The lawyers of Elizabeth Holmes, ex-CEO of disgraced blood testing startup Theranos, have 112 questions for prospective jurors at Holmes’ fraud trial — including how often they check social media and whether they subscribe to Netflix.
As The Wall Street Journal reported, Holmes’ attorneys have just filed a proposed jury questionnaire for her upcoming fraud trial. The extremely detailed 45-page document outlines every possible way Holmes fears a jury could be biased, and part of that apparently involves gauging exactly how online each juror is. Among other questions, jurors are asked:
“Do you have an account on any social media platforms? If yes, please identify the platform(s).”
“How frequently do you use the platform(s) listed above?” (Answers range from “multiple times per day” to “almost never.”)
“How do you use social media? (for example, communicate with friends; express opinions; follow current events; etc.)”
“Do you belong to any groups on social media (ex. Facebook or WhatsApp groups)?”
“Have you ever posted messages, comments, or opinions on websites/social media, or blogged? If yes, please describe the websites or social media platforms that you have used; the types of things you have posted or blogged; and how often you have done it.”
The questionnaire underscores the sheer breadth of media coverage around Theranos, with numerous questions gauging how (and how much) jurors engage with media. On the more general side, that includes:
“Have you ever written a letter to the editor or called into a radio show?”
“How much in the news media do you believe is fair and accurate?”
Then it asks whether potential jurors read, watch, or listen to any of 46 text news outlets, 15 individual media figures, and 19 video or audio outlets — mostly news stations, but also Hulu, Netflix, and HBO. (The Verge is not named on the questionnaire, although fellow Vox Media outlets Vox and New York Magazine are.) That’s on top of questions about whether the jurors have consumed media about Holmes and Theranos.
By contrast, US prosecutors — who filed their own 51-question proposal yesterday — asked participants to list their “main sources of news” and if they follow “financial news” specifically.
Prosecutors called Holmes’ form “far too long, deeply intrusive in unnecessary ways, argumentative, and repetitive” in a court filing. Beyond the social media questions, the form asks jurors to specify things like whether any family members or close acquaintances have experience with 26 different professional fields and government agencies. But Holmes’ lawyers claimed the entrepreneur was “routinely referred to in derisive and inflammatory terms,” making the questions pertinent.
That’s not an unfair description of Holmes’ media portrayal, although getting rich off a medical device that doesn’t work is arguably worthy of derision. It’s also a little ironic, because news outlets were once criticized for hyping Theranos without sufficient fact-checking. As Holmes’ filing notes, however, Theranos’ fall is now chronicled in a well-known book (Bad Blood by John Carreyrou), documentary (HBO’s The Inventor), and multiple podcasts (Tyler Shultz’s Thicker Than Water and Rebecca Jarvis’ The Dropout), plus an upcoming Hulu miniseries starring Amanda Seyfried.
Holmes was indicted for fraud in 2018 alongside former Theranos president and COO Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani. Her trial is scheduled to begin in August.
Unisantis Electronics, a startup led by Fujio Masuoka, the inventor of NAND memory, has developed Dynamic Flash Memory (DFM), a volatile type of memory that promises four times higher density than dynamic random access memory (DRAM) along with higher performance and lower power consumption.
DRAM memory relies on arrays of charge storage cells consisting of one capacitor and one transistor per data bit. Capacitors charge transistors when ‘1’ is recorded into that cell and discharge when ‘0’ is recorded into that cell. The arrays are arranged in horizontal wordlines and vertical bitlines. Each column of cells consists of two ‘+’ and ‘−’ bitlines that are connected to their own sense amplifiers that are used to read/write data from/to the cells. Both read and write operations are performed on wordlines, and it is impossible to address a single bit.
Throughout the history of DRAM, manufacturers have focused on making memory cells smaller by applying new cell structure and process technologies in a bid to increase DRAM capacity, reduce power consumption, and improve performance.
(Image credit: Unisantis)
Unisantis’ Dynamic Flash Memory uses a Dual Gate Surrounding Gate Transistor (SGT) to eliminate capacitors and uses 4F2 gain cell structures (which are smaller than 6F2 used by DRAM today), something that significantly increases bit density (by up to four times) of memory compared to DRAMs. DFM is not the industry’s first capacitor-less type of random access memory (RAM), but previous attempts were unsuccessful.
According to Unisantis, unlike ZRAM (where the margins between 1 and 0 have been too narrow), its DFM has significantly increased ‘1’ and ‘0’ margin results, increasing speeds and improving the reliability of the memory cell. DFM uses the PL (Plate Line) gate to ‘stabilize’ the FB (Floating Body) by separating ‘1’ write and ‘0’ erase modes, Unisantis says.
(Image credit: Unisantis)
Unisantis is an IP licensing company that does not produce memory or commercialize its technologies. The company’s DFM will only come to market if Unisantis manages to persuade the industry (namely SoC and memory makers) to adopt its dynamic flash memory. Since DFM uses conventional CMOS materials and does not require very sophisticated manufacturing methods, it may indeed be commercialized. Meanwhile, the company’s Dual Gate Surrounding Gate Transistor (SGT) IP could be licensed by various parties that want to take advantage of GAAFET-type transistors.
The DFM technology was described by its inventors, Drs. Koji Sakui and Nozomu Harada earlier this month at the 13thIEEE International Memory Workshop.
Microsoft is now claiming the performance crown in the desktop browser battle. The software maker has been gradually adding new features to Edge over the past year to improve performance and launch times. These additions have allowed Microsoft to claim itself the performance winner, even as Google releases Chrome 91 today.
“Microsoft Edge will be the best performing browser on Windows 10 when Microsoft Edge version 91 releases later this week,” says the Microsoft Edge team in a blog post. “So, why can we say this? It’s simple: startup boost and sleeping tabs.”
Microsoft first started rolling out its new startup boost feature in Edge back in March, with claims that it makes browser launches up to 41 percent faster. The new sleeping tabs feature also appeared earlier this year, designed to improve browser performance. Edge now automatically releases system resources for inactive tabs, which helps new tabs run better or stop the browser from hogging memory and CPU resources in the background. Microsoft is also working on a separate performance mode for Edge that’s currently in testing.
Google hasn’t been sitting around letting Chrome eat up more RAM, either. Recent updates to Chrome have included a bigger focus on performance, with a more advanced memory allocator to reduce memory usage and increase performance. The last update to Chrome in 2020 was also all about efficiency.
