad, is facilitating further implementation by giving tools and professional support to startups. Other promising initiatives that aim to educate Haitian businesses about the potential of blockchain include Cryptocurrency for Haiti and Haiti Blockchain Alliance.
And the recent announcement at the Haiti Tech Summit in June 2019 that the Haitian Central Bank is planning a pilot for a blockchain backed digital currency shows that the crucial next phase of blockchain development, institutional adoption, is already underway. Considering the financial instability in Haiti, a digital currency would be a blessing. Not only would this development regulate the effects of extreme inflation, it would also reassure foreign investors who were previously alarmed by currency fluctuation.
These recent developments illustrate how blockchain is already improving life for ordinary Haitians. It seems 2019 is a critical moment, as these projects begin to take effect and demonstrate their full potential. The industry in Haiti is a perfect example of blockchain’s application not just for commerce, but as a catalyst for social change by ensuring quality, fair conditions, and reduced economic volatility. The potential to reshape society, to connect people in new and transparent ways, addressing the unique challenges of emerging markets, is within grasp.
Sheikh Irfan Mohammed is the Managing Partner of Bloccelerate VC , a blockchain focused venture fund. Throughout his career Sheikh Irfan has held leadership positions at EGB Capital, a Greece focused debt fund, and at the Center for Asia Leadership Initiatives, a Harvard-based Asia think tank. He is also the founder of Irfan Consultancy, a technology solution consulting firm.
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"Valve Index review - When only the best will do | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/valve-index-review-when-only-the-best-will-do"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Review Valve Index review – When only the best will do Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn The Valve Index head-mounted display.
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Valve doesn’t make anything anymore, right? At least that’s the meme. The company just sits back and cashes those sweet Steam store checks. Except Valve absolutely still makes things. Sure, it’s easy to overlook its recent games like Artifact and Dota Underlords if you aren’t into card battlers or auto chess. But Valve has also spent years researching and developing virtual reality into a product. Now, it’s ready to sell its own hardware.
After working with partner HTC on the Vive , Valve is launching the high-end VR head-mounted display Valve Index all on its own. This is a top-of-the-line HMD with an impressive list of specs that put it ahead of competitors like the Oculus Rift S.
But as is standard for high-end VR, the technology comes with a lot of caveats. The full kit with headset, controllers, and base stations is $1,000.
Or you can get it for $750 if you’re upgrading from a full HTC Vive kit. You also still need the powerful PC, a tethered cable, and the external tracking stations. This is the direct inverse of Oculus’s all-in-one Quest.
So does the Index overcome those hurdles? Is it good enough to justify the price and inconvenience. I think so. In all the ways that the Quest feels like the future of VR from a form factor standpoint, the Index is the future of VR in every other way.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! What you’ll like A stunning display In trying to sell a $1,000 headset, Valve knows that it has to have the best display technology without exception. And it accomplished that goal. The Index uses two 1,440-by-1,600 LCD panels that it designed specifically for VR.
With these displays, the Index has the exact same resolution as HTC’s Vive Pro. But HTC uses OLED screens, which are excellent for contrast and recreating realistic blacks. But the drawback is that the pixels on an OLED are more pronounced. This creates a noticeable screen door effect where you can see the black lines between the pixels. Index’s LCD pixels minimize the screen door to the point where I almost never notice it. I have to specifically look for it, and even then, I only see it when looking certain objects like distant foliage.
The LCD screens also enables Valve to offer a higher refresh rate of 120Hz and even 144Hz in an experimental mode. That is significantly faster than the industry standard of 90Hz. And this creates a noticeably smoother image when you look around a world. I’m not surprised by how much of a difference it made, though. We’ll hit a point of diminishing returns eventually with refresh rate, but the jump from 90 frames per second to 120 fps is almost as big as 60 to 90.
Valve also did the work on the optical system of the Index to ensure a wider field-of-view. Valve claims that it’s about 20 degrees more than the Vive. And what’s most important is that the FOV increase doesn’t come with any real visual distortions or anomalies.
It’s just the best that VR has ever looked in a consumer headset.
The VR audio But Valve didn’t focus on what you see at the expense of what you hear. The Index includes a pair of excellent ear speakers that are so much better than anything I’ve used in other headsets up to this point.
Unlike headphones, the ear speakers hover over your ears without touching them. They instead blast sound toward your head while also letting in all of the ambient noise of the real world around you. That real-world room noise is important for keeping you grounded and making you comfortable. If someone walks up to you, you’re going to hear them.
But then the speakers also sound amazing on top of that. They are loud and crisp but also capable of producing deep booming bass when you need it. And since they are hovering away from your head, they are excellent at creating natural sounding audio for room-sized spaces.
Index controllers are an improvement You can get Index with Valve’s new controllers, and they are a big improvement over the Vive and, in many ways, the Oculus Touch. Like the Touch, the Index controllers are all about finger articulation. It has sensors for 10 digits, which means you can stick out your pinky or easily give people the bird.
The index controllers also easily strap to your hands. This means you don’t have to have to actively hold them. You can let go of the device, and the strap keeps it firmly in place. Picking up and letting go of objects now works like it does in the real world. After years in VR where you are pulling a trigger or grip to mimic the act of picking up objects, this is a profound leap forward.
Comfortable The Valve Index is very comfortable. It has all of the modern straps and adjustment knows that you would expect in a post-PlayStation VR world. And I was able to use those options to dial in the comfort so that I could wear the Index for more than an hour without fatigue or pain.
If the headset is digging into your face or skull, that’s a sign that you’re wearing it wrong. And adjusting the settings while you have it on is really simple. As someone who is impatient, I really appreciate that.
What you won’t like Limited support for Index controllers The Index and its controllers are great, but they are also frustrating in a lot of games. A lengthy list of developers and games have added native support for the Index controllers. And that’s great. But you’re going to run into some popular games that don’t have support — at least not yet.
I tried to play The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR Edition with the Index controllers despite its lack of native support. Like with standard games, Steam gave me a number of different re-map options, but nothing fully worked. In one setup, I could move but not interact with anything. In another, I could interact but not move.
This is, hopefully, a temporary problem. Either devs will add better support, or the community will find better ways to re-map each game. But I definitely found myself looking for my old Vive controllers in some games.
It’s expensive Yeah, $1,000 is a lot of money. Pricing is always such a hard thing to talk about in a review because everyone is different. But at this point in the life of VR, I’m confident in saying that the Index is out of most people’s price range.
The biggest issue is that the Quest has totally rejiggered the value proposition of VR. A Quest with 128GB of storage is $500. Again, that’s the all-in price. You don’t need a beefy PC. You don’t even need a dedicated room because you don’t need to set up stationary trackers.
And the Index is significantly better than the Quest. They are doing different things. Once is a mobile device and the other is a peripheral for powerhouse gaming rigs. But, for most people, the Quest is beyond that important “good enough” threshold.
That doesn’t mean an audience for Index doesn’t exist. It does. But they are just going to have to pay a premium.
Conclusion The Valve Index is the best head-mounted display that a consumer can buy off the shelf. But it’s probably not the best for you.
You need an even more powerful PC to take advantage of the improved resolution and refresh rate. That means you’re still tethered to a computer and to external tracking stations. And let’s not ignore the price.
While the Index is better than any other headset, it’s not $400-to-$600 better than them.
But, be honest, you already knew whether or not you would spend $1,000 on a VR headset before you read this review.
For those of you who want the best and can afford it, however, the Index is the only choice. If you don’t care about price-to-performance ratios, then don’t hesitate. Go get one. The Index is the best VR experience you can have at home.
The Valve Index is available now for $1,000 in its full configuration. Valve Software provided GamesBeat with a sample unit of the $1,000 version for the purpose of this review.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Twitch Prime expands its free loot for gamers with Apex Legends gear on Prime Day | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/twitch-prime-expands-its-free-loot-for-gamers-with-apex-legends-gear-on-prime-day"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Twitch Prime expands its free loot for gamers with Apex Legends gear on Prime Day Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Apex Legends.
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Twitch Prime is giving away new gear for gamers, including unique free in-game content for Apex Legends and EA Sports titles on Prime Day , or July 15 and July 16, when Amazon has big discounts on its merchandise for Amazon Prime and Twitch Prime members.
Twitch Prime is also holding two events around Prime Day where it will bring celebrities, game streamers, and Amazon Prime members together for competitive gaming tournaments for Apex Legends and EA Sports games.
Amazon Prime is a pretty good bargain for $10 a month, and a lot of Americans are taking advantage of it for free shipping and access to premium content. But many people may not know that it also gives them a membership in Twitch Prime , which offers members a lot of gaming deals.
And now Amazon is beefing up Twitch Prime again with a lot of new benefits for gamers.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! “Our goal has always been to be the best deal in gaming,” said Ethan Evans, executive vice president of Twitch Prime, in an interview with GamesBeat. “Being a subscriber should be a no brainer for a gamer.” Evans noted that Twitch Prime is platform agnostic. Anything you get from the program can be used wherever it is tied to a specific device or distribution channel.
On top of that, Evans noted that Prime has given out a lot of content.
“If you played all the different offers in Prime across all the games last year, you would have ended up with more than $3,000 of gaming content,” Evans said. “And this year, we’re already at more than $2,000. We expect to eclipse last year’s total. And as you may have seen, we’ve done great games this year, League of Legends, Call of Duty Black Ops IV. Nintendo Switch Online.” Evans noted that many people may not know that they already have the benefit of being Twitch Prime members if they are Amazon Prime members. Amazon’s Prime Day is coming on July 15-16, and it will offer a lot of deals.
Twitch will hold a live event in honor of Prime Day, with a couple of celebrity tournaments for a EA Sports game in London and Apex Legends in Las Vegas. At those events, Twitch will have a variety of musicians and other celebrities playing along with streamers on twitch.tv/twitchprime starting at 10 am Pacific time on July 13. Special guests in London include Sir Mo Farah, Thierry Henry, and Leticia Bufoni. And special guests in Las Vegas include Murda Beatz and Dillon Francis.
“This really builds on that it’s bringing our communities together to really show what’s in prime and what’s possible,” Evans said. “And so as a part of those events will be releasing new content in both games. So we’re pretty, we’re pretty happy about that. And then just continuing the content is coming in that period.” Above: WTF! Deantak has shown up on a victory screen in Apex Legends? When Amazon cuts this kind of deal with developers, they usually see more people taking advantage not only of the free content offered, but also other content in the game, Evans said.
“So people, including Prime members, go on to buy other things in the game or explore other parts of the game,” Evans said. “The developers generally see engagement. So they get a lot of benefits of people enjoying their game.” Another benefit of Twitch Prime is that you get a channel subscription to the streamer of your choice.
“So the way streamers are supported, is through channel subscriptions, as one of their main ways of earning a living and in interest, you get the chance to subscribe to streamer of your choice, which gives you benefits in the channel special status,” evans said. “That is part of prime, at no additional cost. Normally, that’s $5 a month if you do it directly without.” Twitch said it can’t guarantee certain levels of engagement, but Evans said that good programs with game developers will often generate a double-digit percentage increase in monthly active users.
Twitch Prime members are allowed to share some of their rewards with friends, and that helps get the friends more interested in the games that their friends are playing.
“We’re going to add the ability to give some of the content and time to other ambassadors experience will be launching later this summer. It’ll operate through Twitter. And I think that will really jump out one more great thing about being a Prime member,” Evans said.
“And second thing we’re going to do is we’ll be launching a new mobile experience, which will allow you to access content from your mobile phone, but also have new mobile offers,” Evans said. “So today, Prime is focused on core games on the PC and consoles. But we’re excited to expand that and start addressing the large and global mobile audiences.” “I’m sure you’ve heard Jeff Bezos say that it’s irresponsible not to be a member of Amazon Prime, given all of the things you get,” Evans said. “We are carrying the same thing over with Twitch Prime.” GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"The DeanBeat: Great moments with game developers at Gamelab 2019 | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/the-deanbeat-great-moments-with-game-developers-at-the-gamelab-2019-event-in-barcelona"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages The DeanBeat: Great moments with game developers at Gamelab 2019 Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn The crowd at Gamelab 2019.
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I’m always hungry when I go to Gamelab , the video game conference in Barcelona that is curated each year by Ivan Fernandez Lobo. I eat up all of the morsels of wisdom that the leaders of the game industry drop during their sessions at the event.
This year, I was honored to moderate a fireside chat with former Blizzard president Mike Morhaime and another session with A Way Out creator Josef Fares and David Cage. Of that group, Morhaime had the wisdom of experience, Fares provided the passion and comic relief, while Cage had thoughtful answers to my questions on storytelling in games.
I’ll be sharing the full text of the conversations later, but for now, I will share some of the best moments from Gamelab.
Mike Morhaime’s morsels Above: Mike Morhaime, former president and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment.
Morhaime was recognized with the Honor Award, as his wife and four-year-old daughter looked on from the front row. He received a standing ovation, but he showed a rare bit of emotion as he thanked his departed father. It was a nice reward for a career that spanned more than 27 years at a single company. He said that Blizzard’s greatest creation wasn’t its games but its culture, which allows creative talent to create their best work.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! I noted how one of Blizzard’s (when it was known as Silicon & Synapse) defining moments was when the company was working on its first original title, The Lost Vikings. Brian Fargo, then head of Interplay, gave the young team some honest feedback about how the title should be changed.
Morhaime’s first impulse was to say the game could ship without the requested changes. But cofounder Allen Adham agreed with Fargo’s deep criticisms and said the team should, for the sake of quality, make the requested changes to the game. It was expensive and time-consuming, but it set a precedent for a quality-focused approach to game development that set Blizzard apart from so many of its rivals.
Over time, Morhaime said that the company only shipped about 50% of the games that it started. Very few peers have done the same, but Blizzard has developed a great reputation for shipping the best games that it can. At one point, Blizzard counted 14 games it canceled.
“There’s a saying that ‘perfect is the enemy of great,’ because if you strive for perfection you’ll never ship. But I do think that there’s so much competition out there,” Morhaime said.
In 1996, as Blizzard was finishing Diablo, the company delayed the title past the holidays. That could have been disastrous. But instead, gamers saw that the game shipped without major flaws, and they helped turn it into the best-selling game of 1997.
Blizzard also canceled Titan, a science fiction massively multiplayer online game, because it just wasn’t as fun as expected. But the remnants of that game and team ultimately led to the creation of Overwatch, one of Blizzard’s biggest hits.
Morhaime acknowledged that the team often had to engage in crunch to become a premier game company, but he said that a culture of crunch is not sustainable in the long run, and the game industry should find a way to build a more sustainable way of working.
One interesting moment we didn’t get a chance to talk about onstage was his speaking out against bad player behavior in the wake of the Gamergate crisis.
“They have been tarnishing our reputation as gamers. It’s not right,” Morhaime said at Blizzcon, Blizzard’s big fan conference in 2014. “BlizzCon is a great example of how positive and uplifting gaming can be.” He added, “There is another person on the other end of the chat screen … let’s take a stand to reject hate and harassment. Let’s redouble our efforts to be kind and respectful to one another. Let’s remind the world what the gaming community is really all about.” Above: Mike Morhaime (left) and J. Allen Brack at BlizzCon 2018.
Back in 2014, this was a rare case of the game industry addressing bad player behavior. Privately, Morhaime told me he was proud of this moment, but he had to be careful balancing what needed to be said without alienating Blizzard’s core audience.
Morhaime handed over his duties to J. Allen Brack in October, and he formally stepped down in April. He does not have a no-compete agreement, and he is thinking about what to do next.
“Right now the thought process is making a list of the ideas we come up [with], my wife Amy and I. We’ve been talking to a lot of people who are doing interesting things,” he said.
At the close of his acceptance speech, Morhaime got a standing ovation. The sound was deafening, and it felt like it echoed across the decades.
Different ways of telling stories: Josef Fares and David Cage Above: Josef Fares, creator of A Way Out and Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons.
Josef Fares of Hazelight created some memorable games like Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons and A Way Out. David Cage of Quantic Dream built games like Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, and Detroit: Become Human.
But Fares, a former filmmaker, said that he starts out making a game by trying to come up with the defining gameplay mechanics first. After that, he comes up with the game concept and the story arc. It’s no accident that Fares’ games had very innovative gameplay.
That has worked for Fares. But Cage said he starts by coming up with a story idea and then fleshing it out. Later on, the game takes shape around that story. For instance, the script for Detroit: Become Human eventually took up more than 4,000 pages, with dialogue to cover so many story branches.
“Sometimes it starts with an emotion, sometimes it starts with an idea,” Cage said. “Heavy Rain as a game started when something happened to me, when I lost my son, as a 6-year-old boy, in a [shopping] mall. And I was so scared.” The idea for Detroit started when Cage started thinking about artificial intelligence and read the book The Singularity is Near, by Ray Kurzweil, about AI’s inevitable surpassing of collective human intelligence. Cage thought about how humans would have android assistants following them around. At some point, the human would go into a restaurant, but the android would have to wait outside. And then Cage wondered what the android would feel like, as a second-class citizen, and what would happen if the androids were the good guys and the humans were bad.
Above: David Cage of Quantic Dream, creator of Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, and Detroit: Become Human.
“For me, that was the starting point of the story,” Cage said. “For me, the most important thing is what people feel during the experience. It’s all about emotion. Of course, it’s very important what you do when and which buttons you press. But at the same time, my experience is people remember not so much what they did but what they felt.” These different approaches reflect the core tension in games between story and interactivity. A game could also be on rails, or give players all of the choices they can make in an open world.
“What is fascinating to me about games is that we create something together [with the players],” Cage said.
Fares said that he is more the type of creator who favors linear experiences, where the developer takes the player on a journey that is crafted by the game director, rather than the player. Fares believes that Marvel’s Spider-Man did a good job of balancing story and an open world, but he thinks that linear tales like The Last of Us are more memorable. He’s not, however, a fan of open world games where you lose track of the story and forget your overall purpose.
Other nuggets from game leaders Above: Fred Markus (left) and Jordan Mechner at Gamelab.
Were it not for the Apple II, Prince of Persia maker Jordan Mechner might have been a screenwriter or a comic book artist. The machine was primitive by today’s standards, but Mechner said it was his kind of canvas for telling a new kind of story that was interactive.
Ryan Smith, game director at Insomniac on Marvel’s Spider-Man, said at Gamelab that trust is the most important thing you can establish with your team. It’s hard, but worth it in the long run as you have to ask them to do very difficult tasks that eventually pay off. He gave an hour-long talk — the first such extensive rundown on the making of Spider-Man — and I will write more about that later.
Above: Mick Donegan of Special Effect at Gamelab.
Mick Donegan, founder of Special Effect, a charity that helps disabled children play video games, talked about how “it’s everyone’s turn to play.” His team helped develop and test the Xbox Adaptive Controller with disabled people who the controller was meant to serve. I teared up as he showed videos of children who had no limbs or other challenges, playing games as best they could.
When actors were auditioning for voice acting and motion capture roles in God of War, they thought they were auditioning for a role in a movie, not a game. Creative director Cory Barlog delayed disabusing them of that idea so they wouldn’t be demotivated. Barlog said his job as creative director was to inspire the troops. In any given day, he didn’t code or create art or write scripts. Rather, his main output in a day was to talk to his team.
Above: Cory Barlog, creative director at Sony Santa Monica and creator of God of War.
Sometimes, it was an achievement just to preserve the status quo on the game. He had to defend a lot of decisions, including whether to keep Kratos as the main character of God of War, and he had to fight to keep Kratos’ son, Atreus, as well.
Daniel Sanchez Crespo, one of Spain’s most successful game developers, said, “Your reputation is your future.” People will remember if you were an asshole, and they won’t work for you on future projects if that’s what they remember.
Above: Ivan Fernandez Lobo is curator of Gamelab.
A lot of these moments and comments were moving. They were full of wisdom for the next generation of video game developers. My hat’s off to Lobo, who did a great job collecting some industry greats at this event.
Disclosure: The organizers of the event paid my way to Barcelona. Our coverage remains objective.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"NowSecure raises $15 million to automate mobile app security and privacy testing | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/nowsecure-raises-15-million-to-automate-mobile-app-security-and-privacy-testing"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages NowSecure raises $15 million to automate mobile app security and privacy testing Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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The growth in popularity of mobile apps hasn’t kept pace with app security improvements — quite the opposite. It’s estimated that roughly 63% of so-called grayware apps leak phones’ mobile numbers and that 62% of the top VPN apps request dangerous or unusual permissions. Researchers at Symantec found in a recent study that the number of new mobile malware variants increased by 54% in 2017 over 2016’s numbers. Perhaps worse still, Gartner forecasts that only 10% of DevOps initiative will have achieved the level of automation required to be considered fully secure by 2019, up only 5% from 2017.
Forever fighting the tide of malicious apps is an exhausting task, but companies like security – and privacy-testing solutions provider NowSecure are raising capital to develop load-lightening tools. To this end, NowSecure today revealed that it has raised $15 million in series B funding led by ForgePoint Capital, bringing its total raised to over $27 million following a $12.5 million series B in December 2014. CEO Alan Snyder said that the funding will accelerate NowSecure’s product development and help to scale its business operations.
“Every business is becoming mobile first; yet millions of people are using apps on a daily basis that have major security and privacy issues. NowSecure is addressing this fundamental, global-scale problem that puts businesses and consumers at direct risk,” said Snyder. “We’re thrilled to be working with ForgePoint Capital to grow our business and empower mobile app developers to deliver secure mobile apps faster. ForgePoint has the right mix of veteran leadership, industry relationships, and successful track record across their security portfolio to support NowSecure.” Above: NowSecure’s cloud dashboard.
NowSecure offers a range of solutions built on open source platforms (principally Frida, Radare, and Capstone) that run on-premises or in the cloud, plus expert professional penetration testing and managed services. The company’s automated mobile app security testing suite — which stands alone or integrates with existing dev pipelines, and which can execute up to “hundreds” of tests in minutes — performs static, dynamic, and behavioral analyses, and auto-generates reporting and remediation guidelines. As for NowSecure’s penetration testing, it’s able to suss out vulnerabilities in data at rest, data in motion, web services, and backends by conducting tests on real iOS and Android devices with platform-compatible binaries.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! NowSecure offers a robust API that enables devs to kick off security tests automatically post-build and populate results into ticket-tracking systems. Moreover, they can map test findings to a vulnerability scoring system that takes into account common regulatory compliance mandates, including OWASP, NIAP, FFIEC, PCI DSS, HIPAA, GDPR, CWE, and more. And through NowSecure’s cloud dashboards, teams gain access to a database of safe and unsafe public Android and iOS apps.
NowSecure is doing something right, it seems. The company’s customers include recognizable brands like Capital One, Carfax, Citi, Concur, Emerson, The Home Depot, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, Kellogg’s, Motorola Mobility, Shell, and Synchrony.
“From digital transformation projects to pure mobile businesses driving multi-billion dollar global economies, the stakes have never been higher for mobile security and privacy,” said ForgePoint Capital cofounder and managing director J. Alberto Yépez, who has joined NowSecure’s board of directors. “NowSecure has the right mix of talented team, unmatched technology, and proven track record serving world-class customers. We are excited to invest in NowSecure to help them grow the business, serving a global enterprise market expected to grow to nearly $1 billion by 2023.” NowSecure’s current investors include Baird Capital, JumpCapital, and Math Venture Partners. In addition to its Bellevue, Washington headquarters, the company has offices in Chicago and Vienna, Virginia.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Niko: China will spend $1.5 billion on console gaming by 2023 | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/niko-china-will-spend-1-5-billion-on-console-gaming-by-2023"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Niko: China will spend $1.5 billion on console gaming by 2023 Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn China has a new committee evaluating games.