Microsoft has also revealed it has now submitted 5,300 commits to the Chromium browser project, which will also benefit Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers. While sleeping tabs and startup boost are features for Edge, Microsoft has helped Google improve Chrome’s tab management, and the rivals have worked together on a variety of underlying Chromium improvements.
Microsoft claims that as of a new release this week, its Edge browser will be the “best performing browser on Windows 10.” The announcement was made at the company’s annual Build developer conference, being held virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
When Edge version 91 releases, it will include two new features in startup boost and sleeping tabs that should boost performance. Startup boost makes the browser launch more quickly. Microsoft says “core” Microsoft Edge processes will run in the background and won’t need more resources when you add additional Windows. This should, Microsoft says, make for far faster launching.
The second feature, “sleeping tabs” sounds like it will address a bigger issue in the browser market. It aims to boost performance of the browser by “freeing up system resources from unused tabs,” including putting ads to sleep in background tabs. This month, Microsoft intends to enhance the feature to allow for up to 82% memory savings, per its internal testing using preview builds of the browser.
Since last year’s Build, Microsoft has made more than 5,300 commits to the open-source Chromium project, so that other browsers using the project can also see improvements made to Edge. Microsoft has also added a Progressive Web Apps, or “PWAs” build on Edge to the Microsoft Store.
Microsoft Edge is taking on an increasingly important role as part of Windows 10.
Microsoft is retiring Internet Explorer
on June 15, 2022, for most versions of the operating system. At Build, the company is pushing developers to transition away from IE11 websites and apps, though Edge’s Internet Explorer mode is expected to last through at least 2029.
At Build, Microsoft will discuss the WebView2 embedded web control and Edge in a session about apps for hybrid work, while the Edge team will also have a session to take questions directly from attendees.
Other Windows-based announcements include the ability to use Windows Terminal as the default emulator, along with a “Quake mode” to open a new terminal with a keyboard shortcut. Additionally, there will be GUI app support on the Windows Subsystem for Linux. More will be announced at Build throughout the week.
Electric vehicle startups have raised an absurd amount of money in the last year by merging with special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs. That money — billions of dollars, collectively — was supposed to be enough to help each of them start fighting for space in a market dominated by Tesla. But many of these startups are still having trouble getting rolling.
EV startup struggles are not new. Most of the ones focused on passenger vehicles that are still around spent years grappling with the inherent, unavoidable difficulties of automotive manufacturing. Now, though, the bruises of that fight are developing in broad daylight — all while they try to beat deep-pocketed legacy automakers to the punch.
Ohio-based Lordstown Motors raised nearly $700 million when it went public late last year and has backing from America’s largest automaker, General Motors. But it’s spending faster than expected — it lost $125 million in the first quarter — and on Tuesday, the company said it needs more cash in order to hit its goal of making its first 2,200 electric pickup trucks by the end of 2021.
California-based Canoo went public in December and has already replaced its leadership team. The new one has upended the startup’s business model and largely thrown out the projections that were used to raise around $600 million during last year’s merger with a SPAC.
Startups that have announced SPAC mergers but have yet to complete them have run into some trouble, too. Lucid Motors again delayed the release of its luxury electric sedan, the Air, in order to address quality assurance issues raised by its investors. When it does go public, the California startup is looking to add $4.4 billion to the sizable war chest it started building when Saudi Arabia pledged some $1.3 billion in exchange for majority control in 2018.
Another California EV startup working on a luxury electric vehicle, Faraday Future, is set to raise $1 billion when its own SPAC merger is complete. But this week, Faraday Future told investors that it needs to recalculate basically all of the financial projections it made so far in order to follow new guidance from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Other startups have had to make similar adjustments.
Some of these problems are the result of bad timing. These companies are trying to debut vehicles at a time when the pandemic has put a ton of stress on the automotive supply chain. Lucid Motors CEO Peter Rawlinson told Bloomberg on Wednesday that “COVID has wrecked havoc with our process.” On Tuesday, Lordstown Motors said the pandemic has created “significantly higher than expected expenditures for parts/equipment, expedited shipping costs, and expenses associated with third-party engineering resources.”
But these startups also rushed to become public companies so they could take advantage of the deluge of money during the SPAC merger boom. That has left them scrambling to cope with the demands of being listed on a major stock exchange. On Canoo’s first earnings call as a publicly traded company, for example, an analyst called out the startup’s head of investor relations for not returning emails. In response, CEO Tony Aquila admitted to the team being “overwhelmed.”
Not all of the side effects of this rush to market have been so frivolous, though. Nearly all of these startups have disclosed so-called “material weaknesses” in their internal financial practices in filings with the SEC. Faraday Future admitted that, among other things, it “did not design and maintain effective controls for communicating and sharing information between the legal and accounting and finance departments,” and that it was not able to “address the identification of and accounting for certain non-routine, unusual or complex transactions” — which is notable considering the startup’s well-documented history with unusual and complex financial transactions.
Fisker Inc., which raised $1 billion in its own merger last year, admitted to weaknesses in its “risk assessment process, including as it relates to fraud risks.”
What’s more, multiple electric vehicle startups are now under government investigation. The SEC is probing Lordstown Motors over claims that it misrepresented the number of preorders for its trucks. It’s also investigating Canoo’s SPAC merger, as well as the recent executive departures. Both the SEC and the Department of Justice have opened investigations into hydrogen trucking startup Nikola, which was one of the earliest electric vehicle companies to go public in a SPAC merger. And if that weren’t enough, all of these startups have been hit with multiple securities fraud lawsuits from shareholders alleging they were misled.
Only Lordstown Motors and Lucid Motors remain committed to starting production by the end of 2021, which means most of these startups are still a long way away from generating revenue, let alone turning a profit. The only exception so far is Fisker Inc., which sold $22,000 worth of merchandise in the first quarter — though the cost of those sales was $17,000, meaning the company netted just $5,000.
Without any near-term revenue, these EV startups are now in a sort of race to get into production before their massive piles of cash run out. And some are already looking for more help, buoyed by the fact that many of them were able to use funds from the SPAC mergers to wipe out any existing debt.
Fisker Inc. founder Henrik Fisker has already said he is open to borrowing money to make sure his company meets a late 2022 production target. Lordstown Motors said Tuesday that it is looking to borrow against some of its assets (which include a former GM factory and equipment). It’s also talking to strategic investors and is in the running for a loan from the Department of Energy’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing program, from which Tesla once borrowed.
If the startup isn’t able to raise more money, Lordstown Motors CEO Steve Burns said it will have to cut its production target to around 1,000 trucks this year.
“We wanted to make sure everybody knew the worst, worst case is we are still making pickup trucks this year,” Burns said.
Lordstown Motors is especially under pressure, as the startup is focused on making and selling its electric pickup, the Endurance, exclusively to commercial customers. But Ford not only just revealed an all-electric version of its bestselling truck, the F-150, it also showed off a fleet-focused version with a cheaper base price than the Endurance.
Burns, without mentioning the Detroit automaker or its new truck by name, said this week the F-150 Lightning launch helped prove that electric pickups are now a “mainstream” idea. He remained confident that Lordstown Motors could beat Ford to market, as the Lightning is not supposed to go on sale until the first half of 2022. But, he said, it “would be crushing to have the lead, have a first market mover, and not be able to fulfill [that goal].”
People like to argue that technology is value neutral; that it’s neither inherently good nor inherently bad, but can simply be put to different uses. As a rebuttal, I’d like to direct the court’s attention to exhibit a), a video of “digital humans” rapping using AI-synthesized voices, that is intrinsically awful.
Indeed, I’d argue that the video above not only disproves the whole value-neutral thing, but makes a decent case for shutting down this “technology” lark altogether and heading back to the trees before it’s too late. What I mean is: AI is posting cringe and I don’t like it.
Okay, so I’m being a little harsh here and the video is obviously a joke. It’s the work of Replica, an AI startup that does interesting things with synthetic speech. The company tells us that during a recent hackathon, one employee worked out how to capture live audio of himself rapping and transfer “the timing, cadence and energy of his delivery onto one of our AI voices.” Combined with a little 3D animation and rendering, this video is the result.
For fairness, here’s Replica’s mea culpa, sent to us via email:
“DISCLAIMER – we know this video is deep in the heart of the uncanny valley. That’s not because the tech is bad, it’s because we’re amateurs at using 3D real-time rendering software – that’s not our speciality. The only reason this video exists is because the team created this during an internal company hackathon for fun using a new feature that’s under development, not yet open to the public.”
That feature in question is an upcoming integration due to be announced at GDC in July between Replica’s speech synthesis tools and Unreal Engine’s MetaHumans software, which generates realistic CGI humans. By combining the two tools, says Replica, anyone will be able to “create lip sync dialogue for games and movies, and even rap.”
As a reminder, though, you can also not do that. Just a thought.
Apple is releasing its latest iOS 14.6 update today, and it’s largely focused on audio improvements. This new OS update will allow Apple Music subscribers to enable lossless audio or Dolby Atmos once it’s available next month, and it also debuts Apple Podcasts subscriptions.
Podcasts users can now subscribe to content in the app for extra perks like ad-free and bonus content, as well as early access. Apple is also improving the Podcasts app with the ability to mark all episodes as played, recover old episodes, and remove downloads.
iOS 14.6 includes a number of other quality-of-life improvements. If you’re an AirTag owner, iOS 14.6 includes the option to add an email address as a contact method for when the item tracker is in lost mode. There’s also Apple Card Family sharing, with support for up to five people to share an Apple Card for purchases.
As always, this latest version of iOS also includes some fixes and security improvements. Apple has fixed an issue with the Apple Watch not unlocking an iPhone correctly, problems with reminders as blank lines, call blocking extensions not appearing in settings, reduced iPhone performance during startup, and Bluetooth issues during calls.
Ford has revealed a version of its new F-150 Lightning electric pickup truck aimed specifically at commercial customers. It’s called the F-150 Lightning Pro, and it starts at $39,974 for a version with an estimated 230 miles of range. Extended-range versions of the truck, which are expected to get 300 miles on a full battery, will start at $49,974.
Much like the retail version of the electric F-150, the Lightning Pro stands to win Ford a lot of business as long as the company executes well when the truck starts shipping in 2022. Fleets all over the country are already considering a switch to electric vehicles, either to get ahead of zero-emission guidelines at the state or federal level, or in an attempt to take advantage of what should be a lower total cost of ownership with electric vehicles. Ford claims the Lightning Pro could cut maintenance costs up to 40 percent over eight years and 100,000 miles of use compared to a 2.7L EcoBoost F-150.
Multiple electric pickups are coming to market over the next year or two, including Tesla’s Cybertruck, the GMC Hummer EV, and the Rivian R1T. But almost none are geared specifically towards commercial fleets. One of the only examples is the electric pickup truck being developed by Ohio startup Lordstown Motors. That truck is supposed to go into production later this year, but it will start at around $52,000, and the company doesn’t have anywhere near the track record of an established automaker like Ford. Paired with the E-Transit van, the Lightning Pro gives Ford a potent one-two punch in the fight to electrify the commercial market.
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There aren’t a lot of obvious differences between the Lightning Pro and the retail versions of the electric F-150 that Ford revealed last week. Like the retail version, it only comes in a four-door SuperCrew cab and 5.5-foot bed configuration. Buyers can choose to equip the Lightning Pro with the standard or extended range battery. The standard range version will have a max 7,700-pound towing capacity when equipped with the optional towing package, while the extended range can pull up to 10,000 pounds. Both versions use a dual-motor, all-wheel drive setup, with the standard range truck maxing out at an estimated 426 horsepower, while the extended range version can make around 563HP.
Both Lightning Pro trucks have onboard power available, which can run electric tools or other accessories, though buyers will have to pay more for extra outlets (including a 240 volt plug in the bed) and higher total output. The extended range option also comes with an 80-amp charging station that can pretty much help refill a truck’s battery overnight. All versions of the commercial truck come with the massive, water-resistant front trunk, which has 14.1 cubic feet of storage and its own set of electrical outlets.
There is one big difference between the commercial and retail versions, though: the Lightning Pro will come with Ford’s commercial telematics software, which makes it easier for fleet owners to keep tabs on the location, charging status, or health of their vehicles.
“It’s actually complimentary for customers, and it gives insights such as: what’s your odometer [at]? What warning lights and diagnostic trouble codes are there? And we’re going so far as to provide preventative and proactive prognostics,” says Alex Purdy, the head of connectivity on Ford’s business operations side. Purdy says Ford even offers a data service that works with any other third-party fleet telematics software businesses might already have up and running.