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In certain key regions of the world, consoles are king for traditional game releases. Consumers in the United States spend more on console games than PC, for example. But that dynamic is not universally true. In China, consoles have only just started to find their footing after the government ended its ban on such devices in 2014.
Now, console gaming is quickly approaching $1 billion in annual revenue, according to a new report from intelligence firm Niko Partners.
And console revenues may reach $1.5 billion by 2023.
Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony have all launched devices in China over the last several years. The Xbox One debuted in the country in 2014.
Sony launched the PlayStation 4 later that same year.
Now, after testing out other hardware, Nintendo is partnering with publishing giant Tencent to release the Switch, according to a Reuters report.
And with Sony and Microsoft planning to launch next-generation followups for their Xbox and PlayStation boxes, those companies are likely factoring China into their plans in a major way.
And those new systems are where most of the growth is going to come from, according to Niko. The industry generated $767.1 million in revenue in 2018. Niko estimates that business will grow to $851.1 million by the end of this year. That’s an 11% increase. China obviously has a growing interest in consoles. But a PlayStation 5 and a Next Xbox (they don’t have official names yet) should supercharge that.
So Niko expects the industry to double its 2018 total by 2018 with more than $1.5 billion in sales. Of that $1.5 billion, approximately 25% will come from hardware and then the rest will come from software sales.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Gray market China has a massive, thriving gray market. This is where crafty business finds ways to bring products into the country outside of the official channels. Products are often cheaper and more readily available on the gray market because they avoid tariffs and sellers more directly benefit from the transactions. Traditionally, the Chinese gray market is also less likely to have counterfeit products.
Those market forces have ensured that most people still turn to the gray market to make their console purchases. In 2018, Niko estimates that the gray market sold 730,000 consoles while legal retailers sold 450,000. That gap is shrinking. And by the end of this year, Niko expects the gray market to account for 670,000 console sales while legal retailers will sell 510,000.
Niko’s analysts claim that the gray market will slowly fade relative to legal consoles. And by 2023, legal devices will make up a majority of hardware purchases.
If you’re looking for more on China, Niko is selling its full report now. It includes a sales forecast for each device, outlook on Chinese regulation, and more. You can get it from the company’s website.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"How Devolver Digital pursues the indie fringe and brings it to mainstream gamers | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/how-devolver-digital-pursues-the-indie-fringe-and-brings-it-to-mainstream-gamers"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages How Devolver Digital pursues the indie fringe and brings it to mainstream gamers Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Mike Wilson is founding partner at Devolver Digital.
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No one does a game trade show quite like Devolver Digital.
The company set up its faux booth and trailers outside of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), in a parking lot across from the Los Angeles Convention Center. And then it created its zany Devolver Direct online press event (which was really just a silly video) for its new games.
I made my way to the Devolver lot, ostensibly to have a hot dog with Mike Wilson, founding partner at Devolver Digital, during E3. I got a wiener with a corn tortilla, which was quite tasty considering the desperate circumstances of E3.
Then, in the sweltering heat offset by a really loud blowing fan, I caught up with Wilson. We went inside a trailer (yes, an actual mobile home trailer) to get some quiet. Then I interviewed Wilson about the state of indie games and new Devolver titles like Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout.
The company also showed off Carrion, Enter the Gungeon: House of the Gun Dead (an arcade game for 2020), and My Friend Pedro.
I asked Wilson why Devolver had survived for a decade. We also talked about other issues, like the indie game developer revolution, the feared indie apocalypse, mental health issues in game development.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Here’s an edited transcript of our interview.
Above: Mike Wilson at Devolver Digital booth at E3.
GamesBeat: Catch me up on Devolver history. How many years has it been now? Mike Wilson: We turned 10 this year. We had our birthday party Sunday night, which happened to be the night of our E3 press conference. It was just random synchronicity.
GamesBeat: Did you dig out some facts about how many games you’ve published, things like that? Wilson: Counting the ones we’ve announced but not released yet, I think we’re up to about 100 games. We released six already this year, and we have 10 more this year. It’s a lot of games.
GamesBeat: Any day now, you’ll beat EA’s release schedule.
Wilson: I know! It was funny. I forget the website that ranks publishers by average Metacritic score, but number of games released is also a factor. Five years ago we showed up right under all the big guys. We were seven people at the time. But we released a lot of games. It was just one of those funny metrics that doesn’t really work. We enjoyed it. I think we were right below Sega or something like that, back before they weren’t a publisher anymore.
We do a lot of games. Every year we say we’re going to do less, but then — the thing is, we’re hitting a point where a lot of the people who’ve made hits for us previously are back with their second or third IP. We’re in an enviable position. I feel like we see most indie stuff first. We pass on more than 20 games a week. It’s not just the garbage that comes in our email, but viable games that are worth considering. As much as we want to do less, so everyone’s not working so hard….
GamesBeat: You’ve become the suits.
Wilson: I don’t know about that? We still get excited about projects. Even though we keep saying we gotta do less next year, we end up doing more. So many of these guys — if we’ve been successful with somebody in the past, they kind of become family. We’re not going to not do their next game. It’s them, plus all the next generation of indies. It stacks up. That’s why we’ve swelled up to 16 people now.
GamesBeat: What’s your most successful game so far? Wilson: Our single top-grossing game I think is SCUM, which released last year. It was our first game as a service, a big online simulation game. We’re a pretty small company to try to deal with that. It’s funny. I was at Burning Man when it launched, and therefore offline for several days. I came back and checked my email — still at Burning Man, but I couldn’t just be gone for 10 days — and it had blown past our biggest hits in a weekend. We had high hopes for that game, but nothing like that, not doubling our last biggest hit.
Enter the Gungeon is our next best-selling franchise. Part of that is because it’s on so many platforms. It’s been massively successful on Switch. Then the Hotline Miamis and Shadow Warrior, Serious Sam, The Talos Principle. A ton of our success has still come from Croteam, who we started with. They did all the Serious Sam games and then Talos Principle, which is maybe our third or fourth best-selling title.
Enter the Gungeon was made by three guys. Hotline was made by two. Our other best-selling games are made by teams that are a bit bigger, the 3D shooter types of games. Or in the case of Talos a philosophical puzzle game.
GamesBeat: Your identity as the publishing alternative. Do you think that’s still who you are? Wilson: I think it’s still a first choice if you’re an indie, because we still give everybody a really screaming deal. Whether we’ve never worked with them before or whether they’re the Hotline Miami guys, they get pretty much the same deal. We’ve helped make a lot of indies rich without messing with their art or owning anything. It’s tough to argue with.
We can’t do too many more games. We don’t want to grow a lot. We like the feel of what we’re doing, and we think it’s important that we know all our developers, that we know all our employees. Everybody maintains this close relationship. That’s just not possible with scale. The good news is, there are a lot of other indie publishers now that I hope are giving good deals.
I think owning your IP is the default now, which was not the case when we struck out at all. That was one of our big pillars. We love that, because we can’t grow. We don’t want to do everybody’s game. We can’t. The fact that there are other small publishers that have the same sort of ethos is wonderful for us. It’s nice to be able to say, “Hey, it’s not for us, but go talk to these guys.” We know that they’re not going to get completely screwed.
GamesBeat: How many people are at Devolver now? Wilson: It’s 16 on staff. That’s up from 12 last year. But I don’t anticipate hiring a lot more. We had to get a couple of people in China, because China became such an important market until it shut down. [laughs] But regularly, even for our indie games, it’s the second or third-biggest market. We had to take that very seriously. We hired Mark Hickey from Apple last year to take mobile more seriously. We hired a CTO that used to be at Steam, John Bartkiw. He was at Steam, and then Devolver, and then Oculus. Now he’s back at Devolver, partially because — SCUM’s success was part of it. We had to trust too much that the developers knew how to handle all the servers and all that. We didn’t have anyone super technical at our company.
We’ve been bolstering the troops with big brains that have chosen to get out of the big companies and take a massive pay cut to work for us, because of the lifestyle. They can work from home and live wherever they want. They can bring their kids to E3 or whatever. We’ve found that to be a huge advantage for us. We get people that we can’t afford because they just have to get out of a campus, wherever they’ve been, whether it’s a big publisher or a platform.
GamesBeat: How much of the original Gathering of Developers fire-and-brimstone vision is there still? That anti-establishment attitude.
Wilson: We poke fun, but we love the industry. When Gathering happened, it was necessary to make noise. Honestly, we didn’t — when we were making a lot of that noise, when we announced the company, we didn’t even know if we were going to get funded. Worst case scenario, we wanted to pull back the curtain on how terribly some of the most successful independent developers in the industry were being treated as far as ownership of their IP. They were making single-digit percentage royalties. These were people that made multi-million-unit hits.
There was no knowledge, no information-sharing back then. That’s why we did the Ten Commandments of what a good deal looked like, because nobody knew. It was heartbreaking for a lot of teams to read that and find out how crappy their deal was. Then we got absorbed by the same evil empire that we were striking out against. But now it feels like the crusade is over. People know what a good deal is now. The indies know. They know they should own their IP. Not all of them still do. I’m sure some of them are still signing bad deals. But at least they know.
Above: A lawnmower at the Devolver Digital booth outside of E3.
Part of it was, the internet was pretty new back then. There just wasn’t a lot of information-sharing in general, never mind about business and money stuff. We feel it’s less necessary to crusade against the industry in a more serious way. Now it’s much more playful. Isn’t this silly? Aren’t loot boxes silly? Whatever it is this year. It’s just fun. We try to remind people that the big companies really can’t do that. We feel like it’s part of our job to say the things that everyone wants to say. But it’s not so much a war against the industry anymore. We’ve found our place. The indies have found their place. Largely just because of digital distribution happening.
GamesBeat: Have you noticed any interesting patterns about the indies? I remember Theresa Duringer’s talk at GDC. She was talking about the whole barter economy that had developed among all the San Francisco studios. Then, a couple years later, she said that all the indies were gone. The rents got too high in San Francisco and they were all forced out. Now San Francisco is almost empty as far as creative talent goes.
Wilson: And they also got hired into the giant companies.
GamesBeat: But it was interesting for me, on that level, to hear about a larger pattern.
Wilson: I’d say most of the developers we work with live somewhere fairly inexpensive. The biggest difference I can see compared to that first generation of indies, like id and Epic and 3D Realms — these guys don’t really aspire to get big. They’re not just doing something small so they can step up and get bigger and build a giant studio. Most of them have this inherent intuition that it’s better to stay small and be free to make what you want to make.
It’s not unlike millennials, the way they don’t buy into the program our generation did. “We need to do this and then get a mortgage and so on.” They’re saying no. The Hotline Miami guys are a good example. They’ve been killing themselves to make their next IP for several years now, and it’s still just the two of them. They’re pretty wealthy guys now. They could hire some help. But they don’t want to. Most of the studios we work with, even though they’ve become immensely successful, are staying small. It’s very freeing. It removes a lot of the artificial pressures.
GamesBeat: What about the arrival of things like the Epic store and the fund they set up to fund a lot of indies? Does that wind up being competition for you? Wilson: Maybe? Everybody wants to be the Netflix of games eventually. That ends up meaning that you have to deal with Netflix to have a deal. I don’t know how that’s going to go. We get offered exclusive checks and opportunities and whatever from Google and Apple and Microsoft and Sony, and now Epic. We feel like it’s our job to present those to each artist and say, “Look, here’s the deal. You might be giving up something. You might be contributing to the industry being completely fucked for indies in a few years.” If you look at what Spotify did to music, and what Netflix did to indie filmmakers as far as people being actually willing to buy something — those are real possibilities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OAVHWmeV0c GamesBeat: The music industry is actually shrinking.
Wilson: Nobody buys an independent film anymore. iTunes and Amazon and all those platforms — cable VOD doesn’t exist anymore. That’s all down to Netflix. Once you get to the 12 bucks, all you can eat, whatever it is, it’s hard to convince someone to pay 10 or 20 bucks for something they’ve never heard of. The record industry has the same problem. Albums were still $18 when they collapsed, with one or two good songs on there. So there are inherent problems.
GamesBeat: Was there an indiepocalypse, by the way, or….
Wilson: Not that I can tell? It got real crowded. Steam got really hard for indies, especially if you don’t have a publisher at all. It’s interesting. Let me just say on the record that those guys are the only reason we exist, Valve. But also, the Steam team, they intentionally have stayed small. They’re like 30 people. Their answer to staying small, once they became a thing for everybody, was to automate a lot of stuff and say, “Look, we can’t choose and curate. We can’t.” Most of them are engineers. They’re busy making it go for the world. They can’t also be the people saying, “Yes, you, but not you.” It’s a demoralizing thing to do.
GamesBeat: At least until they had the rape game.
Wilson: Right. At some point you have to draw a line. But they just leave it to the community to decide what’s a good game and what’s not, or what’s inappropriate. If there’s something that inflames enough of the community — anyway, that was their answer, the only way they could stay small. Who knows? Who knows how that works out? But there are a lot more channels to find a market than there have ever been. The good news is, all of these platforms actually pay you when they owe you money, which is a new thing in the industry. In the retail days that was not the case. They paid you if they absolutely had to.
GamesBeat: I wonder why Steam hasn’t chosen to match Epic’s percentage, 12 percent.
Wilson: Everyone’s waiting to see what they will do. They’re definitely paying attention. We have a pretty close relationship at this point. We release so many games, and every one of our games is on PC. There’s nothing that’s not on PC. We have that conversation sometimes. They’re internally trying to figure out how to respond. Do we need to adjust? Why did you sign this exclusive? Things like that.
For us, we just really leave it up to each developer. Here’s the opportunity. It’s up to you. Just like every screenshot or every quote or whatever we do is ultimately up to the artist. Different artists — we do express our concerns over things like streaming services and all these things we’ve been talking about. But ultimately we leave it up to each artist to make their own choice.
They do make very different choices. There’s different levels of fear. Some of them are super happy to take a check that means they’re definitely not going out of business next year after their game launches. Others say, “No, we believe in our project. We believe in our upside.” Those are usually ones that are more financially stable because they’ve been successful in the past.
But all we know for sure is we don’t know what’s going to happen. Staying small is the best answer to not knowing, being able to move with whatever works. Even though these are giant companies making these efforts — Apple, Google – we’ve seen them all fuck things up before, hugely. I don’t know when the last time is you checked your Google+ or your Google Wave or your Google Buzz, but just because these are giants coming in, it doesn’t make this all inevitable.
Somebody will do it right, and I really — my heart tells me — I want to trust that Epic will do the right thing, in the same way that Valve will, because they come from being an independent developer. When I was at id, Epic was a small company. That was the race. It was Sweeney and Carmack and our little teams, Quake and Unreal. I know for a fact that every decision relating to that store right now is still down to Tim Sweeney, as big as they’ve become.
Somebody has to be in charge at some point, and I think that’s the best we can hope for, that it’s a Tim Sweeney or a Gabe Newell, somebody that came from doing this because they love it and they’ve been in it for that long. They’ve seen it all come ago. They’re wealthy enough that they’re not tempted. They’re not trying to go public and be the next Google. My money is on those guys to win, and I hope they do.
Above: I had a hot dog, or a wiener with a tortilla, at E3 with Mike Wilson.
GamesBeat: What about curating for you guys? Of those 16 people, how many are weighing in on what you should publish? Wilson: Sometimes everyone. There are 16 individuals, and everyone likes different types of games, or can — if you’ve never played a tycoon game or whatever — we released Weedcraft recently, and that was our first tycoon game. Not a lot of people at Devolver play those types of games, so a lot of people were like, “I’m out.” But everyone is welcome to. There’s no real hierarchy. There’s no final decision-maker. It’s a consensus thing.
GamesBeat: Have you guys developed some sensibility for what you will do and what you will stay away from? Wilson: Yeah, but it’s — we don’t have a road map. It’s very fluid. Really, if you’re small and you don’t take advantage of being small, it’s the worst place to be. If you’re small, you’d better be nimble and willing to evolve, because your advantage is being able to do that when big companies can’t. You can do it much more quickly.
GamesBeat: You see edgy stuff, but not necessarily having to exercise that sort of discretion that much.
Wilson: No. It’s interesting. I’d say probably our most edgy game, possibly, would have been Genital Jousting a couple of years ago. But that was specifically made by Free Lives, the guys who made Broforce, to make a statement about how ridiculous it is that violence is okay, but we’re so afraid of our own body parts and sexuality, and the homophobic thing in the industry. It’s such a strange place for machismo in the video game industry. [laughs] But it exists! So they made that game. It was a party game. I don’t know if you’ve seen it. Testicles chasing each other around. They made it an eight-player party game, which means their ultimate vision was two dudes having to share a controller while they were doing this. They just wanted to make fun of how ridiculous it is that we’re afraid of things like that, yet we’re super okay with ripping up somebody’s spine out and dangling it in front of them.
That’s why that game was interesting. It wouldn’t be interesting if it was just a dick joke. It was interesting because it was making an artistic statement about the industry. It still wouldn’t have been cool, except the game was also very fun. It was very well-made, very well-balanced, and it’s been very successful. But Twitch couldn’t show it, because of the Amazon guidelines or whatever. We had fun with that too. We put the little black boxes over everything.
Above: Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout It’s the same thing with Weedcraft. I don’t know if you followed all my rants on that, but the fact that we were having YouTube videos, streamers, get demonetized because YouTube has a policy about promoting drugs — this game is not promoting drugs. It’s an examination of the industry. The developers don’t even smoke weed. We’re not trying to say that drugs are great. We’re trying to say, “Isn’t this an interesting time in this industry? It’s this semi-Prohibition-era thing.” All of our other games are about murder! Which is illegal everywhere, by the way, but no problem. Occasionally we still find ourselves in a really funny place with where the industry is at, maturity-wise. Facebook also blocked our ads for that game. With Facebook I was actually able to get to a human being and say, “Hey, you’re probably not a gamer, but this is kind of like a documentary about the industry. It’s a super educational industry sim. We’re not selling drugs.” And then they said, “Oh, that makes sense,” and they changed it to where we could sell ads.
I still haven’t been able to get to a human being at YouTube to have that conversation. It’s interesting. YouTube’s policy, part of it is a section about promoting drugs or other illegal things. The next one is about, except for educational and artistic purposes. Look at all the music videos and documentaries about weed. They still don’t see games in there. I can’t get a human being to have that conversation.
Honestly, I wanted to sue YouTube, just to raise awareness of that silliness, and they honestly did — to sue somebody and win you have to prove damages, and I can tell you, that cost that game’s trajectory quite a bit. Part of our math for making that game was that YouTubers would love it. They love these types of games, and it’s really interesting subject matter. Sure enough, when it launched, there was a ton of YouTubers doing it, and as soon as they got demonetized, which was in about two days, they all stopped doing it. That has a real effect on an indie game like that. The same day we got all our ads shut down.
We don’t have massive marketing budgets. Social media is integral to the success of anything we do. Harry decided that suing Google probably wasn’t — he encouraged me to do it personally, but not as Devolver. [laughs] It stinks. But it also makes it interesting, that there are still those barriers that makes it worth pushing the envelope with this artform. To just say, “Guys, what are we talking about here? Why is super-realistic violence okay? Promoting war, whatever it is. But growing weed….“ Above: Devolver GamesBeat: There’s a funny thing now with EA and their EA Partners program. The next game they’re going to publish is Sea of Solitude, this game about loneliness, that was conceived by one woman. They found that this was an interesting story to tell. One of the biggest companies in the industry….
Wilson: It’s like the big studios that do the movie that was clearly for an Oscar push. [laughs] They make all their comic book movies to make money, and then they do this emotional indie thing to win an Oscar. But I love that EA does that.
It’s wonderful that — and honestly, that’s been the most — we were talking about trends and the differences between Devolver and our old companies. The fact that engines have become ubiquitous or free, you’re getting a lot more women and people of color and just people from around the world that never could have written the $500,000 check just to get started. The storytelling is becoming much more interesting, especially in the indie world, where a couple of people can still make a game that matters. That’s super important, because any time it gets too big, there are too many people to say no to ideas like that.
I guarantee that Sea of Solitude, that struck a nerve with a gatekeeper that’s probably experienced that. The conversation around mental wellness — I really prefer to refer to it as “wellness,” because our minds are not separate from our bodies. You’re either healthy or you’re not. You can be sick in any part of your body or your brain. I love that that’s become such a conversation in our industry in the past couple of years, because these things are so engaging.
These digital platforms — again, if you’re a small team — none of our games are mass-market. Nobody on the street has heard of our stuff, for the most part. That’s fine. We’re doing fine. The developers are doing fine. It gives you the opportunity to tell those stories. It can just be for that person that needs to find it. It doesn’t have to be for the world. I love that.
GamesBeat: You’ve been fairly outspoken on Facebook [about caring about mental health issues in gaming].
Wilson: Well, somebody has to be. Like I said about Devolver, a lot of the stuff we say, the antics — if you watch our press conferences, we’re just, “Hey, isn’t this silly?” We do that because the big companies often can’t. It’s not that the people in those big companies don’t feel that way. They just don’t have permission. We can say whatever we want, and I as an individual, not representing Devolver, can do the same.
I can say I was very nearly suicidal at one point in my life. I have mental and physical health issues throughout my family like everyone else. I feel like if you’ve got — I don’t have the biggest megaphone in the world, but I have some people that follow me. I feel like it’s kind of your job to say something besides showing vacation pictures. “Hey, this is real. If you happen to be reading this, I too feel this way sometimes. Nobody’s immune to it.” A lot of our developers — that was part of it. We had several developers hospitalized over a couple of years while making their games, or just after, from the stress. I would kind of be a jerk if I didn’t say something about that. Again, most of the people that benefit from that, I don’t feel like we ever hear from them. It’s just this ripple out there that’s happening. Somebody saw something they needed to see that day. With all the garbage coming at us every day, all the reasons to be depressed, I think it’s important to talk about it.
GamesBeat: Do you ever see many pitches coming in as far as games for seniors, older people? Wilson: No, not really. But as we get older, we’re that first generation.
GamesBeat: There’s some movement toward tech for older people.
Wilson: Yeah, but it’s mostly a demographics cash grab right now.
GamesBeat: It’s not so much about entertainment.
Wilson: No. You see clumsy efforts in the movie theaters to adapt. “This is the fastest-growing demographic! We need to have movies with gray people in them.” But they don’t feel that genuine a lot of times. We have a lot of people who’ve been making games for a long time, getting into their 50s and 60s now. I think instead of a demographic thing, you’ll just naturally see that happen. People will make games for themselves. The best games are made by people who are making what they want to play. Whatever that looks like, I don’t think we know. But my gut tells me it’ll be a bit less hyper-violent, a little less shocking.
GamesBeat: Grand Theft Alzheimer’s? Wilson: [laughs] Oh my God. What are those called, those little scooters people drive? I can’t remember. What are those called? The things in shopping centers. Anyway. Grand Theft whatever those are called. Aren’t we lucky to still be doing this? GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Clause Announces $5.5 Million Series A Round, Including Strategic Investment from DocuSign | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/clause-announces-5-5-million-series-a-round-including-strategic-investment-from-docusign"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release Clause Announces $5.5 Million Series A Round, Including Strategic Investment from DocuSign Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn -Injection of funding further helps bring smart contracts to enterprise -Clause adds two new members to their board of directors as part of Series A Round NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–June 28, 2019– Clause, a leading provider of smart contracting technology, announces the close of a $5.5 million Series A round. The funds will be used to accelerate Clause’s business development efforts, further augment its engineering teams, and nurture the broader smart contract ecosystem.