Ford’s fleet software will also help operators tackle some of the more unconventional issues that might crop up as they switch to electric vehicles. For instance, some workers take their fleet vehicles home at night, fill up the gas tank on their own, and get reimbursed by their employer. Ford could help install home chargers for those workers, Purdy says, but the company has also written into the fleet software a way to let employers reimburse workers for the cost of at-home charging.
“These are the kinds of things that make Ford different,” Purdy says. “We say that we know how people use their vehicles, and it feels like a hollow thing — it’s not actually hollow in this case at all, because there are unique challenges with making an electric vehicle, relevant, useful, and adoptable by commercial customers.”
Chinese autonomous vehicle startup Pony.ai has received a permit from California’s Department of Motor Vehicles to test its driverless cars without human safety drivers behind the wheel on specified streets in three cities.
Pony has been authorized to test autonomous vehicles with safety drivers in California since 2017, but the new permit will let it test six autonomous vehicles without safety drivers on specific streets in Fremont, Alameda County; Milpitas, Santa Clara County; and Irvine, Orange County. According to the DMV, the vehicles are designed to be driven on roads with speed limits of 45 miles per hour or less, in clear weather and light precipitation. The first testing will be in Fremont and Milpitas on weekdays between 10AM and 3PM.
A total of 55 companies have active permits to test driverless vehicles in California according to the DMV, but Pony is only the eighth company to receive a driverless testing permit, joining fellow Chinese companies AutoX, Baidu, and WeRide, along with US companies Cruise, Nuro, Waymo, and Zoox. Nuro is the only company so far to receive a deployment permit that allows it to operate its autonomous vehicles in California commercially.
Pony.ai, which is based in Guangzhou and Silicon Valley, was valued at $3 billion after a $400 million investment from Toyota last year. The company said earlier this month its robotaxis will be ready for customers in 2023. Pony claims it’s the first company to launch autonomous ride-hailing and provide self-driving car rides to the general public in China.
Ford has revealed its first all-electric F-150, the Lightning, and on paper it looks like a really compelling truck. It’s priced aggressively for an electric vehicle, has plenty of power, and looks to be more capable at towing and hauling than the cheapest gas-powered F-150s.
But Ford’s not alone in developing an electric pickup truck — far from it, in fact. There is a slew of electric pickups set to hit the market in the next year and a half or so. Tesla’s polarizing Cybertruck should start rolling off the line at the company’s new Texas factory at the end of 2021 or in early 2022. Rivian — a startup that has raised billions of dollars and is backed by Amazon and Ford — has an electric pickup called the R1T due out this June. And General Motors’ first electric pickup will be the gaudy Hummer, which the company has revived after a decade. That’s due out in late 2022.
The most interesting thing about these pickup trucks is perhaps not just that they’re electric. It’s that they’re all quite different from each other. Tesla’s Cybertruck is a radical rethink of a truck’s exterior design and body structure. The R1T is one of the most refined pickups ever made for off-roading. The Hummer is… well there’s not much the Hummer pickup isn’t. The F-150 Lightning is about as straightforward as it gets — which is unsurprising for an electric version of the most popular vehicle in the United States.
Despite the diverse designs, all four of these electric trucks are going to court buyers who want to do Truck Stuff with them, meaning stats like power, torque, towing and hauling capacity, and of course, range will be crucial considerations (along with price). Here’s how they stack up.
VS. THE EV COMPETITION
F-150 Lightning (standard / extended range)
Tesla Cybertruck (single / dual / tri motor)
Hummer EV Edition 1 Pickup
Rivian R1T (large / max battery)
F-150 Lightning (standard / extended range)
Tesla Cybertruck (single / dual / tri motor)
Hummer EV Edition 1 Pickup
Rivian R1T (large / max battery)
Range
230 miles / 300 miles
250 miles / 300 miles / 500 miles
350 miles
300 miles / 400 miles
Battery capacity
N/A
N/A
200kWh
135kWh / 180kWh
Weight
6,500 lbs (est.)
N/A
9046 lbs
5,886 lbs
Height
78.9 inches
75 inches
81.1 inches
72.1 inches
Length
232.7 inches
231.7 inches
216.8 inches
217.1 inches
Width (incl. mirrors)
96 inches
79.9 inches (w/o mirrors)
93.7 inches
87.1 inches
Bed
5.5 feet
6.5 feet
5 feet
4.5 feet
Front trunk
14.1 cu. feet
Y
Y
11 cu. feet
Onboard power
9.6kW
Y
3kW
Y
Horsepower
426HP / 563HP
Up to 800HP (est.)
Up to 1,000HP
Up to 754HP
Torque
775 lb-ft
Up to 1,000 lb-ft (est.)
1,400 lb-ft (est.)
Up to 826 lb-ft
Max towing capacity
7,700 lbs / 10,000 lbs
7,500 lbs / 10,000 lbs / 14,000 lbs
N/A
11,000 lbs
Payload capacity
2,000 lbs / 1,700 lbs
Up to 3,500 lbs
N/A
1,760 lbs
Drivetrain
Dual-motor
Single / Dual / Tri-motor
Tri-motor
Quad-motor
Base price
$39,974
$39,900 / $49,900 / $69,900
$112,595
$67,500 / $77,500
On sale date
Spring 2022
End of 2021/Early 2022
Late 2022
June 2021
Ford’s electric pickup is really price competitive with the Cybertruck, though Tesla promises much more range and performance at the higher ends. The two designs could not be more different, but they track the closest, spec-wise.
The electric Hummer pickup truck outclasses both of those in a lot of ways (like max horsepower and torque), but it costs as much as a house, so it better. Rivian’s premium pickup is right in the middle, with some really good performance promised at a more digestible price.
There are others on the horizon, to be sure, but they’re either too far away to consider right now or there’s just not enough detail about them to properly stack them up. General Motors has committed to making an electric Chevy Silverado, though it doesn’t have a release date yet. Michigan startup Bollinger has spent years teasing a boxy electric work truck (plus a few variants) but still does not have a clear path to production. Lordstown Motors has a pickup truck slated for production at the end of this year, but it’s exclusively for fleets (and the company still has to finish a lot of real-world testing).
Meanwhile, one of the most compelling things about the F-150 Lightning is that it stacks up really well against its gas-powered siblings — especially because Ford is only selling it in a four-door SuperCrew configuration to start, which is its most expensive cab layout. Here’s a snapshot of the Lightning up against the cheapest gas-powered SuperCrew F-150 and the hybrid F-150.