The Series A round was led by Galaxy Digital, with strategic investment from DocuSign and participation from existing investors BN Capital at Lerer Hippeau, and London-based Seedcamp. Several new investors were added to the funding round including Raptor Group, Galaxy Digital’s EOS VC Fund backed by Block.one, Nat Turner and Zach Weinberg (co-founders of Flatiron Health), Tom Gonser (founder of DocuSign), and Jonathan Summers (co-founder of Everett Capital Advisors).
As part of the Series A round, two new executives will join the Clause board of directors. The new board members include: Mike Dinsdale , CFO of cloud-based enterprise people management company Gusto, and Greg Wasserman, Co-Head of Principal Investments at Galaxy Digital.
Peter Hunn, founder and CEO of Clause said: “Documents no longer need to be merely static records of agreement but can now be a truly integrated part of enterprise technology stacks. Contracts and other documents can now be APIs. With this round we add a wealth of collective experience in disrupting enterprise contracts through digitization. We are excited to drive the next phase of market adoption.” Greg Wasserman of Galaxy Digital noted: “Major enterprises sign millions of documents per year across many different business units. It’s extremely difficult for companies to monitor and manage all of the terms within those documents. Connecting contracts with data to automate actions and alerts is an obvious next phase in the evolution of document digitization. I’m convinced that smart clauses will become a default standard for document management in the future and am excited to partner with Clause.” DocuSign COO Scott Olrich added: “DocuSign’s investment in Clause reflects the impact that smart clauses can have on simplifying and accelerating the overall agreement process. Earlier this year, we announced the DocuSign Agreement Cloud-a suite of products and integrations for digitally transforming how organizations prepare, sign, act on, and manage agreements. At its core, this helps companies to automate and connect their entire agreement process. The technology being pioneered by Clause is one of the fundamental drivers here, and we’re looking forward to partnering with them for the future.” About Clause Clause is a leading provider of cloud-based smart contract technology, which enables users to add smart clauses to documents to automate business processes, workflows, and digital transactions. The technology allows documents to be integrated fully into enterprise systems, web services, and blockchains to form the backbone of automated business logic. Contracts (and other documents) empowered with smart clauses are, for the first time, capable of becoming a living part of an organization’s IT infrastructure. Clause aims to leverage their smart contract technology to unite and automate many of these often-disparate processes, ultimately reducing complexity in transaction workflows and contract management.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190628005053/en/ Robert Corrado [email protected] VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Atelier interview: Finding the proper mixture for a niche RPG | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/atelier-interview-finding-the-proper-mixture-for-a-niche-rpg"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Atelier interview: Finding the proper mixture for a niche RPG Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn The Atelier series has carved out a solid spot in the niche RPG market.
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The Atelier series has a conceit that’s a bit different from the Final Fantasys , Tales , and just about every other Japanese role-playing games out there — alchemy. Creation is key; you use recipes to make new items as you take on the challenges you find in the series’ gorgeous worlds. From the dev studio Gust, Atelier first hit Japan in 1997, but it took eight years for it to hit the West with Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana in June 2005.
Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings came out in March 2018, and it was the first Atelier game I’d ever played. I wanted to learn more about the series, so I asked Gust’s associate head of development Keisuke Kikuchi some questions about the franchise. He’s working Atelier Ryza: Ever Darkness & the Secret Hideout, which was just announced for release in Japan on September 26 and in the West on October 29 for PC, PS4, and Switch.
Koei-Tecmo has been the series’ publisher over the years.
What helps the Atelier series stand out is that it’s not one of those melodramatic “the world’s ending, and you’re its savior” games. It focuses on the stories of its protagonists; making and mixing; exploration bright, colorful worlds, and combat. We also talked about what platform sees the strongest Atelier sales — this surprised me! — and in which region it’s strongest.
Here is a edited transcript of our email interview, which I conducted via a translator.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! GamesBeat: The Atelier series has been in North American now since the mid-2000s? How well has it done here? Keisuke Kikuchi: In the past, we used to launch one new Atelier title per year, and we are proud of having a group of loyal fans constantly supporting us. Although we still have smaller fan base currently compared to some other titles, we are aiming to improve and make changes in order to attract more fans from North America.
GamesBeat: What region has the strongest sales for Atelier? Kikuchi: Japan has the top sales, but sales in Asia are still growing since last year.
GamesBeat: What’s been the best-selling Atelier game in the U.S.? Above: Recipes are a key component to the Atelier series.
Kikuchi: The console versions have almost had the same performance throughout the years, but the best-selling title overall would definitely be Atelier Sophie: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Book [2015 for PS4, PS3, Vita, and PC].
GamesBeat: How difficult is it to localize for the U.S. market? Kikuchi: We are so worried about if we can convey the nuance of the scenarios and the characters’ personalities accurately to the U.S. market. Especially for the gag scenes, we are not sure if users from NA will have the same response as Japanese users, you know, “Are they going to laugh?” Also, as you may know it already, one of the Atelier series’ features is to grind for rare traits, and then enhance or create powerful items and equipment via synthesis. Most of our Japanese fans love this very much but we don’t know if users from NA will like and enjoy it or not.
GamesBeat: Where does this fit in the landscape of Japanese RPGs? Kikuchi: We would like to define this title as “a lite simulation RPG.” Unlike some triple-A RPGs that have huge maps and long scenarios, this series is focusing on repeating a cycle of gathering, synthesis, and battle. This is one of the points that makes it different from other RPGs. Another point is, the protagonist is not going to “save the world.” Instead, the series always follows a warm and bright main storyline with a focus on vivid characters and their stories.
One more thing I would like to point out is, yeah, we have a lot of protagonists.
GamesBeat: Why does the conceit of alchemy resonate with its fans? Kikuchi: Well, when you are talking about alchemy, it’s all about putting raw materials into the cauldron and mixing them together to get the essence inherited and create something complete different. We believe that people all have desires to master such skills of item creation, so we are just trying to fulfill their desires.
GamesBeat: Has the series ever told a story across several games, or is each game telling its own story? Kikuchi: Actually, each title has its own story, and each individual story ends by each title. However, as you may know, we do have trilogies. The worldview is linked, the characters are bonded and the timeline is also shared within one trilogy. We do have 20 titles so far, but for new users, it’s totally OK to begin with any title, just make sure you start at the beginning of a trilogy, otherwise you might get confused about the relationship with characters.
GamesBeat: Besides the alchemy focus, how else does this series stand out? Kikuchi: The conception of the world and the charming characters. We’re trying to make the users feel like the Atelier series is very close to their lives, that’s why we have been focusing a lot on daily routines to create a warm, relaxed world to our users.
GamesBeat: Of the current consoles, what platform has the best sales — PlayStation 4 or Nintendo Switch? Kikuchi: Well, for EU and NA, the number of sales on Switch is catching up with the PS4 version due to constant growth, but in Asia, the Steam versions dominates sales.
Updated 9:17 a.m. July 1 with additional information and dates.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Apple design chief Jony Ive is leaving to form his own company | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/apple-design-chief-jony-ive-is-leaving-to-form-his-own-company"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Apple design chief Jony Ive is leaving to form his own company Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Apple design guru Jony Ive and Apple CEO Tim Cook demo the new iPhones.
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( Reuters ) — Jony Ive, a close creative collaborator with Apple co-founder Steve Jobs whose iPhone and other designs fueled Apple’s rise to a $1 trillion company , will leave later this year to form an independent design company.
Apple said Ive will continue work on its products at his new venture, but shares fell as much as 1.5% to $197.44 in after-market trading, wiping about $9 billion from the firm’s value.
Ive spent nearly three decades at Apple, leading the design of the candy-colored iMacs that helped Apple re-emerge from near death in the 1990s to the iPhone, regarded by some experts as one of the most successful consumer products of all time.
“It’s the most significant departure of somebody who was a core part of the growth story” under Jobs, said Ben Bajarin, analyst with Creative Strategies.
Ive joined Apple in 1992 and led Apple’s design teams since 1996. He became chief design officer in 2015.
Ive’s new company will be called LoveFrom, the Financial Times reported, quoting Ive as saying it would be based in California “for now.” Ive told the newspaper he would work on Apple devices in addition to unspecified “personal passions” and non-Apple projects.
“I have the utmost confidence in my designer colleagues at Apple, who remain my closest friends, and I look forward to working with them for many years to come,” Ive said.
Ive’s departure comes amid falling iPhone sales , including a record drop in Apple’s most recent quarter.
Sales of some newer hardware products such as the Apple Watch and its wireless AirPods headphones are expanding, but Apple has turned its attention to growing its services business, which includes Apple Music and iCloud.
Nehal Chokshi, an analyst with Maxim Group, said that despite Ive’s key role in Apple history, his departure will not hurt the iPhone maker.
“I would view it as Jony Ive looking to get paid market rates for his design expertise from Apple, with the right to allow other companies — not competitors to Apple — to leverage that expertise,” Chokshi said.
Continuity after Jobs Jobs deeply involved himself in Apple’s design process, sometimes visiting Apple’s design studios daily to offer Ive feedback. Chief Executive Tim Cook, to whom Ive now reports, has not done the same.
After Jobs’ death, pundits questioned whether Apple could continue Jobs’ pace of new products. Ive became a symbol of continuity, bridging the Jobs and Cook eras.
But Alan Cannistraro, chief executive of online video discovery platform Rheo who previously worked at Apple for a dozen years, said Apple employees knew Ive had taken on fewer day-to-day design duties in the past several years. Around 2015, Cannistraro would often see Ive at a high-end fitness gym on Market Street in San Francisco doing mid-morning workouts.
“When I would see him there, two days a week or more, that just told me he had taken a step back,” Cannistraro said.
Ive came to oversee both hardware and software design at Apple, but the company laid the groundwork for his departure over several years. During 2015, Ive handed off some duties to other executives while he finished Apple’s new corporate headquarters, Apple Park.
One of those executives was Alan Dye, who Apple on Thursday said will become vice president of human interface design. The company appointed Evans Hankey as vice president of industrial design. Both have “played key leadership roles” in Apple’s design team for years, the company said.
Cannistraro, the former Apple employee, said Hankey stood out as “exceptional” among Apple’s already strong design teams. Around 2008, as Apple readied new iMacs, Hankey dug in on an idea to make Apple products talk to each other as a home control system.
The effort, which was never released, was not part of Hankey’s official duties. But she took an interest anyway because of her “very long-term vision kind of role — looking for seeds that could turn into something bigger, or maybe plant some seeds, too,” Cannistraro said.
The elevation of Dye and Hankey could reignite the connection between Apple’s design teams and senior executives. Both will report to Chief Operating Officer Jeff Williams, who will in turn hand off logistics and supply chain duties to Sabih Khan, newly named senior vice president of operations.
Meantime, Williams, who oversaw development of the Apple Watch, “will spend more of his time working with the design team in their studio,” Apple said.
Williams has gained clout in Apple’s product development process, but that does not necessarily mean he is poised to become chief executive in the near future, Maxim Group’s Chokshi said.
“I don’t see Tim Cook retiring anytime soon,” Chokshi said.
( Reporting by Stephen Nellis in San Francisco; Additional reporting by Supantha Mukherjee and Sanjana Sitara Shivdas in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta and Lisa Shumaker ) VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Amazon's FC Ready program will let employees do on-demand fulfillment work | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/amazons-fc-ready-program-will-let-employees-do-on-demand-fulfillment-work"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Amazon’s FC Ready program will let employees do on-demand fulfillment work Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Roughly 200,000 people work in over 100 of Amazon’s North American fulfillment centers continent-wide. But that’s not enough. The company is hoping to add to the ranks considerably through a new initiative, VentureBeat has learned. Fulfillment Center Ready — abbreviated FC Ready — has been described as an “Uber-like” program intended to fill shift slots to ensure that internal shipping and processing quotas are met.
Both new and salaried Amazon workers will be eligible for FC Ready when it rolls out to select facilities in the coming weeks, including Amazon’s 855,000-square-foot Staten Island fulfillment center. They will be able to sign up for night or day shift work through a web portal that will spotlight availability and track their accumulated hours. Employees will have to complete both safety and knowledge-based training for specific jobs (like picking, packing, and shipping customer orders) onsite.
FC Ready employees will receive the same base pay as full-time associates, an Amazon spokesperson told VentureBeat. (At the Staten Island center, that works out to between $17.50 to $23 an hour.) Additionally, they’ll be eligible for benefits including health, vision, dental, 401k with 50% match, up to 20 weeks of paid parental leave, and tuition reinvestment. Those who choose to work part-time will receive a less-comprehensive benefits package.
Amazon began piloting FC Ready at fulfillment centers in Whitestown, Indiana and Sterling, Virginia as early as August 2018, according to participating employees’ LinkedIn profiles. Its impending launch follows on the heels of “shift swap,” which allows full-time Amazon fulfillment center employees to swap shifts with other workers as an alternative to taking time off.
A shift toward contract workers Amazon’s recommitment to full-time hiring comes as the company invests in contractor platforms like Amazon Flex, which compensates vetted workers for delivering AmazonFresh , Prime Now , and Whole Foods orders to customers’ doorsteps with their personal vehicles. A separate Amazon program — Delivery Service Partners — aims to encourage entrepreneurs to run local delivery fleets of up to 40 vans driven by subcontractors.
Amazon’s increasing reliance on gig workers could be said to align with national workforce trends. According to a recent Gallup poll , roughly 57 million people in the U.S. — 29% of the country’s workers — have an alternative work arrangement as their primary job, and by 2020, some firms are forecasting that over 40% of U.S. workers will opt for contract work instead of full-time jobs.
Harsh working conditions In March, Rashad Long, a former Staten Island fulfillment center worker who was driving local unionization efforts, said he would pursue legal recourse following his termination in February. Amazon claims Long committed a fireable safety violation, but in a complaint filed with the National Labor Relations Board earlier this year (which has since been dropped), Long argued his supervisors were punishing him for speaking out about poor working conditions.
In reports spanning nearly a decade, Amazon’s warehouse workers have exposed indignities like suffocatingly high temperatures and steep penalties for failing to meet certain production goals. In an effort to allay critics both internal and external, Amazon last year raised the minimum wage to $15 for full-time, part-time, and temporary seasonal workers hired through agencies, and recommitted to “providing a safe and positive workplace.” An Amazon spokesperson told VentureBeat in a statement that the safety of Amazon’s employees is the company’s “top priority,” noting that it invested $52 million in 2012 to retrofit existing fulfillment centers with climate control and that all new centers are built with climate control and HVAC systems in all buildings. The spokesperson added that Amazon provides support to employees who aren’t “performing to the levels expected” with dedicated coaching.
“Ensuring the safety of these associates is our number one priority. Operational meetings, new hire orientation, process training and new process development begin with safety and have safety metrics and audits integrated within each program,” said the spokesperson. “Training is constant, both in making sure employees know how best to work with the technology in the facility and also how to prevent injuries … We encourage anyone to compare our compensation, benefits, and safe workplace to other retailers.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"The rise of robots-as-a-service | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/the-rise-of-robots-as-a-service"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest The rise of robots-as-a-service Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) is about to eat the world of work. While much of the attention in the world of automation technology has been focused on self-driving cars, many other markets traditionally dominated by human-in-the-loop solutions are reaching a point of inflection, enabling RaaS solution s to take over.
Robotics companies historically have sold their customers — you guessed it — robots. In the enterprise, robots have often been leveraged to streamline manufacturing. Giant companies with ominous, global, megacorp-sounding names like FANUC and ABB provide solutions that require hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of investment dollars just to get started. Companies buy massive robots and software solutions that are customized — at great cost — to their specific needs. The massive conglomerates that sell these robots have dominated the field for decades, but that is about to change.
One major factor driving this change is how dramatically globalization has reduced hardware production costs and capabilities. At the same time, cheap and powerful computing and cloud infrastructure are now also readily available and easy to spin up. As a result, vertical-specific, robotic-powered, solutions can today be offered as variable cost services versus being sold at a fixed cost. Just as cable companies include the costs of set-top boxes in their monthly bill, robots and their associated software will be bundled together and sold in a subscription package. This change to the robotics business model will have profound implications, radically transforming markets and at the same time changing the future of work.
With a new variable cost model in place as a result of subscription packages, it’s simple to calculate when a market is about to tip to favor RaaS. A market has hit its automation tipping point (ATP) when an RaaS solution is introduced with a unit cost that is less than or equal to the unit cost for humans-in-the-loop to conduct the same task. I’ve been actively investing in and looking for new companies in this market that are catalyzing this change and have already made an investment in a company disrupting the inventory management space using autonomous drones.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! One market that has already reached its ATP is the enterprise building security market. Traditionally, office security has been conducted by humans. The Guardian estimates that there are 20 million private security workers worldwide.
One company, Cobalt Robotics , hopes to change that. With its platform, companies can replace a guard, or guards with a 30%+ cheaper robotic security robot. [ Update : Cobalt has reached out to say their platform is actually 65% cheaper than traditional security guards.] For example, instead of manning a building with three to four people, you can have one human managing a few remote robots. Moreover, all the data and insights collected via these robots is organized and made available for building and security optimization. It isn’t just cheaper, it’s better. There’s no turning back — this market has hit its ATP. And given that the market is predicted to grow to $240 billion by 2020, companies like Cobalt can be absolutely massive.
Above: Cobalt’s security robot service Beyond security, RaaS is poised to disrupt many other markets. According to Allied Market Research, the RaaS market is estimated to grow to nearly $34.7 billion worldwide in the next three years and is growing at a fast clip — nearly 23% CAGR. In my opinion, this market size estimate falls short, as it fails to capture the full impact of how this business model will disrupt multiple sectors. Uber was once thought to only compete in the $11 billion taxi/limo market but ultimately disrupted the multi-trillion dollar transportation market. Similarly, over the next decade, RaaS will eat many other markets. Crop dusting ($70 billion), industrial cleaning ($78 billion), warehouse management ($21 billion), and many more service markets are tipping. When these sectors hit their ATP, we will see the same level of industry disruption currently taking place in the building security market.
The changes taking place in the enterprise will also deeply impact consumer markets, and ultimately society, in profound and potentially challenging ways. We are at the start of a massive shift in how work gets done. RaaS will allow humanity to focus on more challenging problems, while saving the most physically demanding and sometimes dangerous jobs for robots. As manual or repetitive labor shifts to machines, we will see some jobs get destroyed, others changed or accelerated, and new types of jobs created. This will create massive opportunity for some, but as a society we need to focus on education and training for those who will need to move into different fields.
Hooman Radfar is a Partner at Expa.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"ProBeat: Apple's Drive.ai acquisition proves nothing new | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/probeat-apples-drive-ai-acquisition-proves-nothing-new"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Opinion ProBeat: Apple’s Drive.ai acquisition proves nothing new Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Drive.ai is a ride-hailing service that uses self-driving vehicles.
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This week was another whirlwind in AI news.
But one story particularly stood out to me: the collapse of self-driving car startup Drive.ai.
In the span of just a few hours, we learned Drive.ai will be ceasing all operations, laying off 90 employees … and was acquired by Apple.
This is big news, no doubt. But the calls that this is “proof” Apple has a self-driving car project are misguided.
Let’s go over what we know. In February, The Information shared that Drive.ai had been looking for a buyer. Earlier this month, The Information and Bloomberg both reported that Apple was preparing to buy Drive.ai. This week, Apple confirmed to Axios that it had bought Drive.ai, its autonomous cars, and other assets, and hired dozens of its engineers.
Some have argued that this is a reversal from Apple’s last confirmed move regarding its autonomous car skunkworks endeavor, Project Titan.
In January, Apple cut its Titan team by 200 employees.
Taken in isolation with the Drive.ai acquisition, it might seem like Apple is reversing course.
Business as usual Not at all. Apple has staffed Titan up and down for years. The cut earlier this year was a cut, not a shuttering of the project. Keep in mind Project Titan was reportedly first approved by Apple CEO Tim Cook more than five years ago.
In June 2017, Cook described self-driving cars as “the mother of all AI projects.” Furthermore, Apple reportedly maintains thousands of employees ( around 5,000 in 2018 ) working on its secretive database of automotive technologies.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! But you don’t have to accept reports and rumors to believe that Apple is taking autonomous cars seriously. Just read Apple’s statement from earlier this year: We have an incredibly talented team working on autonomous systems and associated technologies at Apple. As the team focuses their work on several key areas for 2019, some groups are being moved to projects in other parts of the company, where they will support machine learning and other initiatives, across all of Apple. We continue to believe there is a huge opportunity with autonomous systems, that Apple has unique capabilities to contribute, and that this is the most ambitious machine learning project ever.
Building an autonomous vehicle is “the most ambitious machine learning project ever.” This is why Project Titan still exists. Even if Apple never produces a self-driving car, the company still believes, in 2019, that the project is worth the effort because of the machine learning challenge.
Apple’s acquisition doesn’t signal anything new. Drive.ai was just available at a bargain price, and Apple took advantage.
ProBeat is a column in which Emil rants about whatever crosses him that week.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"Indeed: AI job-posting rate slows and interest dips | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/indeed-ai-job-posting-growth-slows-and-interest-in-jobs-dips"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Indeed: AI job-posting rate slows and interest dips Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Indeed.com Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Artificial intelligence jobs have been hot in Silicon Valley and elsewhere, with a machine-learning engineer getting an average salary of $142,858 a year. But AI job-posting growth has slowed, and interest in these jobs is also dipping, according to a study by job site Indeed.
AI job postings on Indeed rose 29.1% from May 2018 to May 2019. However, that increase is substantially less than it was the previous two years. During the same time period — May 2017 to May 2018 — AI job postings on Indeed rose 57.9%, and a whopping 136.2% between May 2016 and May 2017.
Meanwhile, interest from job seekers is leveling off. From May 2018 to 2019, searches for AI-related jobs on Indeed decreased 14.5%. By comparison, searches increased 31.9% between May 2017 and 2018 and 49.12% between May 2016 and 2017. This year’s drop also suggests there could be more open jobs than qualified workers to fill them, Indeed said.
AI job searches don’t always keep pace with the number of postings. Consider data scientists, whose job is to take raw data and apply programming, visualizations, and statistical modeling to extract actionable insights for organizations.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Given that data is “the new oil,” data scientists are in high demand, and Indeed’s research shows job postings jumped 31% from 2017 to 2018. During the same period, however, job searches only increased about 14%.
Machine learning and deep learning engineers rule the top 10 AI jobs list Above: Indeed To learn about the most sought-after AI jobs posted on Indeed between 2018 and 2019, the firm’s analytics team identified 10 positions with the highest percentage of job descriptions that include the keywords “artificial intelligence” or “machine learning.” Top 10 AI jobs machine learning engineer deep learning engineer senior data scientist computer vision engineer data scientist algorithm developer junior data scientist developer consultant director of data science lead data scientist Director of analytics, statistician, principal scientist, computer scientist, research engineer, and data engineer are former contenders that didn’t make the top 10 this year.
Indeed discovered that machine learning engineer job postings had the highest percentage of AI and machine learning keywords this year (as was true in 2018). Machine learning engineers develop devices and software that use predictive technology, such as Apple’s Siri or weather-forecasting apps. They ensure machine learning algorithms have the data that needs to be processed and analyze huge amounts of real-time data to make machine learning models more accurate.
While machine learning engineer jobs still have the largest number of postings containing relevant keywords, in 2018 they comprised a greater percentage of these postings (94.2%, versus 75% in 2019).
Many of the jobs requiring AI skills on 2019’s top 10 were nowhere to be found on 2018’s list — such as deep learning engineer, appearing for the first time in second place. Deep learning engineers develop programming systems that mimic brain functions, among other tasks.
These engineers are key players in three rapidly growing fields: autonomous driving, facial recognition, and robotics. The global facial recognition market alone is poised to grow from $3.37 billion in 2016 to $7.76 billion by 2022, according to one study.
The year-over-year differences could reflect the growing demand for data scientists at all types of companies; many employers now need a whole data science team, with staff from junior to director levels. By comparison, the 2018 list contained data science jobs that were more generic, such as data scientist, principal scientist, and computer scientist. Hiring for a range of experience levels appeals to a wider swathe of talent, which can help organizations better compete in the tight labor market, Indeed said.
Top AI jobs by average salary Machine learning engineer is not only the top AI job in terms of the number of job postings, it also commands one of the highest paychecks. And it’s the role with the biggest boost in average annual salary, as compared to 2018.
Machine learning engineer is the third-highest paying job on Indeed’s 2018 and 2019 rankings. This year, however, the average annual salary for this position is $142,859, which is $8,409 higher than last year’s. That’s an increase of 5.8%, compared to the average 2.9% salary increase that human resources firm Mercer predicted for 2019.
Similarly, an algorithm engineer’s average annual salary rose to $109,313 this year — an increase of $5,201, or 4.99%. Both salary bumps are likely a result of organizations spending more to attract talent to these crucial roles in a competitive AI job market.
As with the previous list, the positions that top the salary rankings show an evolution and maturation of the overall AI market. More generalized positions, such as director of analytics, data engineer, computer scientist, statistician, and research engineer, were all on 2018’s list but didn’t crack the top 10 this year. New positions taking their place on the 2019 list include more differentiated data science jobs, such as senior data scientist and lead data scientist.
New York and San Francisco lead top cities for AI jobs Above: Indeed Compared to last year, 2019’s ranking of metropolitan areas with the largest percentages of AI jobs hasn’t changed significantly — though there are a few shifts, as well as a newcomer.
Top Cities for AI Jobs New York, New York San Francisco, California Washington, DC San Jose, California Seattle, Washington Boston, Massachusetts Los Angeles, California Chicago, Illinois Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas Atlanta, Georgia In both 2018 and 2019, the New York City and San Francisco metro areas ranked first and second, respectively. However, New York has lost some of its edge: Last year, the Big Apple comprised 11.6% of AI job postings, which dipped to 9.72% in 2019. By comparison, San Francisco had a 9.6% share in 2018; this dropped to 9.20% in 2019, but it’s now only slightly behind New York. (San Francisco also ranks second on Indeed’s Best Cities for Job Seekers 2019 list, out of 25 metro areas.) New York’s top position is surprising, but the city is home to diverse industries, from financial services to publishing — many of which are now adopting AI. Many West Coast-based tech companies (such as Amazon, Facebook, and Google) have a significant presence in the region. And New York has its share of AI-related tech startups, such as AlphaSense, Clarifai, Persado, and x.ai.
Three areas swapped positions on Indeed’s lists between last year and 2019. In 2018, San Jose ranked third (9.2%) and Washington, D.C. fourth (7.9%). But this year, D.C. ranks third, while San Jose is fourth. In 2019, Boston (slipping from fifth place) traded places with Seattle (rising from sixth), and Chicago ceded its seventh-place position to Los Angeles (formerly eighth). Dallas-Fort Worth held onto ninth place. And Philadelphia, at number 10 last year, was bumped off the chart by newcomer Atlanta.
Will AI create more jobs than it eliminates? In the coming years, the big question will be whether AI generates more jobs than it eliminates.
Some studies suggest AI will, in fact, produce more jobs than it destroys. The 2018 “Future of Jobs” report from the World Economic Forum finds that by 2022, a shift in the division of labor between humans and machines — or AI-enabled automation — will displace 75 million jobs but generate 133 million new ones. Gartner estimates AI will create 2.3 million new jobs in 2020 while eliminating 1.8 million positions. And according to a 2019 Dun & Bradstreet report, 40% of organizations are adding more jobs as a result of adopting AI, while only 8% are cutting jobs because of the new technology. We’ll have to wait to see if that trend holds.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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4,581 | 2,019 |
"How Google Maps uses machine learning to predict bus traffic delays in real time | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/how-google-maps-uses-machine-learning-to-predict-bus-traffic-delays-in-real-time"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages How Google Maps uses machine learning to predict bus traffic delays in real time Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
The world is moving into cities. For the first time in history, the majority of humanity lives in cities, according to United Nations data. In the decades ahead, as more of the global population moves into cities, congestion could get worse, but advances in technology that can help make public transportation a more predictable or enjoyable experience can lower carbon emissions and have a positive impact on climate change.
Google Maps today introduced live bus delay forecasts powered by machine learning in hundreds of major cities around the world. Google gets real-time data on bus locations from some transit agencies today. Real-time bus forecasts, which started in India earlier this month, can power forecasts in places where transit agencies do not provide real-time bus location data today.
Using a combination of time, distance traveled, and individual events as data sets, the AI makes it possible for Google to provide predictions without a need to rely on bus schedules provided by public transportation agencies.
Details of how Google Maps uses machine learning to forecast how many minutes away your bus is more accurately than bus schedules was spelled out today by Google research scientist Alex Fabrikant.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Above: Bus delay forecast model compared to bus schedule in Sydney, Australia The model creation process begins by gathering bus location data from public transportation agencies for training data, then aligning that to car speeds on the route. The sequence model then accounts for each anticipated stop or reduction in speed, such as the time and distance a bus needs to slow down and pull over at a bus stop.
“Each unit predicts its duration independently, and the final output is the sum of the per-unit forecasts. Unlike many sequence models, our model does not need to learn to combine unit outputs, nor to pass state through the unit sequence,” Fabrikant said in a blog post.
Factors like location, day of the week, and time of day are also considered.
“To capture unique properties of specific streets, neighborhoods, and cities, we let the model learn a hierarchy of representations for areas of different size, with a timeline unit’s geography (the precise location of a road or a stop) represented in the model by the sum of the embeddings of its location at various scales,” Fabrikant said.
Google today also rolled out a feature to predict how crowded a bus or train will be using machine learning in 200 cities globally.
A number of features have been introduced in the past year to make life easier for travelers on public transportation, with the introduction of bus stop-by-bus stop directions last year and in recent months, on-screen augmented reality directions, as well as Google Assistant voice commands to tell you when the next bus is coming for New York City residents and Google Pay support for bus and train tickets.
A Wall Street Journal report published last week concluded that there are millions of fake listings on Google Maps, a fact Google acknowledged and said it is attempting to address. More than 3 million fake business profiles were removed from Google Maps in 2018, the company said in a blog post in the wake of the news.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"GAN Paint Studio uses AI to add, delete, and modify objects in photos | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/gan-paint-studio-uses-ai-to-add-delete-and-modify-objects-in-photos"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages GAN Paint Studio uses AI to add, delete, and modify objects in photos Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn The GAN Paint Studio interface.
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AI and machine learning hold incredible promise for post-production image editing, if new research is any indication. Engineers at Nvidia recently demoed an AI system — GauGAN — that creates convincingly lifelike landscape photographs from whole cloth, while Microsoft scientists last month proposed a framework capable of producing images and storyboards from natural language captions.
But what about AI that paints with common sense? Thanks to an enterprising team at the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, a collaboration between MIT and IBM to jointly pursue AI techniques over the next decade, it’s made its way from the literature to the web. A publicly available tool — GAN Paint Studio — lets users upload any photograph and edit the appearance of depicted buildings, flora, and fixtures to their heart’s content. Impressively, it’s generalizable enough that inserting a new object with one of the built-in tools realistically affects nearby objects (for instance, trees in the foreground occlude structures behind them).
“Right now machine learning systems are these black boxes that we don’t always know how to improve, kind of like those old TV sets that you have to fix by hitting them on the side,” said PhD student at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) David Bau, a lead author on a related paper about the system. “This research suggests that, while it might be scary to open up the TV and take a look at all the wires, there’s going to be a lot of meaningful information in there.” Above: Examples of edits performed by GAN Paint Studio.
So how’s it work? Given a photo as input, the machine learning system underlying GAN Paint Studio first rerenders it by finding a latent representation from which it can generate a photo that’s nearly identical to the original. As users tap the tool’s collection of image-editing settings to transform their photo, the system updates the latent representation according to each edit and renders the modified representation.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Developing the model required identifying units correlated with object types (like doorways) inside a GAN, a two-part neural network consisting of generators that produce samples and discriminators that attempt to distinguish between the generated samples and real-world samples. The researchers tested the units individually to see if eliminating them would cause certain objects to disappear or appear, and over time isolated artifact-causing units to increase overall image quality.
“Whenever GANs generate terribly unrealistic images, the cause of these mistakes has previously been a mystery,” said paper coauthor and IBM research scientist Hendrik Strobelt. “We found that these mistakes are triggered by specific sets of [units] that we can silence to improve the quality of the image.” As alluded to earlier, the system learned a few basic rules about the relationships among objects. It won’t put something where it doesn’t logically belong (like a window in the sky), and it moreover creates different visuals depending on the context. For example, asking GAN Paint Studio to add doors to two different buildings won’t result in duplicate doors; they’ll likely look quite different from each other. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. GAN Paint Studio can “turn on” bedside lamps which were previously switched off, restyle shrubbery for spring or autumn, install windows to apartment interiors, and add rooftop domes to buildings.
The team believes that more sophisticated GAN-powered painting tools could someday enable designers to tweak visuals on the fly, and that could allow computer-graphics editors to compose arrangements of objects needed for particular pictures quickly. They acknowledge the technology could misused, of course, but they assert that ongoing research is the best way to prevent abuse.
“You need to know your opponent before you can defend against it,” said coauthor and MIT CSAIL postdoctoral student Jun-Yan Zhu. “This understanding may potentially help us detect fake images more easily.” Zhu has a point. In mid-June, researchers at Adobe and the University of California, Berkeley detailed an AI program that recognizes when Photoshop’s Face Aware Liquify tool has been used to alter facial expressions. (They claim that in tests, it was able to spot manipulations with an accuracy as high as 99%, compared with the average untrained person’s success rate of 53%.) Separately, computer scientists at the University of Southern California’s Information Sciences Institute devised a system that’s able to suss out anomalous movements in fake videos generated by popular AI-powered apps.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Cruise is testing emergency vehicle detection for autonomous cars | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/cruise-is-testing-emergency-vehicle-detection-for-autonomous-cars"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Exclusive Cruise is testing emergency vehicle detection for autonomous cars Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Cruise is testing computer vision and sound detection AI to help autonomous cars respond to passing emergency vehicles, a company spokesperson told VentureBeat in an email. More specifically, the systems are alert for the sound and sight of sirens to understand if a police car, fire truck, or ambulance is in motion.
The company is using emergency vehicle detection on all of the autonomous vehicles it’s testing on roads. It currently has nearly 180 autonomous vehicles in the field, primarily in San Francisco.
To train its emergency vehicle detection systems, Cruise used a combination of synthetic and real-world data. At the time of publishing, the company was unable to provide additional details about training data sets or more technical information about how an autonomous vehicle responds when it detects an emergency vehicle.
How an autonomous vehicle responds to an emergency vehicle could utilize systems Cruise currently uses to navigate chaotic double parking on the streets of San Francisco.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! In a video provided to VentureBeat, Cruise senior engineering manager Sean Harris demonstrated the visual and sound detection systems in action. In the video, the vehicle pauses at an intersection and waits for an ambulance to drive by.
“For most vehicles, we don’t care about [whether] they’re making noise or have lights flashing on their roof, but for an emergency vehicle that’s really important because we need to behave differently in this kind of active state,” Harris said in a presentation at the Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition conference (CVPR) held last week in Long Beach, California.
In California, drivers are legally obligated to yield to emergency vehicles, but with autonomous vehicles there’s more to consider than whether they pull to the side of the road if they hear sirens. Understanding the precise location of an approaching or receding siren can be challenging when sound bounces off tall buildings in a city, but it’s worth the effort required to solve this problem. As Harris notes — and many other autonomous vehicle companies surely know — emergency vehicle detection will be important for the safety of both emergency responders and passengers in cars.
In the years ahead, if autonomous vehicles become more prevalent on congested city roads and emergency vehicle detection systems are reliable, we could see a drastic decrease in emergency call response times. The Fire Department of New York City and New York University recently received a grant from Google.org’s AI for Good initiative to reduce emergency vehicle response times in congested urban areas.
Construction zones pose another complicated scenario for autonomous vehicles. To address this challenge, Waymo — and more recently Zoox — have been tuning their machine learning systems to recognize and navigate such sites.
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"Can you just start dabbling in AI and begin seeing big results? (VB Live) | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/can-you-just-start-dabbling-in-ai-and-begin-seeing-big-results-vb-live"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages VB Live Can you just start dabbling in AI and begin seeing big results? (VB Live) Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Presented by Bold 360 by LogMeIn You have big expectations for AI-powered customer service tech, but is it the tech’s fault if they aren’t met? Catch up on this VB Live webinar to learn about the five biggest mistakes companies make when they implement AI and how to leap over these pitfalls and into real results.
Access the webinar on demand for free right here.
There are several common misconceptions businesses have around artificial intelligence, and these actually are the biggest barriers many have when it comes to implementing the technology, despite the clear evidence that it offers real, measurable results.
“At least initially, there was a general lack of understanding in the marketplace around what AI really is,” says Akhil Talwar, senior product lead at Bold360 by LogMeIn. “There’s a lot of this hype cycle phase that organizations have gone through. My hope is that we’ve now shifted into more practical applications of AI, but unfortunately that’s not always the case.” Michael Butler, head of customer success at Ople agrees.
“What I’m excited about is the opportunity that AI presents to businesses across all industries,” says Butler. “But a lot of businesses don’t know how to get started with AI because they’re confused about what it truly is and how to dabble in it. My feedback is, just jump right in.” Come to the table with some business questions you would love AI to address, he says, or at least try and solve for you, bring your data sets, and just start experimenting. Not all of them are going to work, and not all of them are going to be successful, Butler adds, “but you will find some spectacular insights once you start dabbling in it.” However, it’s this idea of “dabbling” that seems complex or inaccessible to the average business leader.
“If you’re a data scientist or you have a data science team, they understand the algorithms, they know how to get started, they know the process,” he says. “For me, as a leader in ecommerce and renewals [when I was at] VMware, I had a lot of data, a ton of data. I just wasn’t getting valuable business insights from it.” It took sitting down as a team to discuss what answers, as business leaders, they wanted from their data sets. One of the first areas was identifying the customers mostly likely to churn, which saved them billions of dollars.
Talwar notes that having a clear understanding of what AI can truly deliver is essential in this process.
“There are some risks associated with having misalignment within an organization, where they’re spending a disproportionate amount of resources on the wrong initiatives and they end up struggling to recognize an ROI,” he says. “One example is the confusion in the customer service and support domain around automation and AI being referenced synonymously. ” You don’t need AI if you’re looking for simple automation. But on the flip side there are compelling use cases where organizations can create a richer customer experience, leveraging NLP and machine learning.
“You have to make sure you’re not paying AI prices for automation,” he says.
He points to chatbots as an example, which come in both these flavors. If you’re looking to collect contact information, or prospect and schedule a follow-up with some leads, you can set up simple automated process. Bots will ask a set of predefined questions, recall the answers, and block off calendars. But if you want to take and build a chatbot that behaves more like a human, where it can understand more broad sets of intents, be able to understand contextual differences, and handle a wide variety of topics in a single conversation, that’s where you really need AI.
That confusion around what AI really entails and what kind of technology you need often comes down to simply succumbing to the hype associated with AI.
“People try to fast-track anything that has an AI label slapped on it without going through the right set of motions,” Talwar says. “Very often, we’re seeing that there’s an executive internally that’s trying to elevate their position or trying to drive attention to some of their projects, so people will attach an AI initiative around it.” It’s important to set the right expectations across the organization first, and get folks aligned on the specific business use cases.
“It’s great to jump in and start, but you want to start with the problem you’re solving, versus having this cool piece of technology or an algorithm you want to deploy,” he explains.
It’s also important that executives understand the cost and time investment involved, and to help address employee concerns around how an AI solution will impact their jobs – in other words, bring the right set of stakeholders together beyond just the people who are implementing it from a data science or engineering standpoint.
“Unless we can address the concerns of others, and be transparent with them, these initiatives come up against a lot of friction, and they’re less likely to succeed,” Talwar says.
Getting buy-in from stakeholders comes down to identifying which business pain points AI can help with, and looking at the return,” says Butler.
And then you get down to proving that out. The advent of AI as a SaaS platform really speeds up your experimentation life cycle and allows you to succeed or fail much quicker, so you can go back to your stakeholders with solid results and get buy-in to continue to push your AI success: say, identifying the nine percent of customers who are at risk for churn, addressing the issue, and being rewarded with higher renewal rates, and more cross-sell and upsell, for example.
It requires putting specific business metrics around experimentation, and people are failing with the belief that they need massive amounts of super-clean data right out of the gate, otherwise they won’t be able to get accurate results.
The reality is, you need a statistically efficient amount of data for the neural network to learn the predictions, Butler says.
“And it doesn’t need to be 100 percent clean, to be honest,” he says. “If you wait to clean it and you spend 80 percent of your time cleaning the data, you really don’t get to the fun part, which is making the models, tuning the models, and having the models kick out business predictions. Just start dabbling in it and playing in it, and you will learn. You’ll adopt it, because it’s the future.” For the in-depth discussion around the kinds of use cases AI is creating tremendous ROI in, specific strategies for the specific hurdles you’ll most often encounter, and a look at the security issues around implementing AI, don’t miss this VB Live event! Access on demand here! You’ll learn about: What AI actually is (hint: it’s not automation) The importance of buy-in from executives and agents How to approach AI implementation and measure success The impact of AI across the customer journey Speakers: Akhil Talwar , Senior Product Lead, Bold360 by LogMeIn Michael Butler , Head of Customer Success, Ople The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Boston suburb bans facial recognition software | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/boston-suburb-bans-facial-recognition-software"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Boston suburb bans facial recognition software Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
Citing concern over potential discrimination and dystopian misuse, the Somerville City Council in Massachusetts today voted to ban facial recognition software use by local police and city departments. This makes Somerville, which is located near Boston and has a population of 81,000, the second U.S. city to outlaw the technology. The ban follows the introduction of a facial recognition ban passed in San Francisco in May.
That ordinance was written in part by the ACLU, which also helped craft the Somerville ordinance.
In addition to a ban on active use of AI by city departments, the ordinance outlaws use of data or evidence produced by facial recognition software systems in criminal investigations or legal proceedings. The local law does not have the scope to restrict facial recognition use by state or federal law enforcement.
However, the law refers to facial recognition as the “functional equivalent of requiring every person to carry and display a personal photo identification card at all times” and cites concern over false positive facial recognition matches for women, young people, immigrants, and people of color.
The ordinance was approved in an 11-0 vote — hardly surprising, as 9 of the 11 Somerville City councillors sponsored the legislation.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! As facial recognition software begins to trickle into the workplace and consumer devices like the iPhone use facial recognition to verify purchases, police are also adopting the largely unregulated technology.
With the ball already in play, governments are just now beginning to consider how facial recognition software should be used in society.
Local residents shared 98 written comments, plus letters of support from the ACLU and a letter in opposition from trade organization Security Industry Association, Somerville city clerk John Long told VentureBeat in an email. All letters received by the city support a ban.
“Any new security technology must be proven effective before taxpayer money is spent implementing it,” Somerville resident Dmitry Erastov said in a letter.
Founding editor of Logic magazine and Harvard University fellow Moira Weigel is a technologist married to a technologist and a Somerville resident.
“We know that such technologies enforce racism and cis-heterosexism and hand over huge amounts of sensitive information to enrich democratically unaccountable private entities. It’s no accident that San Francisco, another city with a high population of technologists who understand how these systems work, [has] also voted to ban them,” Weigel said.
Also this week: Police body camera maker Axon today pledged to keep facial recognition software from its devices.
On Tuesday, the Oakland Privacy Advisory Committee in California endorsed the wording of facial recognition ban legislation being considered by the city council.
Brian Hofer is chair of the Oakland Privacy Advisory Commission and coauthor of the San Francisco legislation, but passage of a similar ban in Oakland encountered some initial delays, he told VentureBeat last month.
The California State Legislature is also considering a facial recognition ban on police body cam footage.
A number of AI experts or privacy advocates who advise state and national lawmakers about the risks and opportunities associated with facial recognition software favor a moratorium or outright ban on the technology.
The Boston area plays a fairly prominent role in facial recognition policy debates. And the Massachusetts State Legislature is currently considering the Face Surveillance Moratorium Act, a bill sponsored by a Boston area lawmaker.
Representative Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), who represents Somerville and Boston in Congress, has in recent weeks participated in multiple House Oversight and Reform Committee hearings that saw bipartisan support for temporary limitations on facial recognition software use by law enforcement.
MIT Media Lab’s Joy Boulamwini, who testified before a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee this week, led assessments that raised serious issues with leading facial recognition systems from companies like Microsoft, Face++ and Amazon’s Rekognition.
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"AI Weekly: China, the United States, and the struggle for global leadership | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-weekly-china-the-united-states-and-the-struggle-for-global-leadership"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI Weekly: China, the United States, and the struggle for global leadership Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Democratic presidential candidates (L-R) Marianne Williamson, former Colorado governor John Hickenlooper, former tech executive Andrew Yang, South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) take part in the second night of the first Democratic presidential debate on June 27, 2019 in Miami, Florida.
Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
This week, 2020 presidential hopefuls took the stage in Miami for the first Democratic primary candidate debates. At times the whole thing felt a bit like a reality show, because some desperate people knew they wouldn’t make it to the next round, but also because of a smattering of meme-worthy moments.
I know nobody wants political content on this account but it's 2:30am and I am awake and putting Marianne Williamson's speech to Twin Peaks music pic.twitter.com/fSjP5wzrnR — Sebastian Fundora: Future World Champion (@BoxrecGrey) June 28, 2019 Most debate time went to issues like health care, climate change, or immigration after the tragic, avoidable deaths of children along the U.S.-Mexico border in recent weeks. And notably, Elizabeth Warren defended her position that Google, Facebook, and Amazon should be broken up.
China was a hot topic. At the end of night one, several candidates referred to China as the biggest external threat the United States faces today. That sentiment was echoed during the second night of debates, and it’s a judgment no doubt made in part because of a number of economic and military-related issues, but also because of China’s stated desire to become a world leader in AI within approximately the next decade.Tech investor Andrew Yang said his first call as president would be to China, to work together on issues like AI.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg talked about Chinese AI investments as more important to the U.S. than present Trump administration arguments over tariffs. “China is investing so that they could soon be able to run circles around us in artificial intelligence, and this president is fixated on the relationship as if all that mattered was the balance on dishwashers,” he said.