VS its combustion counterparts
F-150 Lightning (standard range)
F-150 3.3L V6
F-150 hybrid
F-150 Lightning (standard range)
F-150 3.3L V6
F-150 hybrid
Range
230 miles
483 miles (combined city / hwy)
750 miles (combined city / hwy)
Front trunk
14.1 cu. feet
N/A
N/A
Onboard power
9.6kW
N/A
7.2kW
Horsepower
426hp
290hp
430hp
Torque
775lb-ft
265lb-ft
570lb-ft
Max towing capacity
7,700lbs
8,200lbs
12,700lbs
Payload capacity
2,000lbs
1,985lbs
2,120lbs
Drivetrain
Dual-motor AWD
3.3L V6 RWD
3.5L Hybrid RWD
Base price
$39,974
$38,990
$43,485
The base Lightning obviously can’t compete with the ability to go nearly 500 miles on a tank of gas or nearly 800 miles in the hybrid. But Ford has packed the electric F-150 with a lot of really compelling features — like a gigantic front trunk, tons of onboard power for running tools or even your home in a pinch — and has made its all-wheel drive standard. How many buyers will those features sway? We’ll have to wait until 2022 to find out. But Ford has already taken more than 20,000 $100 deposits for the electric F-150, so it’s off to a pretty good start.
What exactly is lost in translation when TV shows and films are subbed or dubbed into a new language? It’s a hard question to answer, but for the team at AI startup Flawless, it may be one we don’t have to think about in the future. The company claims it has the solution to this particular language barrier; a technical innovation that could help TV shows and films effortlessly reach new markets around the world: deepfake dubs.
We often think of deepfakes as manipulating the entire image of a person or scene, but Flawless’ technology focuses on just a single element: the mouth. Customers feed the company’s software with video from a film or TV show along with dubbed dialogue recorded by humans. Flawless’ machine learning models then create new lip movements that match the translated speech and paste them automatically onto the actor’s head.
“When someone’s watching this dubbed footage, they’re not jolted out of the performance by a jarring word or a mistimed mouth movement,” Flawless’ co-founder Nick Lynes tells The Verge. “It’s all about retaining the performance and retaining the original style.”
The results — despite the company’s name — aren’t 100 percent flawless, but they are pretty good. You can see and hear how they look in the demo reel below, which features a French dub of the classic 1992 legal drama A Few Good Men, starring Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise. We asked a native French speaker what they made of the footage, and they said it was off in a few places but still a lot smoother than traditional dubbing.
What makes Flawless’ technology particularly interesting is its potential to scale. Flawless’ pitch is that deepfake dubs offer tremendous value for money: they’re cheap and quick to create, especially when compared to the cost of full remakes. And, with the advent of global streaming platforms like Netflix, Disney Plus, and Amazon Prime Video, it’s easier than ever for such dubbed content to reach international markets.
As a recent report in The Wall Street Journal highlighted, demand for streaming services in the US is saturated and companies are now looking abroad for future growth. In the first quarter of 2021, for example, 89 percent of new Netflix users came from outside the US and Canada, while the service’s most watched show, Lupin, is a Parisian thriller.
“What you’re seeing is more and more streamers come online realizing the vast majority of their consumers are going to be outside the US, over time,” Erik Barmack, a former Netflix executive responsible for the company’s international productions, told the WSJ. “The question is how international does your content need to be to be successful.”
As Barmack suggests, there are different ways to answer this demand. You can create shows with local flavor that still entertain domestic viewers. You can do remakes of local hits for new audiences. And you can roll out the subs and dubs. But Flawless is betting that its technology provides a new option that will be particularly enticing for filmmakers.
This is because the company’s deepfake dubs preserve, to some degree, the performance of the original actor, says Lynes. Flawless’ technology is based on research from the Max Planck Institute for Informatics first published in 2019. As you can see in a showcase video below, the dubs it produces are somewhat sensitive to the facial expressions of the performers, retaining their emotion and line delivery.
Flawless has developed these techniques over the past three years, says Lynes, speeding up production time and reducing the amount of input footage. The end results are still a balance of automated dubbing and manual retouching (about 85 percent to 15 percent) but speedy to edit. “If something comes out we don’t particularly like we’ll do a few iterations; resubmit the training data in different forms and get another result,” says Lynes.
The company hopes that preserving the original performance will be appealing to filmmakers who want to retain the magic of their original casting. Lynes gives the example of the 2020 Oscar award-wining Danish film Another Round,which stars Mads Mikkelsen as one of a group of teachers who experiment with low-level alcoholism to see if it improves their lives. After its success at home and on the international award circuit, the film is set to be remade for English-language audiences with Leonardo DiCaprio in the main role.
The news sparked discussion about the value of such remakes. Is the Danish drinking culture that forms the film’s backbone really so alien to American audiences that a remake is required? Is Mikkelsen, an actor who’s appeared in such mainstream fare as Hannibal, Doctor Strange, and Rogue One, such an unknown that he can’t attract viewers in the US? And is the “one-inch barrier” of subtitles (to quote Parasite director Bong Joon Ho) simply too much for audiences to overcome?
From Lynes’ point of view, a deepfake dub would at least be a cheaper way to bring Another Round to English-language audiences while retaining its original flavor. “They’re quoting $60 million to make that movie,” he says. “If we’re offering something that’s two percent the cost of the remake, we only need to be half as appealing to offer 10 times better value.”
Those in charge of the remake will have concerns other than money, of course. No matter how beloved Mikkelsen is, he’s not as bankable as DiCaprio. But Lynes hopes that as deepfake dubs become common it’ll change the calculations for such remakes in future. Much more than that, he says, it’ll could even reshape the international film landscape, allowing actors and directors to reach new audiences with minimal effort.
“I think the pulling power of actors will change globally as a consequence of this technology,” he says. “Different people’s performances and directors’ choices will be better recognized, because a wider audience will be able to see them.”
Perhaps so, but for the moment, Flawless needs to prove that audiences actually want its technology. The company, which launched earlier this month, says it’s already got a first contract with a client it can’t name, but there’s no timeline for when we might see its wares in a commercial TV show or film and that will be the real test. The proof is in the dubbing.
The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened an investigation into newly public electric vehicle startup Canoo, CEO Tony Aquila shared on a conference call on Monday.
“We recently received a notice from the SEC that they are conducting an investigation,” Aquila said, who added that the agency “characterized the process as a fact-finding inquiry.” Aquila did not share any more information about what the probe involves.