Buttigieg further asserted that in order to compete, we must be an alternative to China, who he said is “using technology to perfect dictatorship.” He continued, “If we really want to be an alternative, a democratic alternative, we actually have to demonstrate that we care about democratic values at home and around the world.” Outside of the U.S., while China is sometimes seen as dystopian because of its social credit score and use of facial recognition to track people like its Uighur Muslim minority , the European AI community is talking about the creation of a third way to incorporate AI into business and society.
EU experts said this week AI consistent with EU democratic values means no mass surveillance or social credit score.
In a meeting held at Stanford University last month, members of the public stressed the importance of international coalitions and the U.S. Department of Defense being an international leader in AI ethics.
The White House emphasized work with “international allies” in a recent revision of the U.S. AI R&D strategy.
Futurist Amy Webb’s The Big Nine imagines what our world, shaped by tech giants in the U.S. and China, will look like in the decades ahead. In the most ideal scenario, she envisions international coalitions being formed around the responsible use of AI, similar to the role NATO played during the Cold War, tying democratic nations together for collective action.
Like Cold War debates over democracy and communism, U.S. leadership in AI will depend on more than economic influence or military might, but also on adherence to our own values. They’re often talked about separately, but in this context, all of these issues — the humane treatment of asylum seekers, the future of AI, China’s New Silk Road and growing influence — are connected.
We’re more than 400 days away from Election Day 2020, but no matter who becomes the 46th president of the United States, building AI into business and society in the years ahead may depend on building bridges with allies, and loyalty to our own democratic values. Only then will we be able to envision a better world, and then build it.
Send your news tips to Khari Johnson and Kyle Wiggers — and be sure to bookmark our AI Channel and subscribe to the AI Weekly newsletter.
Thanks for reading, Khari Johnson Senior AI staff writer VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"AI predicts college student stress from phone sensor and questionnaire data | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-predicts-college-student-stress-from-phone-sensor-and-questionnaire-data"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages AI predicts college student stress from phone sensor and questionnaire data Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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College students lead stressful lives. They’ve got assignments to complete and extracurriculars to attend, not to mention tests to prepare for and job applications to submit. Unfortunately for them, the negative health effects of stress are well-documented. If left untreated, it can cause cardiovascular diseases, affect memory and cognition, and even suppress the immune system.
To help suss out the outsized contributors to social and academic pressure, researchers at the College of Computer Science at the University of Massachusetts turned to AI , which they used to predict stress levels — below median, median, or above median — from questionnaire and smartphone sensor data. They report that their model achieved state-of-the-art performance, obtaining a 45.1% improvement compared with the baseline on a data set of student sleep patterns, activity, conversation, location, information regarding mental health (like stress levels), and more.
They describe their work in a paper (“ Personalized Student Stress Prediction with Deep Multitask Network “) published on the preprint server Arxiv.org.
“With the growing popularity of wearable devices, the ability to utilize physiological data collected from these devices to predict the wearer’s mental state, such as mood and stress, suggests great clinical applications, yet such a task is extremely challenging,” wrote the coauthors. “With the induction of high-quality robust sensors in wearables like Fitbit, Apple Watch, and smartphones, efficient collection of physiological and behavioral data with reasonable accuracy has become affordable.” VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! The researchers’ AI system — Cross-personal Activity LSTM Multitask Auto-encoder Network, or CALM-Net — considers data as time-series (i.e., taken at successive equally-spaced points in time) and can identify temporal patterns contained within it. Additionally, it offers the ability to personalize models and incorporate time-series information, which improves performance as the number of students increases. And it infers and measures things like day of the week, sleep rating, sleep duration, and time to next assignment deadline.
The corpus on which the model trained — StudentLife — was conducted at Dartmouth and facilitated by an Android app. Each day over a 10-week period, it recorded stress data from 48 students in the form of ecological momentary assessments (i.e., real-time responses to questionnaires), which it paired with passive sensing data like activity (walking, running), audio (silence, voice, noise), phone charge level, and phone lock status as often as every 10 seconds.
In tests, CALM-Net improved upon of the performance of the two state-of-the-art models to which it was compared. The researchers theorize this was a direct result of its ability to consider data as time-series. “The ability of CALM-Net to incorporate granular temporal information and high-level covariates, along with an architecture which is capable of deciphering personalized patterns for each student without overfitting, contributes to its high performance,” they wrote. “[This approach] improves the performance of all evaluated models, showing that stress indicators can generally be better modeled using personalized layers.” VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"AI cannot progress without a government-led code of ethics | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/ai/ai-cannot-progress-without-a-government-led-code-of-ethics"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Guest AI cannot progress without a government-led code of ethics Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
We’re at the dawn of the fourth industrial revolution. The choices we make today about how to govern AI will determine whether our future resembles dystopian science fiction, or something akin to Star Trek, where trustworthy AIs help bring out the very best in humanity. In the past when technologists and business leaders spoke of “digital transformation,” they had mobile applications or cloud computing in mind. Now they mean AI. However, AI is a powerful tool that impacts people and their trust, and we are only just beginning to understand the profound responsibility that goes with these self-learning systems.
Fear of disruptive, confusing, offensive, and even dangerous AI has caused the city of San Francisco last month to ban law enforcement from using facial recognition technology.
While bans aren’t the answer, it’s hard to fault San Francisco’s leaders. The unrestrained use of AI will erode democratic rights and individual liberties. And as one city council member explained, “We have an outsize responsibility to regulate the excesses of technology precisely because they are headquartered here.” Those closest to AI are in the best position to understand the threat of AI without ethics. Software development, in general, has had a longstanding need to implement better global ethical standards.
But with AI, the need is greater because the stakes are greater. A study of 1,010 UK tech workers found that 90 percent consider technology a force for good, but 59 percent of those working in AI said they had worked on projects they felt might be harmful to society; 18 percent quit their jobs over ethical concerns.
But the question isn’t whether we should ban AI — we shouldn’t, and arguably it’s impossible to put the genie back in the bottle. We need to ask how governments can identify an ethical way forward that embraces progress while safeguarding citizens.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! Citizens will expect governments to keep pace with technological innovation when it comes to public functions such as healthcare, policing, taxation, etc. At the same time, governments will have to make sure private sector AI solutions comply with the values of civil society. In both instances, the key is for governments to model best practices through the establishment of ethics councils that can build trust in AI. Specifically, you build trust by making AI’s decision-making functions transparent enough that the general public can see how the technology aligns with societal values.
Canada’s Directive on Automated Decision-Making offers a leading model for governments looking to create a framework for transparent AI. Using a tool called, Algorithmic Impact Assessment (AIA ), the Canadian government has created a process for the use of AI in both the public and private sectors.
The AIA tool brings together all relevant stakeholders, including the public, to ask a range of important questions, such as: What does the AI do? What types of decision result from this AI program? Food or product safety? Crime prevention or investigation? Licensing or permitting? Are the decisions based on objective criteria, or is there room for discretion and subjectivity? Have all stakeholders been consulted? Is there a recourse mechanism in case people have questions or complaints? What are the processes you’ve put in place? How explainable are machine determinations? Are you monitoring for unintentional outcomes? Do you have a clear audit trail around decisions? The answers to these questions (as well as many others) are then scored based on various categories. Those raw scores are then made available to the public so that they can assess the tradeoffs between innovation and risk.
Grappling with these questions is difficult work for government regulators, technologists, private companies, and most of all, individual citizens. But abdicating our collective responsibility — whether through outright bans or willful ignorance — isn’t an option.
In order to ensure that social good is our North Star, bold government leadership requires moving at the speed of technological revolution, so that long-held values are woven into the DNA of tomorrow’s innovations.
Manoj Saxena is Executive Chairman of CognitiveScale and Chairman of AI Global.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Uber loses $1 billion in Q1 2019 as costs grow for drivers, food delivery | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/transportation/uber-loses-1-billion-in-q1-2019-as-costs-grow-for-drivers-food-delivery"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Uber loses $1 billion in Q1 2019 as costs grow for drivers, food delivery Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
SAN FRANCISCO/BENGALURU (Reuters) — Uber Technologies reported a $1 billion loss on Thursday as the ride-hailing service spent heavily to build up its food delivery and freight businesses, sending revenues up 20% in its first quarterly report as a public company.
Revenue of $3.1 billion matched the high end of the range Uber forecast for the quarter and the loss of $1.0 billion compared with the company’s forecast of $1.0 billion to $1.11 billion.
Shares rose 2.6% following a conference call with executives in which Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi cited business improvements, such as fewer consumer promotions in the second quarter, but called 2019 an “investment year.” With its share price trading more than 10% below its IPO price of $45 , Khosrowshahi will have to convince investors Uber can turn a profit, given its reliance on rider incentives and competition in all parts of its business, from its core business of ride hailing to food delivery to freight.
“Our story is simple. We’re the global player,” Khosrowshahi told analysts on his first earnings call after the company’s IPO earlier this month. “Our job is to grow fast at scale and more efficiently for a long, long time.” The results indicate the newly public company was able to hit its own financial targets, likely to offer some assurance to investors.
Costs went up 35% in the quarter, as the company spent heavily in the run-up to its IPO earlier this month. Gross bookings, a measure of total value of rides before driver costs and other expenses, rose 34% from a year ago to $14.6 billion. Bookings were up 3.4% from the previous quarter, showing the difficulty of recruiting new riders in saturated markets.
But Wedbush analyst Ygal Arounian said he was encouraged by improvements in take rates, and accelerating revenue growth. Uber’s take rate is the revenue pocketed by the company after subtracting driver or restaurant pay and incentives.
“We’re still a while away from profitability, but Uber is expecting strong signs of improvement across many of its key metrics and that is an important sign for investors.” Uber was the biggest of a group of Silicon Valley startups that have gone public this year against the backdrop of a global stock market sell-off sparked by renewed trade tensions between the United States and China. Uber also faces increased regulation in several countries and fights with its drivers over wages.
In the mature U.S. market, where Uber’s main rival is Lyft, Khosrowshahi said two levers for growth were the expansion of rides into suburbs and a generational wave, in which millennials show little interest in car ownership.
Executives said signals from Lyft during its recent earnings call that its rival was focused less on price and more on brand and product was a positive. Khosrowshahi called it a “healthier mode of competing than just throwing money at a challenge.” Overall, incentives paid to drivers more than doubled from a year earlier, outpacing revenue growth, as the company invested in its growing food delivery service, Uber Eats. In that unit, driver incentives tripled to $291 million while revenue rose 89 percent.
Uber was “very early in the stages” of exploiting how ride-hailing can help its Eats business, where take rates would improve over 2019, he said.
The company had begun to “upsell” riders to Eats deals , with encouraging early signs, Khosrowshahi said.
Uber said its monthly active users rose to 93 million globally, from 91 million at the end of the fourth quarter.
A net loss was $1.01 billion, or $2.26 per share, in the first quarter ended March 31 compared with net income of $3.75 billion, or $1.84 per share, a year earlier, when results were helped by its sale of operations to Grab and Yandex.
In its fourth quarter, Uber’s net loss was $887 million and revenue was $2.97 billion.
Uber previously said it expected first-quarter revenue in the range of $3.04 billion to $3.1 billion while seven analysts polled by Refinitiv IBES on average expected revenue of $3.04 billion.
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"NASA selects first commercial partners for 2024 Artemis moon landing | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/transportation/nasa-selects-first-commercial-partners-for-2024-artemis-moon-landing"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages NASA selects first commercial partners for 2024 Artemis moon landing Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
NASA today announced it has selected the first commercial space companies to participate in its payload delivery service as part of the agency’s plan to return humans to the surface of the moon by 2024 and create a permanent moon base by 2028.
Astrobotic is being paid $79.5 million to carry more than a dozen payloads to the near side of the moon by 2021; Intuitive Machines was awarded a $77 million contract for five payload trips; and Orbit Beyond was awarded a $97 million contract to carry as many as four payloads to a lava plain by 2020.
Initial trips will be dedicated to the delivery of scientific investigation and discovery, and the payloads will likely be related to that purpose. Payloads carried by each company will be determined this summer, according to a NASA statement.
The news caps what’s been a momentous month for NASA and commercial space companies.
NASA introduced the Artemis program on May 16.
Named for the twin sister of Apollo, Artemis will include lunar landing studies with companies like SpaceX, Blue Origin, Lockheed Martin, and SSL.
Initial space station conceptual plans from companies like Blue Origin, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman were introduced earlier this week, and last week, NASA selected Maxar as the first commercial partner for a lunar space station in the moon’s orbit.
Blue Origin, owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, introduced its first lunar module and a new rocket earlier this month as part of its pitch to be included in Artemis. More could be revealed next week at re:Mars, a space, AI, and robotics conference Amazon is hosting in Las Vegas.
In other recent initiatives, an Israeli private space company failed to land a rover on the moon in April; in January, China’s space agency became the first to land on the dark side of the moon; and in May, India announced plans to become the fourth nation to land a module on the moon this fall.
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"Pinterest's web app for Windows is now available | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/social/pinterests-web-app-for-windows-is-now-available"
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If you’ve been searching high and low for a Windows-native Pinterest experience, good news: Pinterest today launched a web app for Windows 10 in the Microsoft Store. It’s available globally.
Pinterest’s Progressive Web App (PWA) supports every feature found in the network’s desktop experience proper, which is to be expected — it’s basically a wrapper around Pinterest on the web. In tow is Pinterest Lens, which taps computer vision to detect objects in the real world and suggest related items, along with shortcuts and buttons for saving ideas, browsing recommended and trending Pins, and searching for things like food, style, home, beauty ideas, and more.
The Pinterest app supports Windows’ Live Tiles, and Jump Lists and notifications will go live today or tomorrow, a spokesperson told VentureBeat. Offline functionality and integration with the Share Menu in Microsoft Edge are on the way, but there’s no firm timeline yet.
The launch of Pinterest’s Windows app follows hot on the heels of Pinterest Catalogs , a feature that lets anyone upload and convert their entire product catalog into shoppable Pins, and Related Products, which appear under product Pins to showcase inventory uploaded by brands. In other news, Pinterest’s personalized shopping recommendations were recently expanded to serve up results that resemble individual users’ saved pins.
Pinterest has increasingly pivoted its attention toward brands as it barrels toward an initial public offering (IPO). Lens Your Look, which lets you take a picture of an item of clothing and find similar options, rolled out in 2017 , while Shop the Look, which helps users buy products from companies that work with Pinterest, became fully automated last month. In September, the social network rolled out a new API intended to help brands find and keep track of influencers with metrics like unique viewers, impressions, and engagement per Pin.
Last fall, Pinterest reported that it had 250 million monthly active users, and said that those users have saved more than 175 billion pins and organized them into 4 billion boards.
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"Apex Legends Season 2 Battle Pass features zippier progression | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/pc-gaming/apex-legends-season-2-battle-pass-details"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Apex Legends Season 2 Battle Pass features zippier progression Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Apex Legends.
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Apex Legends is one of a number of ongoing games that will show up at the E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo) this year with new content.
Developer Respawn Games is promising to share details about the second season of its battle royale shooter. Today, however, the studio gave some insight into upcoming Season 2 improvements.
In February, Apex Legends surprised launched for consoles and PC for free. The shooter is a huge success with more than 50 million players.
But many fans voiced problems with the game’s Season 1 Battle Pass. This premium progression pass enables you to spend money to improve the quality of item unlocks. That progress was painfully slow for a lot of people, and now Respawn is acknowledging that issue.
The studio is claiming that it should take significantly less time to reach level 100 in Season 2. This Battle Pass is also getting a variety of daily and weekly challenges that should keep things fresh.
“While we don’t want to introduce wacky challenges that drastically warp the way you play the game, these challenges should provide some interesting variation from game-to-game,” reads a Respawn blog post.
“This means all players should feel more rapid Battle Pass progression and the journey will hopefully be more fun and interesting. Also, this addition should allow players who can only dedicate a few hours a week to the game to make a very deep cut into their Battle Pass progression.” Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Respawn is also dropping some basic stat-tracking challenges from the paid Battle Pass. The goal is to keep things as interesting as possible for anyone who pays.
Respawn’s skin growing formula The other issue with Season 1 is that few people loved the skins that enable you to customize your characters. And even if you did, the battle pass didn’t have a lot of them. That’s changing.
“We’re adding three Legendary items to the Battle Pass,” reads the blog post. “And there will now be a Legendary item every 25 Battle Pass levels in the premium track, including at purchase — that’s level 1, level 25, level 50, level 75, and level 100. Our goal is to have a nice balance of cool character exclusives and cosmetics for everyone — like weapon skins.” The studio is also giving Battle Pass owners a path to earn crafting materials. You can earn enough to build any legendary item that you want.
But as for what those skins look like and other details about Season 2, you’ll have to wait until EA’s pre-E3 EA Play event. Respawn will take over the EA Play livestream at 10 a.m. Pacific time on Saturday June 8. And I’ll try to go hands on with Season 2 at the event if I can stop playing Star Wars.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Sprint begins 5G service in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, and Kansas City | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/sprint-begins-5g-service-in-atlanta-dallas-houston-and-kansas-city"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Sprint begins 5G service in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, and Kansas City Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Sprint announced today that it has turned on its 5G network in parts of four U.S. cities: Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, and Kansas City. The carrier beat its previously announced May 31 deadline by a day, while maintaining that it will commence service in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Phoenix, and Washington, D.C. “in the coming weeks.” According to Sprint, each of the four initial cities has at least 150 square miles and 565,000 people worth of coverage, though the numbers are higher in most locations. Once all nine cities are online, Sprint says that it will cover 2,180 square miles and 11.5 million people with 5G service.
In the Dallas-Fort Worth region alone, Sprint’s initial 5G footprint is 575 square miles with 1.6 million covered people, including cell towers in downtown Fort Worth, Irving, and North Dallas. For Houston, the carrier is claiming 165 square miles of 5G coverage, including downtown through the Memorial City Mall, servicing up to 800,000 people. And today’s Kansas City coverage includes 225 square miles with 625,000 people, ranging “from downtown Kansas City, MO, to Overland Park, KS where the company is headquartered.” Sprint’s initial 5G network is based solely on 2.5GHz spectrum, using Massive MIMO radios that use 64 transmitters and 64 receivers at once. Each radio can simultaneously offer 5G and 4G service, which Sprint notes is LTE Advanced — the newer, faster version of 4G that AT&T has branded as “5G Evolution.” The carrier didn’t reveal its 5G performance levels, beyond describing them in both its promotional video and press releases as “blazing-fast download speeds.” It also says that it will support simultaneous 4G-5G connectivity for faster speeds.
There are, of course, a couple of hitches. While Sprint’s 5G services are now available to customers, its first two devices — LG’s V50 phone and HTC’s 5G Hub — don’t officially go on sale until tomorrow in the company’s retail stores, while Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G is still slated for a Sprint release “this summer.” Additionally, Sprint’s merger with T-Mobile remains in a holding pattern , following which its 5G assets could be subsumed into a larger co-developed network.
It’s unclear whether Sprint’s first 5G devices will be able to fully take advantage of all of the merged entities’ 5G spectrum, particularly the short-distance, high-speed millimeter wave frequencies that T-Mobile has said it will be using.
Update at 11:39 a.m. Pacific: Sprint is apparently setting low expectations for its 5G performance, telling Tom’s Guide that users should “see more than 100Mbps when you’re driving around with your phone,” but actually delivering between 171Mbps and 700Mbps depending on conditions — more commonly between 300 and 600Mbps.
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"IDC: Apple still led wearables market in Q1 2019, but Huawei grew 282% | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/idc-apple-still-led-wearables-market-in-q1-2019-but-huawei-grew-282"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages IDC: Apple still led wearables market in Q1 2019, but Huawei grew 282% Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Apple's second-generation AirPods on a third-party charging mat.
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Market research firm IDC published its first-quarter 2019 report on the wearables market today, and no one will be surprised to learn that Apple maintained its industry-leading market share thanks to growth in shipments of Apple Watches, AirPods, and Beats headphones. But Asian rivals Xiaomi, Huawei, and Samsung all saw sharper year-over-year increases than Apple, IDC suggests, with Huawei posting 282.2% gains — a small miracle given the clouds gathering over the company’s businesses.
Worth noting up front: IDC’s numbers look at shipments rather than sales, numbers that — if accurate in the first place — could be manipulated merely by pushing more inventory out the door with plans to aggressively discount it later. Additionally, the firm added “ear-worn devices” to the largely wrist-worn category last year, enabling both smartwatches and certain earphones to figure into its tracking; wrist wearables are said to constitute a 63.2% share of the market, while ear devices had a smaller 34.6% share, but faster year over year growth: 135.1% compared with only 31.6% for wrist wearables.
For Apple, the uptick was big in shipment numbers, but not as impressive by percentages: Shipments were up to 12.8 million in the first quarter of 2019, a 49.5% jump from 8.6 million units a year earlier. However, the company’s 26.8% overall market share slipped a hint to 25.8%, still roughly twice that of its closest competitor.
Chinese companies Xiaomi and Huawei took second and third place in shipments for the quarter, with 6.6 million and 5 million units respectively. Huawei’s number was up almost four times from a year ago, enabling it to surge past now fourth-place Samsung, which shipped 4.3 million units in the quarter. All three companies were up markedly in shipments from year to year, reflecting the market’s overall growth, while fifth-place Fitbit moved from 2.2 million units a year ago to 2.9 million in the first quarter of 2019, falling to 5.9% market share.
Interestingly, IDC suggests that Apple has been overtaken in wrist wearable shipments (4.6 million) by Xiaomi (5.3 million), and is only modestly ahead of Huawei (3.9 million). Doing the math, that means ear-worn devices such as AirPods generated the bulk of Apple’s wearable demand, though the late March release of second-generation AirPods may have been responsible for the big uptick in shipments for the quarter.
IDC notes that the Mi Band was Xiaomi’s most popular wearable, shipping 5 million units on its own, while Huawei and Samsung benefited from bundling their wearables with hot-selling smartphones. Samsung notably launched the Galaxy Buds and Galaxy Watch Active in February, offering the wireless earphones as a free gift for early Galaxy S10 customers.
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"Here's how Apple's AR headset will likely be introduced -- and when | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/heres-how-apples-ar-headset-will-likely-be-introduced-and-when"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Analysis Here’s how Apple’s AR headset will likely be introduced — and when Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Apple has been working on an augmented reality headset for years. The company hasn’t explicitly confirmed the project, but between hiring AR hardware-specific personnel , filing numerous AR patents , buying AR startups , naming an AR marketing director , and teasing future steps beyond its ARKit software, iGlasses are effectively an “open secret,” just waiting to be unveiled.
Of course, no one knows exactly how and when that will happen. Apple’s black box approach to development means that the specifics are still mysterious, so its iGlasses (or Apple Glasses, or whatever they’re ultimately called) could be nearly ready for production — or a year away. Some of the earliest and best-sourced reports established a late 2019/early 2020 timetable for the rollout.
That suggests that we’re getting close to the official reveal date. It might even come at next week’s WWDC, and I’ve heard whispers that Apple was considering that possibility. As I’ll explain below, however, that would break somewhat with tradition, and it’s best not to get your hopes up for a big reveal right away. Putting the specific timing aside for a moment, here’s how the product is most likely to be introduced.
Expect a preview well ahead of its public release If you think back to every major Apple “new category” introduction over the past dozen years — iPhone, Apple TV, iPad, Apple Watch, and HomePod — their common thread is a substantial gap between initial announcement and actual in-store availability. Specifically: Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! iPhone was announced January 9, 2007 and released on June 29, 2007.