Canoo is one of a number of electric vehicle startups that went public by merging with a special purpose acquisition company (or SPAC) over the last year. These mergers provided a different path to these startups compared to a traditional IPO. But since these mergers are regulated differently, it’s given startups more leeway when it comes to their business projections. In April, the SEC said it would start taking a closer look at this discrepancy to make sure that investors weren’t being misled.
Canoo is not the only EV startup facing pressure from the SEC and other regulators. Lordstown Motors disclosed in March that the SEC is investigating whether the electric pickup truck startup misled investors. Hydrogen trucking startup Nikola also faces investigations from the SEC and the Department of Justice after being caught lying to investors.
Christopher Stringer, an ex-Apple designer who worked on everything from the HomePod to the original iPhone during his 22 year-stint at the company, has unveiled his new startup’s debut speaker. It’s called the Cell Alpha, a futuristic Death Star-shaped connected speaker with an emphasis on spatial audio. It costs $1,799, or $1,969 if you want the model with a floorstanding base.
The Cell Alpha has woofers on its top and bottom arranged into a “force-balanced” configuration. These are paired with three mid-range drivers that are distributed around its equator, where they’re presumably joined by a small thermal exhaust port — the Cell Alpha’s only known weakness. Jokes aside, Stringer’s company Syng claims this three-driver configuration (dubbed “The Triphone”) is able to project sound with “pinpoint accuracy” around a room.
Two of the floorstanding models.Image: Syng
Syng is making big claims about the spatial audio capabilities of the Cell Alpha. It’s styling it as the world’s first “Triphonic” speaker, because it offers spatial audio capabilities beyond the stereo audio that’s long been the traditional standard. In practical terms it’s supposed to allow the speaker to fill an entire room with surround sound audio, creating the impression that specific sounds or instruments are coming from distinct areas of the room. There are three microphones built into the speaker’s stand to measure the geometry of the space it’s in, similar to the HomePod, which helps it create the impression of surround sound using just a single speaker.
Even the model of the speaker with a table stand is hefty.Image: Syng
While Syng says one speaker is capable of offering surround sound, anyone with $5,397 to spend can pair three Cell Alpha speakers together in a single room to get “the fullest expression of Triphonic audio.” According to a report from the Financial Times, Syng hopes to generate revenue from licensing out its audio technology in addition to selling hardware.
In terms of connectivity, Syng says the Cell Alpha supports AirPlay 2 and Spotify Connect over Wi-Fi. Physical connectivity is handled by a pair of USB-C ports, and Syng also says it’s planning on releasing a USB-C to HDMI cable to let the Cell Alpha connect to TVs (it can also output sound from a TV using AirPlay). A companion Syng Space app is available for setup and playback control.
Syng currently has around 50 employees according to Wired, and is reported to have raised $15 million in funding. The FT’s report last year said these employees include ex-Apple designers and engineers, as well as former Nest, Ring, Nike, and Facebook employees. Others have reportedly joined from the audio companies Harman and Bowers & Wilkins.
The Cell Alpha is available to purchase now from Syng’s website. As of this writing, shipping is expected in six to eight weeks.
(Pocket-lint) – Gaming phones have become something of a fixture in the Android space; while many flagship devices push their gaming prowess, for a select few, gaming is their raison d’être, their everything.
The ROG Phone is one such device, pushing Asus’ Republic of Gamers brand and weaving into that the experience Asus has gained from its regular phones. And in the fourth-generation of this phone Asus is more ambitious than ever.
Here’s why the Asus ROG Phone 5 is not only a great gaming phone, it’s a great phone outside of that too.
Design & Build
Dimensions: 173 x 77 x 9.9mm / Weight: 239g
Under-display optical fingerprint scanner
3.5mm headphone jack
ROG Vision rear display
Gaming phones often show their colours when it comes to the design. Aside from being large – which the ROG Phone 5 definitely is – you’ll often find more overt graphics and emotive finishes rather than just being a safe black or grey.
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The ROG Phone 5 doesn’t go to an extreme though: from the front it just looks like a normal phone. Flip it over and you’re treated to subtle design touches etched into the rear glass, which also gives some indicator of where the touch points are for the AirTriggers (which Asus describes as “ultrasonic sensor zones that can be customised to perform different functions, such as reproducing actions in specific games and launching specific apps”. We touch upon these in more detail in the last section of this review).
The thing that gives the game away is the ROG Vision display on the rear of the phone. There are two different versions of the display, with a dot display on the regular ROG Phone models and a slightly smaller but more sophisticated display panel on the Pro and Ultimate models – the Pro is shown in this review.
ROG Phone 5 comes in regular, Pro and Ultimate editions
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That blows the subtlety out of the water, allowing you to have RBG illumination on the back of the phone – with the Pro and Ultimate models offering a wider range of graphics and animations – all of which can be controlled through the Armoury Crate app on the phone, just like Asus PC components.
That control includes turning the Vision display off if you don’t want it – but you’ll soon forget it’s there until people mention it. It’s on the back of the phone and it’s rare to be looking at the back of the phone when you’re doing something, so let’s not dwell on it.
There are a couple of other quirks around the body: The USB-C on the base of the phone is offset to one side rather than central (and we don’t know exactly why), while there’s a secondary USB-C on the side of the phone. This secondary USB sits alongside the contact point to power the AeroActive Cooler 5 – the clip-on fan – and both have a rubber seal that presses into the side to keep out dust.
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This cover is probably the worst piece of design implementation on the ROG Phone 5. The fact that there are a couple of spares in the box tell you everything you need to know: you’re going to lose this cover, because it’s a separate piece of rubber.
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We’ve found it flapping off when pulling the phone from a pocket, and just when handling the device. We’re constantly pushing it back into place and a couple of times we’ve found it missing and then located it in the bottom of a pocket.
An out of box experience all phones can learn from
One of the great things about gaming phones is what you get for your money. There are a whole range of phones on offer and none are really expensive compared to flagships from brands like Samsung and Apple. The ROG Phone 5 starts at £799 in the UK – and that’s for a 12GB RAM model with 256GB storage, not the bottom of the range loadout.
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But it’s not just about the core device, it’s about the rest of the experience. Lavishly packaged, opening the ROG Phone 5 is an event. From the cool comic book graphics of inside of the box, that flow through into the startup process for the phone, there’s a sense of theatre. It’s a reward for your custom and it’s so much better than just sliding a phone out of a box.