Apple TV was previewed (as iTV) on September 12, 2006 and released March 21, 2007.
iPad was announced January 27, 2010 and released on April 3, 2010.
Apple Watch was revealed on September 9, 2014 and released on April 24, 2015.
HomePod was introduced June 5, 2017 (WWDC) for a promised December 2017 launch, but ultimately released February 9, 2018.
Apple needs these gaps for several reasons: to win FCC and related regulatory approvals, to finalize manufacturing and marketing plans, and to work out last-minute issues with anything from laggard components to software and distribution channels. Even former Apple CEO Steve Jobs — arguably the strongest proponent of announcements ending with “in stores now” — yielded to these realities for Apple’s first-of-kind product launches, specifically acknowledging the “sneak peek” as a way to avoid leaks that would just happen with regulatory approvals.
For that reason, you can be certain that there will be an official sneak peek of the new AR product months before it hits stores. That gap will also conveniently give everyone plenty of time to make peace with the first model’s sure-to-be-controversial limitations, such as battery life and pricing.
Will the preview happen at WWDC? One critical question could determine when Apple reveals its AR hardware: Will it be a brand new, standalone computing platform, or just an iPhone accessory? If the device is a standalone computing platform, akin to Microsoft’s HoloLens or Magic Leap One , Apple will need to share a ton of new information with developers to get them on board early. In theory, there’s no better place to do that than WWDC. If it’s just an iPhone accessory, the reveal could be at any time — WWDC, the inevitable iPhone event in September, or later, depending on how close the hardware is to being finished.
Note from the dates above, however, that Apple generally doesn’t unveil major new products at WWDC; HomePod was an exception. Part of that’s for historic reasons: When Jobs was boss, Apple used to offer regular January keynotes and unpredictably call the media out to one-off events at will. But in the Tim Cook era, there’s been a more predictable cadence for product announcements, placing emphasis on March, June, and September events, with the occasional exception.
In a year when there’s a lot of important OS-level news for iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS, such as cross-platform iOS/macOS development or a new Watch App Store , Apple might be especially unwilling to distract its developers’ attention from those initiatives. Revealing a new AR headset would be a huge distraction.
On the other hand, there’s little question that augmented reality will be a part of the WWDC presentation on the software side — that was pretty much the only new selling point for the just-announced seventh-generation iPod touch.
It would also be both a natural and exciting segue for the attendees, as well as the millions of people who watch Apple’s events.
Based on recent reporting , the most likely scenario is that the headset will be an iPhone accessory, akin to the Apple Watch, which means that developers (and Apple) won’t have to do deep dives on a completely new AR-specific platform. There will still be plenty to learn about how the headset works and how developers will be able to add support for it to existing iPhone apps, but third-party support wouldn’t be as critical on day one. That makes a September unveiling, like the Apple Watch, at least as likely as WWDC, if not considerably more so.
What will the preview be like? If the past is any guide, Apple will want to give the iGlasses a significant spotlight — probably more than the 15 minutes that HomePod received at the end of 2017’s WWDC keynote. The September 2014 Apple Watch preview took 45 minutes, and there’s every reason to think Apple would want that much time to explain and demonstrate new AR hardware, which will arguably be a harder sell than a smartwatch.
When Apple wanted to build excitement for the Watch, it structured the reveal event strategically. Coming an hour into the September event as “One More Thing,” it: Started with a memorable design reveal video to get everyone intrigued, Continued with Cook wearing an actual Watch onstage as he offered a big picture look at the device’s functionality and “breakthrough” user interface, Moved into a Jony Ive video talking about design and features, Spent a lot of time on a Kevin Lynch deeper dive software demo, Used another video to discuss health and activity features, and Ended with a discussion of market size and a general on-sale date (“early 2015”).
You can expect a very similar strategy for Apple’s AR headset. The company will want to show off its design chops — most notably miniaturizing the functionality into something that looks far more like regular glasses than, say, Google Glass or HoloLens — as well as explaining the big reason for the project’s existence and showing off some of the cool things it can do. There will be an on-stage demo of its functionality, accompanied by videos of how it will be useful in a range of daily and specialized situations that just might change the world.
And while there will be a general release timetable, it won’t likely be as narrow as a specific date, and there may not be any discussion of the price. It’s worth mentioning that Apple’s specific dates for sneak peek products have a tendency to slip at least a little (see: Apple TV, HomePod, and AirPower ), so it tries to leave the dates ambiguous until it’s very close to actually shipping products.
If I was guessing, the iGlasses reveal will happen later this year, not next week, but anything’s possible. WWDC 2019 is going to be interesting regardless of what’s shown and held back, so tune in for our live coverage from San Jose on Monday.
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"Apple raises iPhone cellular download bar to a still-miserly 200MB | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/mobile/apple-raises-iphone-cellular-download-bar-to-a-still-miserly-200mb"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Apple raises iPhone cellular download bar to a still-miserly 200MB Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Back when downloads from Apple’s own servers were iPhone users’ biggest hits on cellular networks, the company set cellular download limits to ease the strain on carrier partners: 10MB, then 20MB, then 50MB early in the 4G era, jumping to 100MB in 2013 and 150MB in 2017. This week, the company has again modestly raised the bar to allow 200MB cellular downloads from its own stores (via 9to5Mac ), a change that will allow users to grab slightly larger iTunes and App Store files without using Wi-Fi.
Although users are the primary beneficiaries of each of these changes, each boost is largely targeted at app developers, who sometimes struggle to squeeze their initial installation bundles into packages at Apple’s limits. Because the download limit covers the “slice” of an app that is actually delivered to a specific device, the sub-200MB iPhone-ready slice of a 298MB app such as Pokémon Go will download without complaint, and other developers will gain the ability to create somewhat more complex bundles for initial installation.
Given how much downloading has changed over the years and how developers have worked around the prior limits with post-installation downloads, it’s not entirely clear why Apple continues to maintain such stingy caps at all. Users now stream vast quantities of audio and video content over cellular connections, in some cases wasting plenty of data listening repeatedly to favorite songs that might otherwise be stored — even temporarily — on their devices.
Moreover, as 4G networks transition to 5G technologies , users will be able to regularly transfer 200MB files in a second or less. Apple is at least a year behind the curve in adopting 5G, but its latest phones support LTE Advanced , a bridge technology with up to 1Gbps download speeds — enough to transfer a 200MB file in under two seconds. Early 5G networks have been advertising peak download speeds in the 1-2Gbps range, with the ability to download entire multi-episode TV seasons in a minute or less.
It’s likely that Apple will up the limit again over the next two years as higher-speed 4G and 5G becomes more commonplace, making the 200MB cap look as ridiculous as the 10MB and 20MB caps do today. For users, the result may well be larger app file sizes but also more freedom to grab both apps and media files wherever they may be, regardless of whether they have access to Wi-Fi.
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"Joseph Gordon-Levitt: HitRecord is 'GitHub for creativity' | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/media/joseph-gordon-levitt-hitrecord-is-github-for-creativity"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Joseph Gordon-Levitt: HitRecord is ‘GitHub for creativity’ Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you ready to bring more awareness to your brand? Consider becoming a sponsor for The AI Impact Tour. Learn more about the opportunities here.
HitRecord is a production company transitioning into a tech platform. We caught up with cofounders Jared Geller and Joseph Gordon-Levitt at Collision 2019 in Toronto last week to understand what HitRecord was, is, and wants to be.
HitRecord is a collaborative media platform that lets anyone work together on creative projects. If a project earns money, contributors are paid based on any work that makes it into the final product. In June, HitRecord will have paid out some $375,000 over the past year, totaling over $3 million contributor payments since 2010. CEO Gordon-Levitt works 20-30 hours per week, while president Geller is full time. The site has 750,000 users interested in collaborating on content together.
Earlier this year, HitRecord raised $6.4 million to pull off its platform evolution. With the cash infusion, the company has grown from 18 employees to 34 employees today.
“It’s like GitHub for creativity,” Gordon-Levitt told VentureBeat. “I got to speak at Open Source Summit and I spoke to Linus, the creator of Linux, and a number of folks from that movement. They’ve been really great to talk to because there really are a lot of parallels between the open source coder culture and what we’re trying to bring to our creativity [platform].” An informal hobby Gordon-Levitt started his acting career as a kid. At 19, he quit acting to go to college. When he tried to get back into the industry a couple of years later, he couldn’t get a job. That pain led to a desire to take responsibility for his own creativity.
At that time, in the early mid-2000s, “hit record” was a personal turn of phrase, a mantra. Gordon-Levitt would not wait around to be cast. Instead, he would hit the round red record button himself. His brother helped him set up a tiny website: a single HTML page with a few of his videos, songs, stories, and so on. Eventually, they added a PHP message board, and that’s where the community began.
“HitRecord didn’t start as a startup,” Gordon-Levitt told VentureBeat. “It was a very informal hobby many years ago. It was something I was doing with my brother just for fun. We had a little message board where I was putting up things that I was making, little songs and stories and stuff like that.” Some people just wanted to see what Gordon-Levitt was creating. But others wanted to use the forum to make things together.
A message board “We noticed on this message board that what a lot of people wanted to do was not just check out the things I had made, but to make things together,” Gordon-Levitt said. “And we thought ‘Oh, that’s actually new and interesting.’ Just watching a video online isn’t all that different from watching content on existing technologies. But using the internet to collaborate, make something together with other people that you might not have been able to make on your own, that’s legitimately new behavior. And we thought that was really exciting. So we leaned into trying to develop that further. My brother was a coder. At this point, still, it was just something we were doing for fun. But the community kind of kept growing.” The community was doing something that would have been impossible just a few years earlier — giving rise to new human behavior, enabled by technology. The collaborative phenomenon reminded Gordon-Levitt of the creative joy he had always experienced on film and television sets.
Then, in 2010, Gordon-Levitt teamed up with friend and cofounder Jared Geller to figure out if the collaborative creative process could power something bigger.
A production company “First we did the due diligence,” Geller explained. “‘OK, if we’re going to ask the world to create together and make a production company, what are the consequences we need to consider?’ In terms of licensing, terms of services, and making sure we can pay people fairly. So we did that, and obviously built a pretty rudimentary product.” Geller and Gordon-Levitt looked at intellectual property laws. They figured out how people could remix and build off each other’s creations. They considered how they would pay people if productions were monetized. And they set targets.
“We made a list of goals,” Geller noted. “Could we maybe make a short film collaboratively and place it in a film festival? Could we put out a book of writing and illustrations? Could we make music and put out a vinyl record? Could we make a TV show in this collaborative way? And we did all that. We’ve had short film series play at multiple years of Sundance Film Festival, the Toronto Film Festival. We have a great partnership with Harper Collins and have put out multiple book series. Our television show Hitrecord on TV won an Emmy.
” There were also business wins.
“Along the way, we’ve partnered with brands like LG, Samsung, Sony, the ACLU, National Parks Foundation,” Geller added. “All bringing together people from all over the world to tell stories and making it easier to support various initiatives. Over the years, we hit all those goals, and we thought we could set our sights a little higher.” A startup Success brought new challenges. The duo realized HitRecord had hit limits in terms of the collaborative process, as only so many people could get involved. Geller and Gordon-Levitt concluded that better technology was needed if they wanted to let anybody lead a project so an infinite number of people could participate.
“We had never really spent a lot of time or effort on our tech,” Gordon-Levitt admitted. “We had a very small team of developers. We had no product people. We had never raised any money. We had never had to. We were cash flow positive since 2013, doing it as a production company. But we realized if we want to include a lot more people, we’re going to need to provide better tools so that we can take what we’ve learned as a production company and allow other people to do that.” So they took their pitch to Silicon Valley.
“It probably would have been easier to raise money in Hollywood, but we wanted tech partners because we didn’t want just capital,” Gordon-Levitt said. “We wanted guidance and connections. We found some great partners. Javelin Ventures led the round, Crosslink Capital and Advancit Capital came on after them. We had some great angels: MasterClass cofounder David Rogier, YouTube cofounder Steve Chen, and Twitch cofounder Kevin Lin.” “We raised six and a half million bucks for our series A, and now we’re heads down and building this platform so that anybody can come and start a project or find a project to get involved with, recruit collaborators, and make something together. Start it, finish it, and celebrate it. Create a different kind of ecosystem for creativity that puts the emphasis more on the creative process and collaboration, as opposed to how much attention it can get and how many followers it has.” Social media incentives It’s worth diving into Gordon-Levitt’s thinking here. He strongly believes that social media and tech platforms are screwing up the incentives for creativity. If you’re focused on figuring out how much attention you can get, or what the box office numbers will be, or whether you’re going to get famous, your priorities are twisted. (Gordon-Levitt recommends everyone reads the book Ten Arguments For Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now by Jaron Lanier.) “If what you’re going for is posting on YouTube, or Instagram, or platforms that monetize through the ad model, where they’re really just going for sheer volume and have the ability to manipulate people through ads, virality is the measure of success,” Gordon-Levitt pointed out. “And I think this is exactly at the heart of what’s interesting to me about doing [HitRecord]. I think if that is your measure of success, you’re going to undermine a lot of what’s actually meaningful and joyful about creativity. And I’m actually concerned for the human race’s creative spirit, because so much of our collective creativity is now destined for these platforms that are monetized by this sort of attention economy model. And it twists one’s understanding of one’s own creativity, and what the value of being creative is.” Since many social media platforms today emphasize attention-getting, those become the creator’s incentives, Gordon-Levitt explained. What can you get and what are your goals? The user experience says views, likes, and followers. The business model is thus not aligned with monetizing a meaningful creative experience — it’s set up for attention. For the creative process, that’s counterintuitive.
Social incentives Gordon-Levitt has found that the joy and the flow state occur not when you’re focused on the red carpets, the attention, and the box office, but when you’re immersed in the creative process itself — specifically, the part where you’re making stuff together with other people. HitRecord is a collaborative media platform that de-emphasizes attention and emphasizes the creative experience with other people.
“I’ll use an example from my life. I’ve been very lucky in my life. I’ve got to be a part of some very popular movies,” Gordon-Levitt acknowledged. “What’s fun about doing those movies is not when they get popular. It’s not when there’s big box office numbers. It’s not walking down the red carpet. It’s none of it. All of that actually is, in my experience, a little odd and sometimes uncomfortable and sometimes, I guess, nice.” “But the joy, the fulfillment, like the stuff that gets me out of bed in the morning is … the time on set, when we’re actually making something together. And so we’re trying to create our own ecosystem for people to come who have an urge to be creative and say, ‘Hey, let’s reorient the way that we think about what we’re all doing here today.’ And not necessarily go down this path of like, ‘Can I become a star? Can I get more likes? Can I get more followers?’ But rather, think about what’s meaningful and fulfilling about just making something together with other people, whether that’s a song or a short film or documentary.” That’s a hard message for him to deliver, because he’s “made it.” “I think on the one hand, I think you’re right, that it is hard for me to deliver that message. Because yeah, well, ‘you’ve gotten to experience it,'” Gordon-Levitt agreed. “On the other hand, I think it takes someone who’s experienced it to be able to say, I have been on that red carpet. I can tell you from firsthand experience, it’s not all that it’s cracked up to be. Those are marketing gimmicks that are designed to look cool and exciting to sell movie tickets. The actual experience of doing it is really not where the joy is.” A mission So how does HitRecord measure success? “Our mission is to bring as many people as possible the experience of creativity through collaboration,” Gordon-Levitt said. “What we’ve honed and discovered over the years of doing it as a production company is that doing it with other people is a great way to unlock people’s creativity.” “Oftentimes people say ‘I know I want to do something, but what do I do?’ Or ‘How do I do it?’ Or ‘Who do I do it with?’ And what we’ve seen over and over again is that when they’re doing it with other people, it gives them inspiration, gives them feedback, gives them motivation. And so the thing we measure is ‘Are we bringing that experience to as many people as we can?'” The company still looks at metrics like page views and project likes, but it also tracks how consistently users are contributing creative elements to particular projects and how many projects the community conceives of, develops, and finishes.
HitRecord wants to get as many people on the platform as possible, plus ensure they are engaging and collaborating — “not just consuming,” Geller emphasized.
“Not just flipping through and seeing ads, because we’re not putting any,” Gordon-Levitt added. “But how many people are actually having a creative experience with others?” A community HitRecord’s users apparently know all this. On HitRecord, it’s calls to contribute, not finished projects, that go viral.
“One of the key insights that we know about our community is that, more than anything that they want to do, they want to be a part of a project that gets finished,” Geller explained. “They want to be a part of a project that they couldn’t do on their own. Finishing anything creative is going to be hard, to just either get motivated or knowing what the next step is. Like Joe said, we’ve been doing this for a really long time. So we understand how we can support a community and provide them with the tools and product necessary — not only to figure out what is the next step in the creative process but also provide them with the community that can be motivating.” “The emphasis isn’t money,” Geller continued. “That’s not why they’re there. It’s cool when they make something or we make something together and it ends up in a game or on TV. But the reason they’re there is to be creative together and to build upon other people’s work.” “It’s not a gig economy. It’s not a marketplace for freelancers. That wasn’t necessarily intuitive to us. When we did a survey a couple years ago, we raised questions like, ‘Do you want to do more branded stuff? More video games? More TV? Do you want to do blah, blah, blah?’ And the answer was ‘No, we just want to make stuff.’ And that’s what led our thinking to ‘Oh, we need to create a platform that allows people to start projects, to rally a lot of people to work with them, and then to get them to finish it. And then celebrate that.'” A tech platform HitRecord works today, but the cofounders admit that it could function a lot better.
“I would say it’s not an intuitive user experience,” Gordon-Levitt said. “When you go to the website and you go to the mobile app, it’s great work done by a very small team. We were never properly data-driven, we were only ever really tracking two things. One, ‘Are we making art that we like?’ And two, ‘Are we paying the bills?'” “Up until six months ago, what we were tracking is the art that we’re making as a community — do we feel inspired by it? Does it meet the threshold of excellence that we feel good about? And are we also able to pay our bills and grow? We’re learning about what are the metrics that show our community is strong, shows our community is engaged,” Geller added.
“We’re starting to understand how to track KPIs, how to A/B test, how to iterate, how to make a user experience that can really empower people to do the things that do what we’ve done for all these years,” Gordon-Levitt explained. “The advantage I think that we have is, we’ve done all of these productions for years. We know a lot about what it takes to get an illustrator in one continent and an animator on another continent to be productive together. We’ve seen it so many times. We know where the pitfalls are, we know where the advantages are. And so we have all this knowledge to draw on as we design this new product.” But it’s not as simple as just slapping on a bunch of new features.
Formats and templates “There are a couple of elements at play,” Geller explained. “It’s not just the product and technology. This is one thing that our production side is working on. Developing formats, creative formats, that are more conducive to global collaboration. Perhaps not necessarily right off the bat making a 20-minute short-form video. Maybe it’s making a three-minute documentary piece, which is more conducive to collaboration, to start.” “If our mission is to try to inspire more and more people to be creative together, part of that is a product issue,” Gordon-Levitt noted. “You need to build the UX. But part of it is a creative challenge. If you’re trying to create very elaborate, complex pieces of art, it’s going to be harder to do that, especially at first, than if you’re trying to create simpler pieces of art. Or if you have sort of a template for the kind of art you’re trying to create. So not only are we dedicating resources to building out our product and tech, it’s also our creative team coming up with ways to inspire the kind of creativity, the kind of collaboration that we’re looking to inspire.” Gordon-Levitt gave an example: HitRecord has a series of short films called Life Narrated.
They’re animated, but they’re simpler animations because they are built on narrations (no lip sync required). All it takes is an illustration, a little animation of the world, a piece of writing, and some voice acting. The result is a 30-second or 60-second short film. “So this is the kind of work that our creative department is doing — coming up with — format is maybe a misleading word — creative templates for these kinds of collaborations.” Geller gave another example: podcasts. While doing a podcast series with Medium last year called On Mornings , the team learned to simply get people to talk about their own story. Instead of asking people to write a narrative and have a voiceover artist recite it, ask them to talk about their alarm clock, morning routine, or to tell a story about their medicine cabinet. It’s not just easier, but the results tend to be more engaging. In other words, HitRecord’s creative department is “helping people realize how they can do it, and also making content that’s more engaging.” “We’re starting to see, even before a lot of the product is built, the community come up with ideas for how to apply the different formats that hopefully inspire them,” Geller shared. “Having them come up with ideas to make the videos, to collaborate together, and then that project be finished. And then watch it back and see the community watch what they all made on their own. And it being good, which is, you know, not necessarily a given. There’s something really special about experiencing that, if you’re somebody even tangentially close or adjacent. I watched a video that the community made on their own the other day. It creates this really wonderful sensation just to say, ‘Oh, wow, the community made this.'” A business Some of HitRecord’s projects make money. That’s part of what the staff deals with.
“Historically, in the production company model, when a brand or a distributor comes and says, ‘Hey, we want to make stuff,’ a lot of that creativity comes from us,” Gordon-Levitt noted. “So it’s not like we’re just saying, ‘Hey, creators out there, make something for the brand.’ It comes from people in our office meeting and putting a lot of creative work and direction into leading the collaborative process with people all over the world.” “So it makes sense that the money that comes in, historically, what we’ve done is any profit gets split in half. Half goes to the company and half goes to the contributing artists. The reason we split it 50/50 is because both sides of that equation — it would be impossible to make it happen without the other. The people who contributed to the campaign that we did for LG.
That was one of the more lucrative campaigns we did. It’s not like those people by themselves made that campaign for LG. It was a lot of work on behalf of a good number of people in our office, collaborating with people all over the world to make it work.” Credit and payment “If someone’s contributions are generating revenue, that person deserves part of that revenue. If someone gets remixed, they deserve attribution,” Gordon-Levitt said. “These kinds of principles, we’re very committed to protecting. We’ve now been doing this for a number of years and we’ve shown that we’ve been able to protect these principles. If there’s a monetized production, any element that is included in the final deliverable, they get a cut.” And whether money is allocated or not, if something influenced the final form, it gets credited.
“That’s why the UI that we’ve created for payments is so unique to us and done transparently,” Geller noted. “While we’re not making hundreds of monetized projects, we’re not going to know the entire story, necessarily, of how a song came to be, a song that’s going into a Ubisoft game.
We will say ‘Here are all the elements,’ and our community has conversations like, ‘Oh, but didn’t this person inform that and this?'” “Because that’s usually how the creative process goes. It’s not step one, two, three. It’s circuitous. So when the community sees what we call proposals, they’ll say ‘Oh, you forgot this’ or ‘That remix led to that.’ We’ve done a ton of music projects, where someone took the chorus from this version and the melody from that video and put it together. And then all the people who worked on this for us came together. And those stories come out. We rely on our community to help tell that story for us so that we all know what’s going on.” This circuitous process has become part of how HitRecord works.
“Every time you post a piece of content to HitRecord, you can cite your resources,” Gordon-Levitt said. “So you give attribution to every different record that you sampled and you incorporated and you built on. On the page of your piece of content, there’s a list of all those resources. There’s also a list of all the remixes of everybody who built on top of you. And so that attribution, it sort of starts to form a family tree of all the resources and all the remixes. That’s a big part of our UI that I’m proud of, and that’s key to that attribution. You’ll see people in the comments of someone’s thing saying like ‘Oh, hey, you forgot to source me.’ And everyone’s happy to do it. It feels good to give other people credit, share that glory with them.” Splitting the other 50% “We have a system by which we allocate how much each contributing artist gets,” Gordon-Levitt explained. “It’s something we’ve been doing and honing and refining for years that I’m really proud of. A lot of it is by hand. We don’t do this at high volume. We do this for particular, monetized productions. It’ll start by the community team going through a list of all the different contributing artists whose work is included in the final deliverables and making a post saying we’re allocating ‘this much for this person, this much for this person, this much for this person.’ If someone is the lead singer, for example, they’re going to get more than if someone is shaking a tambourine. Those are human judgment calls.” “But first it’s just a proposal,” Gordon-Levitt continued. “We post those proposals publicly and then have a two-week window for feedback. Anybody can write a comment on any of those line items. Our team responds to all of the comments, and gives reasoning for why the proposal was made how it was. If there are suggestions for changes, oftentimes, they’ll make those changes. But if they decide not to, they always explain why.” “There’s a real transparent conversation that goes on about how these amounts are allocated. Once the two-week window for feedback is up, then we finalize the splits and we distribute the money. So we find that by doing it in this transparent way, things end up really fair because no one wants to post something unfair out in the open. If something is unfair that we unintentionally missed, it’ll get brought to our attention and we’ll be able to correct it. We’ve been doing it this way since 2010. We’ve paid out almost $3 million and we’ve never had any problems.” Brands “On top of this production company that we’ve been running successfully for all these years, we’re now building a larger ecosystem to facilitate things that are not just projects led by us, but are empowering anybody to come into the room,” Gordon-Levitt said.
But that doesn’t mean brands can simply show up and make requests.
“We’re not providing that opportunity to brands,” Geller clarified. “If brands want to work with the community, then they start a dialogue with us. We’ve never done outbound sales. Brands that we work with, and that we’ve been fortunate to work with, there’s a lot of trust involved. We make sure, do the brand’s values align with our values and what we believe our community’s values to be? Because the community is making art, so we have to make sure that the brand is doing good in the world. We tend to be very careful so it’s not a free-for-all.” Creating your own projects How will monetization work when someone other than HitRecord starts and finishes a project? “Right now, the notion isn’t to necessarily monetize the project,” Geller explained. “That’s really not going to be the focus — just the act of being creative. The production company will continue to exist. And there might be instances where we pull in projects that people are starting on their own. But really, the focus is just figuring out ways to get people to be able to create projects on their own, rally the community, and finish on their own. That’s what we’re focused on. It’s not really about the monetization of projects.” “That said, though, eventually is there a world where these projects that anybody can come start, could one, or any number of them, end up becoming monetized productions? Yeah, I think that could eventually happen,” Gordon-Levitt added. “And if that were to happen, would we be open to figuring out what’s the fair way to compensate people for this? Yes. That’s really been how we’ve always done it for all these years. It’s been an open conversation. And that’s why I think we haven’t had any problems. Because we’ve made it a dialogue. As long as we’re saying, ‘Hey, is everybody feeling OK about this? Please tell us any issues, let’s talk about it,’ we’ve been able to find fair ways of doing it.” Feedback loop Like many successful internet ventures, HitRecord wants to keep its users happy.
“To some degree, we’re figuring this out as we go,” Gordon-Levitt noted. “HitRecord has always been a feedback loop with our community. As new ways of doing things arise, we will figure out what’s a right, fair way to compensate people. What we’re not willing to move on is the basic principle, which is if someone contributes something that generates revenue, they deserve a fair piece of that revenue. Which is, by the way, quite different than how most media tech platforms work right now. Because nowadays on, I don’t know … Instagram, people’s content that they contribute is generating revenue for Instagram, and no one’s seeing any of that revenue. That’s part of why these platforms are so lucrative.” HitRecord started as a hobby, turned into a production company, and now wants to become a tech platform. But the company had to raise money to do so, and that means it has to figure out how to give its investors a return. Our conversation kept coming back to social media platforms, because Gordon-Levitt wanted to make it absolutely clear he’s not interested in following their business model. While the cofounders know exactly what they don’t want to do, they still need to figure out how to sustainably not do it.
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Despite 5G’s widely acknowledged potential to revolutionize communications with high-speed, low-latency connections, inconsistent performance has continued to mar early launches, and the U.K. just had its first public examples of the phenomenon. BBC reporters attempting to use EE’s just-launched 5G network for live broadcasts have already experienced major hiccups twice today, leading an anchor to cut one broadcast short because “bizarrely, the 5G line isn’t working properly.” In an early segment, reporter Rory Cellan-Jones offered a sharp, smooth field video that looked indistinguishable from standard broadcast quality, but said that the transmission had been delayed by 15 minutes because the BBC’s “whole system went down” due to the SIM card running out of data. While waving a phone showing a 260Mbps connection speed, the issue was a sign, Cellan-Jones said, of how bandwidth-hungry 5G is, assuming users can get it. He noted that there are parts of the U.K. that haven’t even received 4G service yet, and said that it would likely be three years before 5G is fully available nationally.
A more embarrassing demonstration took place when reporter Sarah Walton’s live broadcast from the streets of London continually broke down in a decidedly 4G-like fashion, complete with visible compression artifacts and largely gray screens. Titling its own clip “The moment 5G fails live on air,” the BBC noted that it “ran into some issues” with the video, which Walton noted may have been running on a 40Mbps connection — one-twentieth of the 800Mbps speed EE said it had seen in its 5G testing. A BBC presenter stopped Walton’s broadcast abruptly, blaming the 5G network for the problem.
While some carriers have pledged to offer unlimited 5G service at prices ranging upwards from $70, others — including EE — have launched services with tiny monthly data allotments that users could blow through in a single day. The EE’s 5G plans start at $41 per month for 10GB of 5G data, while U.S. carrier AT&T is trialing a 15GB plan for $70.
Multiple carriers are now predicting that they’ll segment their 5G service prices in the future by speed thresholds and even latency, but for now their challenge appears to be largely in achieving reliable performance at or near their promised “average” 5G data speeds.
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/ultrahaptics-acquires-ar-vr-pioneer-leap-motion-for-only-30-million"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Ultrahaptics acquires AR/VR pioneer Leap Motion for only $30 million Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Leap Motion publicly established itself as a pioneer in VR hand-tracking controls and DIY augmented reality gear , but reportedly didn’t generate much revenue — one reason its valuation sank from $300 million to $30 million as it entertained buyout offers from companies including Apple. Today, U.K.-based Ultrahaptics partially confirmed a Wall Street Journal report that it’s acquiring Leap Motion, seemingly at the low end of that range.
While the Journal characterized Ultrahaptics as a “rival” to Leap Motion, the latter’s CTO and cofounder David Holz underscored that the companies have actually worked together for almost six years. Their innovations are complementary rather than competitive, and Leap Motion’s tech is already used in Ultrahaptics products.
Ultrahaptics makes virtual control solutions that use targeted ultrasonic waves to create mid-air tactile sensations on hands, enabling a gesture control user to feel virtual objects without holding a controller or wearing VR gloves. Between the mid-air gesture sensing and sensations, a user could experience seemingly physical interactions such as a click when a VR or AR button is pressed, friction when a cube is turned, or a texture when running fingers across a surface. Working together, the companies’ engineers can “continue to create two hugely significant technologies,” said Ultrahaptics CEO Steve Cliffe, and “max out the potential of combining them.” Leap Motion’s mid-air gesture tracking technology has been widely praised for elegance and accuracy, leading Apple to twice pursue the company for an acquisition. But Holz reportedly criticized Apple’s innovation credentials and described it as “the devil” as the first potential deal fell through, while the second collapsed due to eleventh-hour disputes over valuation. Apple reportedly offered between $30 and $50 million for the company, one-tenth of its founders’ peak $306 million estimate.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Reportedly, Ultrahaptics paid around $30 million for Leap, and will acquire its patents and staff, including Holz, but not CEO and cofounder Michael Buckwald. It’s unclear whether the company’s open source AR helmet design North Star will continue in development after the acquisition, or whether Ultrahaptics will focus solely on evolving the company’s hand gesture technology.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"The RetroBeat: Aladdin is a Genesis masterpiece | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/the-retrobeat-aladdin-is-a-genesis-masterpiece"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages The RetroBeat: Aladdin is a Genesis masterpiece Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Aladdin for the Sega Genesis.
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I saw Disney’s live action remake of Aladdin last week. Along with video games, I’m a big Disney fan. I’m usually at the theater for every movie event from the Mouse House.
Aladdin was OK. Maybe a little worse than OK. It was something interesting to watch once, but I’d never prefer it over the animated classic. Or, for that matter, the fantastic Sega Genesis game.
Licensed games used to have a reputation among the hardcore for sucking. Now … well, licensed games aren’t much of a thing at all. You find them mostly on mobile as free-to-play experiences. But back in ’90s, every major Hollywood movie would have a console game lined up to release around the same time as the film. It served the same purpose as action figures or other toys. “You saw the movie, now play the game!” Aladdin for the Genesis was different in a couple ways. First off, it came out a whole year after the movie. Aladdin released in theaters on November 25, 1992. The Genesis game didn’t come out until November 11, 1993. Its launch coincided closer to the VHS release of the movie in October 1993.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Compared to a lot of the awful movie tie-in games from the era, Aladdin was fantastic. Heck, it stands up well with the very best of the Genesis library. The action is relatively simple. Aladdin is an action sidescroller where you have to run, jump, and slash your way through levels. The execution is just fantastic. Every action in Aladdin feels precise, and the game offers a good challenge without ever feeling cruel.
But Aladdin stood out because of its visuals. Real Disney animators created actual art for the game’s sprites, which developer Virgin Interactive then digitized. The result is some of the best 2D graphics of the 16-bit era. The characters themselves are more animated and expressive than what was usual for the time.
The excellence of the art becomes clear when you compare the Genesis Aladdin game with the one for Super Nintendo. This version of Aladdin is a completely different game. This practice wasn’t too unusual for the time, especially for movie tie-ins like Jurassic Park and Batman Returns.
Now, Aladdin on Super Nintendo is still a fine game. Capcom, which had created Disney gaming classic like DuckTales for the NES, made this version. But the sprites in this Aladdin look more like a video game interpretation, while the characters on Genesis look like they jumped out of a movie screen.
Back in April, I wrote about some of the games I want to see on the upcoming Sega Genesis Mini.
I included Aladdin on that list, but I thought I was being optimistic. Licensed games don’t usually make it onto these microconsoles. But Sega has surprised by since announcing that other Disney Genesis games, specifically Castle of Illusion and World of Illusion, will be added to the machine. I also thought that Mega Man: The Wily Wars was a long shot, and it actually made it into the library! So maybe there is still hope for Aladdin on the Sega Genesis Mini after all. And since it is one of the best games made for the console, it deserves to be there.
The RetroBeat is a weekly column that looks at gaming’s past, diving into classics, new retro titles, or looking at how old favorites — and their design techniques — inspire today’s market and experiences. If you have any retro-themed projects or scoops you’d like to send my way, please contact me.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"Nintendo adds ex-Gearbox, Disney Infinity EP John Vignocchi to its developer and publisher relations team | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/games/nintendo-adds-ex-gearbox-disney-infinity-ep-john-vignocchi-to-its-developer-and-publisher-relations-team"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Nintendo adds ex-Gearbox, Disney Infinity EP John Vignocchi to its developer and publisher relations team Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn John Vignocchi at Nintendo.
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A few days after announcing that he’s leaving Gearbox , John Vignocchi has reveled that he is joining Nintendo of America.
Vignocchi was the executive producer of Disney Infinity , the toys-to-life franchise that launched in 2013 and was then unceremoniously dumped by Disney in 2016. Vignocchi joined Gearbox in October 2018 to work on a new franchise, but he has left that post after just seven months for this opportunity to work at Nintendo.
“I’ll be driving developer and publisher relations for North America so that Nintendo can continue to bring amazing content to all fans,” Vignocchi wrote on a Facebook post. “I plan to help continue the tradition of building memories through Nintendo that will last a lifetime. I certainly have a lifetime of them already and can’t wait to make more. I’m humbled by this dream opportunity and will work tirelessly to bring you the best that I can.” Nintendo is doing well these days thanks to the success of the Switch , the handheld/home console hybrid that launched in March 2017. The Switch has sold over 34.7 million systems.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! At Nintendo of America, Vignocchi will be working under Doug Bowser , who replaced the recently retired Reggie Fils-Aimé.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Why Infinity Ward chose a mature path for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare after the zany Black Ops 4 | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/why-infinity-ward-chose-a-mature-path-for-call-of-duty-modern-warfare-after-the-zany-black-ops-4"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Why Infinity Ward chose a mature path for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare after the zany Black Ops 4 Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Last year’s Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 made players feel like superheroes with all sorts of Specialist abilities. But Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is taking a very different route toward a mature, gritty, and authentic combat experience with its single-player campaign.
Activision unveiled the game today, and I saw it at a recent preview event at game studio Infinity Ward. Modern Warfare launches October 25 on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. The team said it wanted to create a dramatic game that was more like Jaws rather than the horror film Saw.
I think the game is very disturbing, based on a couple of scenes that I saw from the single-player campaign.
But Dave Stohl, the co-studio head at Infinity Ward, challenged a group of press to look at the game with fresh eyes.
“It’s a very different version, not just of Call of Duty, but Modern Warfare,” Stohl said. “As much as you can, try to look at this differently and with open minds.” Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! The mature distinction, particularly between single-player campaigns and multiplayer modes, is often contradictory within Call of Duty games. The multiplayer modes are often sporty, where players trash talk and rack up the kills. But the single-player campaigns are more respectful of the sacrifice of soldiers and they are often intense and dramatic in their storytelling. Last year’s Black Ops 4 tilted in favor of the zany sport, as there was no single-player campaign. And this year, Modern Warfare will tilt it back toward mature drama with a vengeance.
Stohl said, “It’s just a different world than it was 10 years ago. It’s one game, not a disc with a bunch of different modes. It is a game, with progression and continuity across all modes.” That sounded like a jab at fellow Call of Duty studio Treyarch, whose Zombies, multiplayer, and Blackout battle royale modes from the previous game certainly feel like a “bunch of different modes.” Modern Warfare has always been gritty and terrifying, as it depicts how modern U.S. and British forces break the rules to go after terrorists in the Middle East and in major Western cities. Civilians are often caught in the crossfire in these games, like with the No Russian airport massacre in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and the death of a child in an explosion in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
Above: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Soldiers stack up as they enter a house.
Stohl warned us it would be edgy.
“We are still finding that line. It is important we treat the content because it is ripped from the headlines, respectfully. I hope you will see it,” Stohl said. “This is a more mature Call of Duty from a thematic point of view. Authentic and gritty. I hate it when the industry says ‘boots on the ground.’ I work on the whole franchise. I’ve worked on all the games. We like the fact that Black Ops and Modern Warfare are different. You see Specialists with more over-the-top powers in Black Ops. This is not that. More [military] sim. More realistic. Weapons of war. More kick.” Then his team showed off scenes that were very disturbing. In one scene, a team of British SAS operatives storm a safe house for a terrorist cell. They clear the building room by room, sometimes gunning down unarmed women who are part of the terrorist team and who make aggressive moves. It has a gritty, photorealistic feel, with tight camera angles that focus close-up on the stacked assault team.
In the second scene, a child survives an explosion of a build that claims the life of her mother. She returns home, only to find Russian soldiers shooting chemical weapons around her village. A Russian soldier kills her father, and her young brother and the girl have to hide from the Russian soldier and eventually kill him.
These two scenes are a small part of the game, and we don’t know much of the story yet. But I found them to be very disturbing.
The presence of the non-combatants makes a big point about the thin line between soldiers and civilians in today’s world. War is not at all black-and-white. Instead, it takes place in a moral gray zone.
Taylor Kurosaki, studio narrative director, said that the team had to take into account that many of today’s players have never played the original Modern Warfare. So they decided to do a reimagining, rather than a sequel or remake. The team put the storyline to bed, took some of the good things (such as characters like Soap), and created it for 2019, inspired by “the world we are living in today,” Kurosaki said.
“The battlefield has never been less defined. Enemies more often than not don’t wear uniforms. That means collateral damage, civilians, is a greater part of the equation now than it has ever been,” he said. “Those situations are what our heroes are up against.” Above: Jacob Minkoff, campaign gameplay director at Infinity Ward for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.
“This is the most authentic and realistic game we’ve ever made,” said Jacob Minkoff, the campaign gameplay director at Infinity Ward, in a press briefing. “Taylor and I, as storytellers, all we ever really want to do is make players feel something. I remember playing the first Modern Warfare in the AC-130 mission. The aerial combat. You are firing down at enemies below. Thermal vision. There is no consequence. They cannot hurt you. All you are hearing deadpan is ‘Lots of little pieces.’ That feeling, I found profoundly uncomfortable. … It felt too easy. It felt dishonorable. It felt wrong. But I understood I was protecting my allies. I understood why this tactic is used in real life. It made sense. For the first time, I felt why it is emotionally uncomfortable. And then every time I saw it in the news from then on, I thought about that experience. That game made me think about the real world in a completely different way.” In the single-player campaign missions that we saw, the emotions run high.
He added, “We’ve done a ton of research coming into this game. What we’ve determined is social commentary like that has always been in the DNA of Modern Warfare. We’ve sent research teams around the world. Players have unanimously told us they want those emotional connections. They want complex, morally gray characters. They want gameplay that feels ripped from the headlines and delivers relevant, relatable, and provocative moments that only Modern Warfare would have the guts to show. For me, as a developer who wants to push the medium forward, and do things people have never seen before, getting to work on a franchise, Modern Warfare, where that is expected, is a dream come true.” GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
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VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Where do you stand on the AI curve? (Find out with this survey) | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/where-do-you-stand-on-the-ai-curve-find-out-with-this-survey"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages VB Event Where do you stand on the AI curve? (Find out with this survey) Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
Learn more.
Artificial intelligence has broken out of the black box and is now the not-so-secret recipe for real-world business results.
Industry disrupters like Lyft, Uber, Airbnb, and LinkedIn are demonstrating the power of going all-in on machine learning solutions and AI tools. At the same time, both smaller and more traditional companies are seeing AI as a must-have capability. We want to take the temperature out there and learn exactly where companies, of all sizes, are at in their AI explorations, and the challenges and successes they’re experiencing.
That’s why VB has launched a new AI survey for execs who may already be integrating AI into their workflows and product development, as well as those who are interested in learning how to get started, where to focus their resources, and what kind of results they can expect. It takes just a few minutes, and in return, you’ll have exclusive access to the full results, which won’t be released publicly.
While you’re at it, join the conversation, and register for Transform 2019: Accelerating Your Business with AI.
It’s two days of unbeatable networking, case studies featuring real ROI from industry giants to ingenious startup, and how-to AI product workshops in deep learning, edge computing and more. And you’ll meet AI leaders from companies like Facebook, AirBnb, Uber, Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Amazon, and many more.
AI is the biggest competitive advantage the market has experienced in decades, and Forrester has found that companies are starting to sit up and take notice — 88 percent of marketers have adopted or are planning to adopt AI. It’s not too late to launch your own strategy — or level it up.
VB Event The AI Impact Tour Connect with the enterprise AI community at VentureBeat’s AI Impact Tour coming to a city near you! To learn more about where your company stands now, and how the market is evolving in the AI-first era, take the VB AI Survey now , and look for the exclusive full results once the survey period closes. Responses must be completed by June 28th.
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Warren Equity-Backed M&D Distributors Expands to West Texas with Acquisition of Diesel Testers | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/warren-equity-backed-md-distributors-expands-to-west-texas-with-acquisition-of-diesel-testers"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release Warren Equity-Backed M&D Distributors Expands to West Texas with Acquisition of Diesel Testers Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn HUMBLE, Texas–(BUSINESS WIRE)–May 30, 2019– M&D Distributors (“M&D” or the “Company”), an independent aftermarket distributor of diesel engine parts and components, announced its asset acquisition of Diesel Testers, Inc. (“Diesel Testers”), a service dealer that provides diesel engine parts and repair services through its retail location in Odessa, TX.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190530005551/en/ Diesel Testers is M&D’s ninth branch location within Texas and Louisiana. Diesel Testers will serve as the Company’s first branch location servicing customers within West Texas and the greater Permian Basin area, which has led North America’s resurgence in domestic oil and natural gas production over the last several years. M&D will continue to serve Diesel Testers’ customers at its existing location, located at 2850 Steven Road, with the ability to deliver M&D’s wide product portfolio of more than 100,000 new and remanufactured fuel injection, turbocharger, engine part, and filtration products from leading OEMs and aftermarket suppliers.
“We are extremely excited to join forces with our long-time service dealer to better service our customers in West Texas,” said Trey Ingram, CEO of M&D Distributors. “M&D’s long reputation for excellence and product availability makes us an ideal partner to supply aftermarket diesel engine parts within the Permian Basin region.” “We are excited to enter the rapidly growing and underserved Odessa market through the acquisition of Diesel Testers,” said Michael Zhang, Vice President at Warren Equity Partners. “Our presence and investments will add tremendous value to our customers as the region continues to experience unprecedented levels of industrial activity.” Diesel Testers is M&D’s first acquisition since Warren Equity Partners acquired a majority interest in M&D in December 2018.
About Warren Equity Partners Warren Equity Partners is a private equity firm that invests in small and middle market operating companies primarily in North America. The firm invests in established companies where additional capital and operating resources can accelerate growth, targeting companies in the industrial, infrastructure, and business services sectors. Warren Equity invests in the form of buyouts, growth equity, and recapitalizations. For more information, please visit www.warrenequity.com.
About M&D Distributors Founded in 1943 and based in Humble, TX, M&D Distributors is a longstanding one-stop aftermarket distributor of mission-critical diesel engine parts and components within primarily Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. M&D’s wide product portfolio includes new and remanufactured fuel injection, turbocharger, engine part, and filtration products from the world’s top-tier manufacturers and aftermarket suppliers. The Company also provides additional services through its internal rebuilding capabilities and a wide range of services, including part matching, diagnostics, repair, and technical assistance, including Diesel University. For more information, please visit www.mddistributors.com.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190530005551/en/ Jim Garner M&D Distributors (281) 641-9005 VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"VRgineers debuts AR module for XTAL enterprise VR headset | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/vrgineers-debuts-ar-module-for-xtal-enterprise-vr-headset"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages VRgineers debuts AR module for XTAL enterprise VR headset Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn XTAL equipped with a new AR mixed reality tracking and vision system.
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VRgineers’ XTAL isn’t your typical VR headset — the $5,800 device shipped with a 5K display and a wide 170-degree field of view, later upgrading to an even wider 180 degrees using improved lenses.
Now the developer is looking to expand the enterprise headset’s appeal by adding AR capabilities: A new optional module will add twin wide-angle cameras and new sensors, bringing inside-out tracking, hand tracking, and VR/AR switching to the HMD.
As one might guess from the price and specs, XTAL isn’t a consumer VR device; it’s made specifically for businesses with serious visualization demands. VRgineers says that the new AR module will enable it to be “the most advanced mixed reality (MR) system ever created, and the only enterprise-grade MR system capable of total immersion.” It’s already quite large and boxy, but thankfully won’t become much heavier: The unmodified headset weighs 2.67 pounds including a head strap and balance counterweight, but the module will add only 42 grams, bringing it to 2.76 pounds.