You also get more in the box: the 65W charger that will deliver a fast charge; the case that brings some grip to what is, admittedly, a slippery phone given its massive size; and the clip-on AeroActive Cooler 5 fan, which integrates a kickstand, two physical buttons, and another RGB logo.
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Some might baulk at this as more landfill, but some companies will make you pay for the charger – and here you’re getting a powerful charger you can use with your other devices too.
Display
6.78-inch AMOLED panel
Up to 144Hz refresh rate
2448 x 1080 resolution
There’s a 6.78-inch display in the ROG Phone 5. It’s big by any standard, with Asus hanging onto the bezels top and bottom. The top bezel integrates the front-facing camera, so there’s no need for a notch or punch-hole.
It’s also a flat display, all practical design decisions made to give you the best gaming experience, ensuring that you get as much visual space as possible. Given how problematic we found the Xiaomi Mi 11 Ultra’s display, we’re just fine with the ROG Phone 5 going flat.
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The ROG Phone 5 models all stick to a Full HD resolution and while devices like the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra can technically produce finer detail, generally speaking that makes little difference. We can’t fault the ROG Phone’s display for detail.
It also offers refresh rates up to 144Hz (if you have any games that support that, there’s a full list on the ROG website), with options to select 60 or 120Hz – or Auto, which will pick the refresh rate based on the content.
HDR 10+ is supported to bring pop to the visuals for high dynamic range content, while that AMOLED panel provides rich colour visuals, with the option to tune that to your preferences.
It’s a great display and about the only thing that separates it from the best displays on the market is the peak brightness. It offers 800 nits, which is still bright enough for most, but Samsung’s top-end offerings will outshine this model – most notable when outside in sunny conditions.
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Flanking the display top and bottom are dual stereo speakers, while there’s also a 3.5mm headphone socket for those wanting to go wired. The speaker performance is stellar, amongst the best you’ll find on a smartphone. It’s rich and immersive, with substantial bass and volume that means you don’t need headphones to get the most from your content.
Hardware & Performance
Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 platform
8GB-18GB RAM, 128GB-512GB storage
6000mAh battery, dual USB-C 65W wired charging
The fact the ROG Phone 5 houses Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 platform makes it especially good value for money – as you’re getting the latest flagship hardware that will embarrass some other phones.
Of course it comes in at different price points, with RAM and storage leveraging the price, although not all models will be available in all regions. We actually tested the 16GB/512GB model (the ROG Phone 5 Pro – a model that isn’t planned for the UK; although there’s a 16GB/512GB version of the standard ROG Phone 5, the only difference being the type of display you get on the back of the phone).
The performance is also exemplary. There are a number of elements to this. It’s got that great hardware and, as a result, we’ve found the gaming performance to be outstanding.
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This is a phone that eats hours of Call of Duty Mobile or PUBG Mobile, giving solid gameplay, combined with those design elements and some software enhancements that feel like they give you edge, or at least give you the opportunity to establish new preferences thanks to the bespoke gaming options offered.
We also didn’t find the ROG Phone 5 to get excessively hot under load, despite the option of the clip-on fan.
But the important point about performance is that the ROG Phone 5 also runs fast and smooth outside of gaming. We’ve seen gaming phones that drop the ball when it comes to simple tasks, because of poor software. The ROG Phone 5 is stable, which makes for a great experience.
There’s a huge 6000mAh battery, which is fitting for a phone of this size, again with Asus splitting the battery and enabling 65W wired charging. That makes for really fast charging, with the option to bypass charging – and just have the power used for the system rather than recharging the battery.
Again, this is an option for gamers, so you’re not charging (which produces heat) and loading the system (which produces heat) and could potentially lead to a drop in performance.
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A big battery means big battery life. In regular use the ROG Phone 5 will easily see you through the day and into the next. It’s not a charge every night type of phone. Even with a couple of hours of gaming thrown in – at top brightness and max settings – battery life isn’t a worry. That’s a great position not just for a gaming phone, but any smartphone.
There are power modes available, with X Mode firing up full power to let things rip, and a Dynamic Mode to keep things balanced. You can customise the power modes to suit your preferences with things like network, display, performance, and other controls all selectable.
There’s an under-display fingerprint scanner that’s fast to unlock, while calls comes through loud and clear too – with no detected problems with Wi-Fi or 5G connectivity.
The camera on any gaming phone is often something of an afterthought. The focus is on the experience of gaming – so the camera is seen as less of a focus. Despite that, Asus is pushing the ROG Phone 5 as having a triple camera system.
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The main camera is a 64-megapixel sensor, using pixel combining to produce a 16-megapixel image as standard. You can shoot in full resolution, but you have to dig into the menu to find that option, which no one is ever going to do.
There’s an ultra-wide lens, giving the equivalent of 0.6x, although the quality isn’t great, with visible blurring around the edges if there’s any detail there – but fine for open shots of expansive landscapes.
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1.0X MAIN CAMERA
The final camera is a macro camera, which we’re generally non-plussed about. As on other devices, macro cameras seem to be thrown in to make up the numbers – and that’s what it feels like here too.
So back the main camera and the performance is reasonable, producing naturally balanced pictures, although perhaps not getting the most out of scenes and not showing as much pop as other cameras we’ve seen can offer.
Low-light shooting offers that slow exposure so you can watch the image get lighter, which we like – and it will take those shots automatically in low light, which means people will actually use it.
There’s a portrait mode for blurring the background that works well enough, although it seems to soften the background with over-exposure which makes results look a little clumsy.
Portrait works on the front and back cameras and we generally prefer the results without portrait mode – and you can’t adjust the levels of blur after the fact, so it’s worth taking a few photos and figuring out what gives you pleasing results so you can change the settings before you take the picture. The selfie camera is generally good, although images quickly get softer in lower light conditions and aren’t good when it gets dark.
There’s no optical zoom on offer here, although you can pinch-to-zoom from the main camera out to 8x. It’s not an especially elegant system and the results are typical of digital zoom, with quality dropping as you increase the “magnification”.
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One of the reasons for the high-resolution sensor – apart from for the benefit of the spec sheet – is to allow 8K video capture, on top of the 4K 60fps option.
The important thing about the camera is that it gets the job done: while other phones will sell themselves on camera features above all else, that’s not really the ethos behind the ROG Phone 5. This phone is all about the power and the gaming experience. So, yes, there are more engaging cameras elsewhere, but at the same time, this Asus will give you perfectly good results in most situations.