After the module is installed, users will be able to toggle between VR and AR modes, with the ability to see their hands interacting with real objects inside digitally generated environments — or vice-versa. The company notes that the module will especially expand XTAL’s utility in confined environments such as cars, airplane cockpits, or simulators where mounting outside-in cameras may be difficult, but that the headset will continue to support both options, as well as Leap Motion hand tracking.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! A video demonstration of the inside-out tracking capability shows XTAL identifying and mapping actual objects in a real space (inset) while displaying a nearly photorealistic augmented version to the user. Used for retail or architectural visualization, the system could allow users to perceive fancier objects and decor than what’s actually there, yet interact with physically similar base items.
VRgineers expects that it will enable next-level immersion for mission-critical applications such as pilot training. “Thanks to the camera module,” the Prague-based company notes, “it will also be possible to display a real cockpit with real hands, and to connect real stickers, steering wheel and all switchings with the virtual environment. Thanks to this, pilots will have a real haptic feedback and a perfect visual.” VRgineers hasn’t yet revealed a final release date or pricing for the AR module, but it will be sourcing a beta version to select aerospace, automotive, and simulation partners later this year. Developers interested in joining the beta can contact VRgineers at [email protected].
VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Streamlabs unveils Creator Sites to help influencers monetize streams and grow brands | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/streamlabs-unveils-creator-sites-to-help-influencers-monetize-streams-and-grow-brands"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Streamlabs unveils Creator Sites to help influencers monetize streams and grow brands Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Streamlabs has launched Creator Sites , a way for streamers and influencers to build their own websites and brands for better monetization.
The content creator-focused website builder will help livestreamers consolidate their online brands, monetize their streams, and grow their online business. It’s like Shopify for creators, and it offers options such as livestream donations and selling apparel and accessories from their own website.
Creator Sites is integrated with content platforms like Twitter, YouTube, Twitch, Mixer, Facebook, and Instagram. Cross-platform content aggregation allows the livestream, stream chat and an activity feed from all linked platforms to be displayed on the creator’s site. Creators receive a unique web address and professional email.
The platforms intuitive drag and drop user interface requires no background in web editing or knowledge about domains, cybersecurity, email server setup or SEO. Creator Sites act as a landing page to give viewers, potential sponsors, and business partners one central location to see the latest activity from the streamer.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! “Creator Sites give me the tools to build a website that serves as a community hub for my fans, and allows me to continue to grow my community in a unique way like never before,” said Ali ‘Myth’ Kabbani, a popular live streamer with over five million followers on Twitch, in a statement.
Above: Streamers are planning on using Streamlabs’ Creator Sites.
Basic features for Creator Sites are free, and the bespoke user experience has been tailored for content creators. For $149 per year, creators can subscribe to “Streamlabs Prime,” a new service in which members unlock advanced features for Creator Sites and additional features for a variety of Streamlabs products.
The features include a domain with information protection and enterprise-grade security, one-click custom email setup on personal domain, integrated commerce and monetization, website builder for beginner to advanced users, drag-and-drop building blocks for content creators, website theme gallery with content from top industry designers, SEO friendly websites with 100% user control and ability to add custom headers, content aggregation across all major platforms, cross-platform stats aggregation, and unique website layouts optimized for both desktop and mobile.
“Live streamers are unique in that their online persona is their brand. Showcasing that becomes complicated when your online presence is spread throughout a dozen different platforms,” said Ali Moiz, the CEO of San Francisco-based Streamlabs , in a statement. “Creator Sites provides an opportunity for live streamers to unite their online presence and reflect a consistent brand.” This new product is enabling content creators to position themselves effectively and professionally on their journey as a micro-brand without spending hundreds of dollars on design and web development.
The creator economy is rapidly growing. Streamlabs has processed over $400 million in donations to live streamers since 2015. Hours watched on Twitch increased 35% year over year, reaching 2.7 billion hours in Q1 of 2019. Live streamers are garnering mainstream media attention, changing digital media, and influencing consumer spending habits. As the creator economy continues to develop, Streamlabs remains committed to powering the content creator workforce by providing tools that help streamers turn their passion into a business.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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"SFA Therapeutics to Present Human Psoriasis Data for Microbiome-based Drug (SFA002) at the Global Biotech Entrepreneur Forum and the BIO International Convention | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/sfa-therapeutics-to-present-human-psoriasis-data-for-microbiome-based-drug-sfa002-at-the-global-biotech-entrepreneur-forum-and-the-bio-international-convention"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Press Release SFA Therapeutics to Present Human Psoriasis Data for Microbiome-based Drug (SFA002) at the Global Biotech Entrepreneur Forum and the BIO International Convention Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Also Presenting Preclinical Data on Two Additional Pipeline Products PHILADELPHIA–(BUSINESS WIRE)–May 31, 2019– SFA Therapeutics, Inc. will be presenting human Psoriasis data on its human-microbiome-based drug (SFA002) as well as pre-clinical data for two additional pipeline products at the Global Biotech Entrepreneur Forum on June 2 nd at the Science Education and Research Center at Temple University, and during the BIO International Convention in Philadelphia on June 4, 2019 at the Philadelphia Convention Center.
The first presentation takes place at the Temple University Science and Education Research Center, at 9 AM on June 2 nd at the Global Biotech Entrepreneur Forum in Philadelphia. The second presentation takes place June 4th in Theater 4, Level 200, From 11:15 AM To 11:30 AM the BIO International Convention at the Philadelphia Convention Center.
In each talk, Dr. Ira C. Spector, CEO, will provide an overview of the company, and human data for its microbiome-based drug SFA002 in the treatment of Psoriasis, as well as transgenic animal data on SFA001 in prevention of the progression of Hepatitis B-mediated Chronic Liver Disease (CLD) to Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC Liver Cancer), and in the direct treatment of HCC Liver Cancer.
The company will also discuss early phase research into preventing relapse/recurrence in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) and Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML).
About SFA Therapeutics SFA Therapeutics, Inc. is a bio-pharmaceutical company focused on new human microbiome-based advancements in the treatment of inflammatory diseases, targeting NF-KB mediated pathways. Chronic inflammation has been implicated in a wide range of diseases, including Psoriasis, Psoriatic Arthritis, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Lupus (SLE), Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), Crohn’s disease, Liver Disease, and relapse/recurrence in AML and CML.
SFA’s small-molecule drugs are derived from natural substances produced in the human microbiome and enable a new platform for developing safer treatments for inflammatory diseases.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190531005081/en/ Josh Weinstein jwEinstein Strategic Messaging, Inc.
610-438-8853 [email protected] Dr. Ira C. Spector, CEO, SFA Therapeutics, Inc.
267-584-1080 [email protected] VentureBeat's mission is to be a digital town square for technical decision-makers to gain knowledge about transformative enterprise technology and transact.
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"ProBeat: Microsoft's modern OS is too good to be true | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/probeat-microsofts-modern-os-is-too-good-to-be-true"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Opinion ProBeat: Microsoft’s modern OS is too good to be true Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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Microsoft hosted a keynote at Computex 2019 this week. As always, the company talked up the latest Windows 10 hardware. But then Nick Parker, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of consumer and device sales, started to describe a “modern OS.” He wasn’t talking about Windows 10.
The keynote wasn’t livestreamed, but Parker kindly summarized it all in a blog post with the same title: “ Enabling innovation and opportunity on the Intelligent Edge.
” The post includes a 321-word paragraph describing the mythical modern OS.
Microsoft’s modern OS has eight components: Seamless updates: Updates are invisibly done in the background. The update experience is deterministic, reliable, and instant with no interruptions.
Secure by default: The state is separated from the operating system. Compute is separated from applications, which protects the user from malicious attacks throughout the device lifecycle.
Always connected: Wi-Fi and LTE 5G will just work. Users never have to worry about dead spots. All your devices are aware and connected to each other.
Sustained performance: From the moment you pick up their device, everything is ready to go. You don’t have to worry about the next time the PC needs to be charged.
Cloud-connected: Experiences that use the compute power of the cloud enhance your devices.
AI: These experiences are powered by AI, so your device is aware of what you’re doing tomorrow and helps you get it done. It also enhances applications to make them more intelligent.
Multi-sense: You can use pen, voice, touch, even gaze just as well as the keyboard and mouse.
Form factor agility: The right sensor support and posture awareness enable a breadth of innovative form factors and applications.
No operating system offers this. This is not Windows 10 or anything else that Microsoft has coming soon.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Computex is the key When I first read the paragraph, I will admit that Chrome OS came to mind. A few of the components are eerily familiar to Google’s Chromebook pitch. But after I broke out the text into individual points, it became clear there is a lot more here. This is a wish list.
Is Microsoft working on a “modern OS”? Absolutely. That said, even if tomorrow the company released a major Windows 10 upgrade, the rumored “ Windows Lite ,” or a completely new version of Windows, it wouldn’t check all the above boxes.
How do I know? We would have seen it in the hardware this week. Plenty of new devices were shown off at Computex 2019.
All of them were running Windows 10. None of them matched Microsoft’s modern OS vision.
Microsoft’s keynote was a look at what exists and what could exist. Maybe at Computex 2020 we’ll start to see this vision come to fruition. But only start.
ProBeat is a column in which Emil rants about whatever crosses him that week.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
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The AI Impact Tour Join us for an evening full of networking and insights at VentureBeat's AI Impact Tour, coming to San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles! VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Nreal Light mixed reality smartglasses will debut for $500 | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/nreal-light-mixed-reality-smartglasses-will-debut-for-500"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Nreal Light mixed reality smartglasses will debut for $500 Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Nreal's smartglasses cost $500.
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Nreal said it will sell its Nreal Light mixed reality smartglasses for $500 later this year. The company also said that a developer edition is available today for $1,200.
The Beijing-based company made the announcement at the Augmented World Expo event today in Santa Clara, California. I tried out the 3-ounce glasses yesterday and they were both light on my head and amazingly bright. That’s a rare combination.
Nreal, which has partnered with Qualcomm and LG Uplus, can do this because it connects the glasses via a USB-C wire to a smartphone, where most of the computing is done.
Above: Nreal on display at the AWE event.
Recently, Nreal announced it had raised an additional $16 million in funding from China Everbright Limited New Economy Fund, iQiyi, Shunwei Capital, and China Growth Capital. And that raise came just a month after the company announced a $15 million round at the CES 2019 tech trade show in Las Vegas.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! Nreal uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 mobile processor. The glasses have a wide 52-degree field of view (FoV) and high-definition 1080p resolution. Nreal said they can be worn for hours at a time since they don’t weigh much more than ordinary glasses. Over time, the company wants to tap 5G wireless networking technology to deliver full mixed-reality experiences to consumers.
The $499 package, called the Nreal Light Consumer Kit, will ship later this year with Nreal Light glasses, which can be connected by a USB-C cable directly to compatible “XR optimized” devices powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Mobile Platform. The 855 Mobile Platform supports immersive content on-the-go.
“Nreal light provides a lightweight XR Viewer that allows consumers to take advantage of 5G including high bandwidth and low latency to deliver immersive experiences virtually anywhere,” said Hugo Swart, head of XR at Qualcomm, in a statement. “We worked closely with Nreal to ensure Snapdragon smartphone compatibility and ecosystem integration to transform the way people connect and consume entertainment, and to further advance XR to make it the next generation of mobile computing.” Nreal also has a new partnership with Black Shark, which enables Nreal Light to be tethered to the gaming smartphone Black Shark 2.
“Paired with Nreal Light, the Black Shark 2 will be able to deliver the highest performance mobile gaming experience. Nreal Light will completely immerse our users in a fully interactive gaming environment that places you right in the heat of the moment,” said David Li, global vice president at Black Shark, in a statement. “We are excited to work with Nreal to usher in a new era of the mobile gaming experience.” “We’re excited to finally make Nreal Light available to consumers, which at just $499 has dramatically lowered the barrier to adoption and introduces a new opportunity for mixed reality devices that are finally within the reach of an average consumer,” said Chi Xu, CEO of Nreal, in a statement.
Nreal is partnering with carriers including China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, EE, KDDI, KT, LG Uplus, Softbank Corp., and Swisscom.
The Nreal SDK will be available in August 2019, with a beta version to be made available earlier. Nreal was founded in 2017.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Music moguls invest in esports conglomerate RektGlobal | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/music-moguls-invest-in-esports-conglomerate-rektglobal"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Music moguls invest in esports conglomerate RektGlobal Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Tainy and Lex Borrero are investors in Rekt Global.
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Music moguls Tainy and Lex Borrero have invested in esports conglomerate RektGlobal , joining Steve Aoki and Imagine Dragons as co-owners.
It’s yet another sign that esports is hot (or maybe inflated , depending on who you ask). Market researcher Newzoo expects esports to become a $1.7 billion industry by 2021.
Tainy is a Latin music producer, while Borrero is a seasoned music executive.
RektGlobal recently raised $10.8 million in funding to help grow its esports club Rogue.
“We’re excited to add Tainy, the legendary Latin music producer, as well as his manager and award-winning executive, Lex Borrero, as investors in the RektGlobal family,” said Amish Shah, the founder of RektGlobal and co-owner of Team Rogue, in a statement. “With Tainy and Lex’s support, we look forward to continuous growth and elevation of Rogue Nation’s global footprint in Latin America and beyond.” Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! As co-owners, Tainy and Borrero will support the growth of RektGlobal and Rogue in Latin America through strategic partnerships. They will also create and deliver creative streaming content alongside Rogue players and strengthen awareness around the team’s Junior Rogue program for amateur gamers and enthusiasts.
Tainy is renowned for his production on Cardi B, Bad Bunny and J Balvin’s “I like it.” He co-produced all but three of the 14 tracks on Balvin’s 2018 “Vibras,” and is working on his first-ever album that will release later this summer.
In a statement, Tainy said, “As a passionate gamer and supporter of Rogue, I’m excited to join RektGlobal as an investor. When I’m not in the studio, I’m gaming – playing everything from League of Legends, NBA 2K and Final Fantasy to Gears of War, whose soundtrack I’m currently working on, in addition to my own album.” Borrero, who was the publisher of Zedd’s The Middle , said in a statement, “I’ve been watching what RektGlobal has been doing in the space since 2017, and I love their vision of merging music and gaming. When the opportunity came up, it was a no brainer.” Founded in 2016, the New York-based RektGlobal wants to bridge esports and traditional sports. It has teams competing in Fortnite, FIFA, and League of Legends. The organization also serves as esports Agency of Record to State Farm, which recently announced its first-ever endorsement of an esports athlete, Benjamin “DrLupo” Lupo, a top Twitch streamer and the captain of Rogue’s Fortnite team.
GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Minecraft Marketplace April 2019's top 10 downloads | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/minecraft-marketplace-april-2019s-top-10-downloads"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Minecraft Marketplace April 2019’s top 10 downloads Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Springtime is in the air and Minecraft Marketplace.
Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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The Minecraft Marketplace had another huge month thanks to its Spring Sale.
Players zipped into the store for 7,409,421 downloads. That’s approximately double March’s 3,705,978 downloads.
For the Spring Sale, Microsoft invited fans to get up to 75% off the various items in the Marketplace. It ran from April 19 through April 21, and seems like another big success for building the Minecraft Marketplace brand.
Here’s how the download and revenue charts sorted out: Top 10 most downloaded Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! 1. City Living by Noxcrew Get the full lifestyle experience with luxury apartments, office buildings, and even vehicles you can drive. Pick your perfect home or take in the sights. Customize your world with brand new models, blocks, and textures. Comes with 30 free skins.
2. Pet Shop by PixelHeads Welcome to Pet Shop! Choose between 17 lovely pets. Explore a town and earn coins by collecting poop or by catching stray animals. Play fetch with dogs, trim a poodle, or take a snake for a walk! 3. Dragons by InPVP Take one of six dragons to the skies and become a legendary dragon rider! Surprise your enemies with custom attacks. Shoot fireballs and drop TNT. Explore three huge castles and the beautiful custom landscape.
4. Luxury Life by PixelHeads Luxury Life is a world where you role-play life as a billionaire. Cruise the streets in a sports car or any of the 10 other vehicles, explore luxurious mansions and decorate with furniture! 5. Springtime by CubeCraft Spring is here! Dress up as a cute Easter bunny or choose from a variety of pastel colored outfits – even onesies! 6. Dinosaur Island by PixelHeads Overrun by prehistoric beasts after the scientists lost control of their genetic experiments, explore and discover the hidden mysteries of this intriguing island.
7. City Life by PixelHeads Cruise through the big city in City Life! Chase down a bandit in your police car, save the day as a firefighter, or take your dog for a walk.
8. Steven Universe Mash-Up by Minecraft Steven enters the Minecraft universe in this Diamond-worthy Mash-up! Contains Steven Universe themed skins, textures, original music from the show, and all your favorite locations, from Beach City to Homeworld.
9. City Mash-Up by Everbloom Studios With over 1,000 hand-detailed rooms, there are stories, secrets, and mini-games around every corner. Build with the city’s full texture pack in your own worlds or take on any role you can imagine! 10. Dreamlife by Shapescape Welcome to your Dreamlife! Get a tan at the beach, go shopping at the city mall with your friends, relax at the pool, or tear up the neighborhood in your own monster truck. Dress up fancy, sporty, or casual with our 12 included free skins.
Top 10 highest grossing 1. City Living by Noxcrew Get the full lifestyle experience with luxury apartments, office buildings, and even vehicles you can drive. Pick your perfect home or take in the sights. Customize your world with brand new models, blocks, and textures. Comes with 30 free skins.
2. Pet Shop by PixelHeads Welcome to Pet Shop! Choose between 17 lovely pets. Explore a town and earn coins by collecting poop or by catching stray animals. Play fetch with dogs, trim a poodle, or take a snake for a walk! 3. Dragons by InPVP Take one of six dragons to the skies and become a legendary dragon rider! Surprise your enemies with custom attacks. Shoot fireballs and drop TNT. Explore three huge castles and the beautiful custom landscape.
4. Luxury Life by PixelHeads Luxury Life is a world where you role-play life as a billionaire. Cruise the streets in a sports car or any of the 10 other vehicles, explore luxurious mansions, and decorate with furniture! 5. City Mash-Up by Everbloom Studios With over 1,000 hand-detailed rooms, there are stories, secrets, and minigames around every corner. Build with the city’s full texture pack in your own worlds or take on any role you can imagine! 6. Steven Universe Mash-Up by Minecraft Steven enters the Minecraft universe in this Diamond-worthy Mash-up! Contains Steven Universe themed skins, textures, original music from the show, and all your favorite locations, from Beach City to Homeworld.
7. Dinosaur Island by PixelHeads Overrun by prehistoric beasts after the scientists lost control of their genetic experiments, explore and discover the hidden mysteries of this intriguing island.
8. The Nightmare Before Christmas by Minecraft A nightmare? Before Christmas? Enjoy this themed pack by Minecraft.
9. City Life by PixelHeads Cruise through the big city in City Life! Chase down a bandit in your police car, save the day as a firefighter or take your dog for a walk.
10. Advanced Farming by Gamemode One Farm your heart out with new machines, vehicles, animals, pets, vendors, characters, and lands to explore. This peaceful and relaxing roleplay countryside experience also includes custom sounds and music! GamesBeat's creed when covering the game industry is "where passion meets business." What does this mean? We want to tell you how the news matters to you -- not just as a decision-maker at a game studio, but also as a fan of games. Whether you read our articles, listen to our podcasts, or watch our videos, GamesBeat will help you learn about the industry and enjoy engaging with it.
Discover our Briefings.
Join the GamesBeat community! Enjoy access to special events, private newsletters and more.
VentureBeat Homepage Follow us on Facebook Follow us on X Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on RSS Press Releases Contact Us Advertise Share a News Tip Contribute to DataDecisionMakers Careers Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information © 2023 VentureBeat.
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"Game of Thrones comes to VR with Beyond the Wall on HTC Vive | VentureBeat"
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"https://venturebeat.com/business/game-of-thrones-comes-to-vr-with-beyond-the-wall-on-htc-vive"
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"Artificial Intelligence View All AI, ML and Deep Learning Auto ML Data Labelling Synthetic Data Conversational AI NLP Text-to-Speech Security View All Data Security and Privacy Network Security and Privacy Software Security Computer Hardware Security Cloud and Data Storage Security Data Infrastructure View All Data Science Data Management Data Storage and Cloud Big Data and Analytics Data Networks Automation View All Industrial Automation Business Process Automation Development Automation Robotic Process Automation Test Automation Enterprise Analytics View All Business Intelligence Disaster Recovery Business Continuity Statistical Analysis Predictive Analysis More Data Decision Makers Virtual Communication Team Collaboration UCaaS Virtual Reality Collaboration Virtual Employee Experience Programming & Development Product Development Application Development Test Management Development Languages Game of Thrones comes to VR with Beyond the Wall on HTC Vive Share on Facebook Share on X Share on LinkedIn Game of Thrones: Beyond the Wall is coming to HTC Vive.
Are you looking to showcase your brand in front of the brightest minds of the gaming industry? Consider getting a custom GamesBeat sponsorship.
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HTC Vive has partnered with HBO to deliver a virtual reality experience based on Game of Thrones.
The Beyond the Wall experience immerses players in Westeros, and it will be available to Viveport Infinity subscribers on May 31.
Viveport Infinity gives players unlimited access and platform-agnostic subscription service for virtual reality for $13 a month. It’s compatible for the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.
Starting on May 31, “Beyond the Wall” will launch in English in the U.S., Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, the U.K., and Canada.
Created by Framestore in partnership with HBO, this game transports users to the northern border of The Seven Kingdoms to fight and defend The Wall. Players can test their sword-fighting skills against a terrifying undead polar bear and hoard of wights.
Event GamesBeat at the Game Awards We invite you to join us in LA for GamesBeat at the Game Awards event this December 7. Reserve your spot now as space is limited! I got a look at a version of this experience at an AT&T store last month. Here’s what I wrote: I put on the HTC Vive Focus, which is a standalone VR headset. I was standing on a mixed reality platform with a lot of plastic ice around it. And when I went into the VR experience, I was at the gate at the bottom of The Wall. A Ranger from the Night’s Watch was there in the icy corridor. He told me that I needed a sword, and he gave me his. Then he picked up his bow and opened the gate.
In VR, snow blew in through the open passage. And in real life, I was hit with a blast of cold air. It was a pretty cool effect. Then he began walking ahead. I followed him, though I didn’t have to physically move or control the game at all. It was an experience on rails. The blizzard around us grew thicker, and I could only see his footprints in the snow. Then he screamed, and I started moving faster.
Then I got to a bloody spot in the snow. And a giant creature — I think it was a big Direwolf — attacked me. It was like an infected Direwolf, or an undead creature. The ranger shot a fiery arrow at the creature’s head, and it erupted into flame. I took my sword, hit the head, and then my sword was flaming. The creature jumped and attacked me, and when it landed on the ground, the motion platform I was standing on moved. I kept swinging at the wolf again and again.
Finally, it died. Then I followed the blood trail to my companion, who was lying against a rock in the snow. Then he got up in a zombie-like way, and it was clear that he had become a White Walker. He approached me and attacked, and I swung my sword at him.
Then, all of the White Walkers in the mist came forward, attacking me from a few sides. I swung my sword at them over and over, taking them down with a couple of swings. Eventually, they overwhelmed me and killed me. And that was it.
It was a pretty intense experience, mostly because that cold wind was blowing the whole time.
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