Software and custom gaming options
Android 11
Armoury Crate
Custom gaming controls
As we’ve said previously, the software on the ROG Phone 5 runs smooth and fast. We’ve experienced no problems with the tweaks and changes that Asus has made over Google’s Android operating system, and it’s easy to swing in with Google versions of apps rather than supplied alternatives.
It’s running Android 11 too, so the latest version of Google’s OS – although Asus doesn’t quite have the update record that a company like Samsung now offers, so there’s no telling how long it would be before it moves to Android 12 once that’s released later down the line.
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What’s more relevant here is the gaming software and the options that controls. We’ve mentioned Armoury Crate, which will let you control things like the ROG Vision display on the back of the phone, and act as a launch pad for your games.
Within each game you can see how long you’ve spent playing that game, but more usefully you have a record of profiles for that game. You can, for example, restrict background CPU usage when playing a particular game, change the touch performance, turn off background network syncing – all designed to ensure you have the optimal gaming experience.
That you can customise this to each game is great. For something like a shooter where connection and touch matters more, you might want to restrict everything else. For something casual like Pokemon Go, you might be happy to have everything else on your phone happening. It’s freedom to choose, rather than one gaming mode fits all.
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Within games you have access to the Game Genie dashboard too, allowing you to perform essential things, like tweak the brightness, turn off alerts or calls, speed up your phone – and block navigation gestures so you don’t accidentally exit the game.
There’s the option to have stats always showing – CPU and GPU usage, battery, temperature, fps – and you can drag these to anywhere on the screen so they are out of the way.
But it’s the AirTriggers that are the biggest differentiator from other phones, giving you a range of touch zones around the body of the phone that you can customise. That also includes two physical buttons on the AeroActive Cooler accessory too – which might convince some people to use it, as those buttons feel more positive than the touch areas of the phone’s casing.
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The Cooler buttons are great for things like dropshotting in shooters, because you can hit the deck while still firing, and get back to your feet, all without having to touch anything on the screen – which is a real advantage during games.
There are two ultrasonic buttons on the top of the phone, like shoulder buttons, with haptic feedback. These can offer a full range of programmable options – taps, swipes, slides – and they can be divided into two buttons each side, or you can programme and assign a macro to that button for a sequence you might use in a game.
Then there’s motion support, which you can assign to controls in the game – like forward tilt to reload, or whatever you like.
There’s also (on the Pro and Ultimate models only) rear touch zones you can use for slide input for your fingers on the rear of the phone.
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The challenge is how you incorporate all these tools to make things easier for you during games – although setting them up is easy enough and each setup is unique to each game.
Even if you just find one thing that’s useful, then you’re a step ahead. That might be using an additional AirTrigger for an on-screen control you find hard to hit – or that you can then remove from the display so you have less UI in the way of the game.
Verdict
The thing that really hits home about the Asus ROG Phone 5 is that it’s not just a great gaming phone: it’s a great phone full stop.
Yes, you can’t avoid the fact that the majority of phones are now based around the camera experience – and that’s one area that the ROG Phone 5 doesn’t really go to town on. But with huge battery and display, this is a great media phone in addition to a gaming delight.
For keen gamers, there’s a market of phone choices out there – and the ROG Phone 5 should definitely be high up your shortlist. For everyone else, if you can accept that this Asus is designed for gamers first, it’s still an awful lot of phone for the money.
Also consider
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Nubia Red Magic 6
This gaming phone attempts to steal the show with a 165Hz display. Despite being a powerful device that’s good value for money, it does oversell the cameras and also brings with it some software quirks you’ll need to work around.
Volkswagen will start testing its new autonomous vehicles in Germany this summer, the company announced Wednesday. The German automaker’s electric ID Buzz vans will use hardware and software developed by Argo AI, a Pittsburgh-based startup that is backed by Ford and VW. The aim is to launch a commercial delivery and micro-transit service in Germany by 2025.
Executives from VW and Argo convened a press conference this week to provide an update on their partnership, which was first announced in 2019 as an extension of VW’s “global alliance” with Ford. And while much of what they discussed was already known, it did provide a closer look at the timeline for launching a revenue-generating service using VW’s vehicles and Argo’s autonomous technology.
Argo, which has been testing its vehicles in the US with Ford for the last few years, said it would be launching the fifth generation of its automated driving technology with the VW ID Buzz, which is the electric version of the automaker’s iconic microbus. Bryan Salesky, the startup’s founder and CEO, praised the collaborative nature of Argo and Volkswagen’s partnership.
“We’re building our technology and partnering with Volkswagen in a way that really sets us apart from what others are doing,” Salesky said. “And we think it really puts us in a position to deliver a safe, smart, and scalable product to deliver on the promise of autonomous driving.”
That work has already started. Earlier this year, Argo and VW developed a prototype minivan using the German company’s MEB electric vehicle platform inside the body of a VW T6 Transporter and Argo’s AV technology, including LIDAR sensors, radar, and cameras. In addition, Argo’s software enables the vehicle to “see” its environment, plan for its next steps, and predict the movements of other vehicles and pedestrians on the road. This, in combination with Argo’s sensor suite, allows for automated driving at low and high speeds, Salesky said.
VW said that it plans to put the vans in service as a ride-sharing fleet under its subsidiary Moia. Since 2017, Moia has been operating a fleet of electric vehicles as part of its “ride-pooling” service in Hamburg, where it has served 3 million customers to date. Those customers have provided a treasure trove of feedback that Moia CEO Richard Henrich says will come in use as the company shifts to a completely autonomous fleet by 2025.
“We have learned in recent years that both customers and cities have really high and very specific expectations towards future autonomous ride-pooling systems,” Henrich said. “Customers, on the one hand side, expect ride-pooling to be as easy, convenient, and reliable as riding their own car… But cities, on the other hand, expect ride pooling to help alleviate traffic congestion.”
The AV industry has been consolidating rapidly over the past year, with many companies being acquired or merging with other companies. It’s a mad dash to keep businesses afloat in the face of lengthening timelines and steep operational costs with little expectation for revenue generation in the near term. Robotaxis, in particular, are seen as being further out than most companies are predicting. VW and Argo say they remain bullish about their ability to hit the target date.
“There is a long way to go still until this high tech becomes an enormous growth market,” said Christian Senger, VW’s senior VP for commercial vehicles.
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