Year: 2019

Tokyo’s 2020 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games are fast-approaching, and Toyota is playing a key role in on-site mobility and transportation. The Japanese automaker has unveiled five robots it’s also going to be bringing to the games, which will each help in some way to support athletes and attendees at avenues get around, get information, experience the games remotely, ferry food, drinks an equipment and much more. The robots range from humanoid to strictly purpose-built and functional in design.

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First up are two robot designs based on Tokyo’s official Olympic mascots, Miraitowa and Someity. These blue and pink big-eyed bots will be on-site at official venues acting as greeters and photo-ops, but they’re equipped with cameras and digital eyes that can offer expressions in response to human interaction. They’ll also be able to move their arms and legs, and part of the plan for deploying them is to potentially distribute them across Japan to offer kids in other cities a chance to get a taste of the games from afar.

T-HR3 offers a similar set of features, albeit in a very different design. This humanoid robot is a lot less ‘cute’ than the mascot bots, but has a lot more potential in terms of articulation. It’s also intended to provide a remote experience of what it’s like to be at the games, and can reproduce the movements of its mascot robot counterparts in real-time. T-HR3 can also stream images and sounds from the remote locations back to the Olympic site, acting as telepresence bots for Olympic fans off-site and mirroring their movements – they can “converse with and high-five athletes and others,” Toyota says specifically.

Next up is T-TR1, a more traditional kind of telepresence robot that has a wheeled base, cameras ad a super large vertical display. It can show people at basically life-size scale, and let remote people chat in real-time with Olympic athletes and fans on-site to really feel like they’re there.

This next robot is actually a pair – Human Support Robot (HSR) and Delivery Support Robot (DSR). The HSR is basically a robotic usher, providing guidance to seats for guests at venues, and also transporting some snacks, souvenirs and other light cargo to them at their seat while they watch the games. DSR, which is all-new for the Olympics, is more dedicated to delivering drinks and concessions to attendees on-site at venues, with people being able to order from a dedicated tablet – a modern replacement for hawkers walking the stands with trays of popcorn, peanuts and drinks.

Last but not least is Field Support Robot (FSR). This box-on-wheels should actually play an instrumental role, specifically supporting those game that involve hurling something as far as you can throw it. FSR’s entire purpose is to take the best route possible to retrieve things like javelins and shot-puts and return them to where they’re needed once thrown and recorded. They live to fetch.

Sadly, we’re not yet at the point where the robots are actually competing against the humans in a ‘winner-takes-all’ battle for the future of the planet. But these should nonetheless provide a look at what our future might be when robots are much more common in daily life, supporting humans in similar ways when there isn’t an international competition of the best-performing athletes in the world going on.

Amazon this morning announced its intentions to open a pair of robotic-powered fulfillment centers in Ohio. The two warehouses — both larger than 700,000 square feet — will be located in the north of the state, in Akron and Rossford, respectively.

They’ll function much like Amazon’s other shipping centers, providing a collaborative workspace between human employees and the company’s growing army of shipping robots. You can get a better look at how that goes down in this piece from our recent visit to a Staten Island location.

The company’s become accustomed to getting out in front of the conversations about automation taking away human jobs, noting than the two spaces will combine to create more than 2,500 full-time positions. Last year’s pushback from Senator Bernie Sanders also means that the full-time gigs will qualify for its $15 minimum wage.

The new locations should also help the company as it pushes into one-day shipping across the U.S. There’s been a fair amount of concern over how much strain such a move will ultimately put on human employees, who are already reportedly strained to hit their current goals.

The additional 2,500 jobs brings Amazon’s total employment up to 8,500 in the midwestern state. No exact word on timing for the two warehouses. 

Just Eat, the publicly-listed takeout marketplace that has faced fierce competition from UberEats and Deliveroo in recent years, has made a round of layoffs in the U.K. and Ireland, TechCrunch has learned.

Announced internally late on Friday, the redundancies are part of a reorganisation that is seeing Just Eat’s customer and restaurant operation teams merged. It it not clear exactly how many employees are being laid off, although I understand it is several dozen, while one source says it could be as many as 100 staff.

Confirmed the re-org, a Just Eat spokesperson declined to comment on the exact number. Instead, the company provided TechCrunch with the following statement:

“At our full year results we talked about organising and energising the business to execute our strategy at pace. In order to ensure our operations are set up to deliver the best possible service we have merged our existing customer and restaurant operations teams into one global unified team. This has resulted in a number of redundancies in the UK and Ireland. Our people are a priority for us and we will of course support all those affected during this time.”

Separately, while Just Eat remains without a permanent CEO after Peter Plumb stepped down in January and was replaced by interim CEO Peter Duffy, TechCrunch has learned that Graham Corfield, previously UK Managing Director, has been appointed as Just Eat Chief Operating Officer. The promotion also sees Andrew Kenny, previously UK Commercial Director, moved into the role of UK Managing Director.

In a further statement issued to TechCrunch, Duffy said: “I am delighted to confirm Graham Corfield’s appointment to Chief Operating Officer for Just Eat. Graham joined the business in 2011, and as UK MD for the past six years, has overseen countless success stories for us including driving UK order growth, evolving the Just Eat brand to be the nation’s favourite takeaway destination, and championing our restaurant partners to drive their success”.

More to follow…

Luckin continues to expand at jaw-dropping speed as it announced plans to open shop overseas for the first time. On Monday, the Starbucks challenger from China said it has signed a memorandum of understanding to set up a joint venture with Americana Group, a major international food group.

The deal will see Luckin launch a new retail coffee business in the Greater Middle East region and India, said the company that just took its 18-month-old business public in May. Its partner has a far longer track record. Founded in Kuwait more than 50 years ago, Americana owns the local franchises of KFC, Pizza Hut, Friday’s, Costa Coffee and other prominent casual dining brands across the Middle East and North Africa.

Luckin did not provide further details of this new venture and a spokesperson for the company declined to comment when contacted by TechCrunch.

But there’s still a lot to read into its international foray. For one, Chinese companies have had a growing presence in the Middle East and India in recent times as Beijing puts forward its Belt and Road infrastructure development and investment initiative. Notably, the MoU between Luckin and Americana was signed with both Chinese and Arab government officials in attendance.

Chinese tech giants have already taken notice of the regions. Alibaba is active in the Middle East with its cloud computing business. Up-and-coming Chinese app developers such as ByteDance run the immensely popular TikTok and Helo in India. 

These countries are also blessed with emerging middle-class populations, the demographic that Luckin targets back home. In China, the coffee startup is known for shelling out large subsidies to lure millions of tea drinkers into trying its coffee beverages. Instead of attracting them to sit and relax at Starbucks-like retail stores, Luckin relies on a massive network of pickup points and delivery staff — which allows it save on rent and take advantage of China’s relatively cheap labor — to complete orders.

Luckin also owns a massive amount of user data, as all orders and payments take place over its app. It can be imagined how the Chinese startup sets out to replicate this digital-first model in places with booming internet populations.

Like China, India is historically a nation of tea lovers that’s experiencing rapid growth for coffee consumption. The beverage scene is crowded with popular tea brands like Chaayos and foreign players team up with local companies to gain an upper hand. Even international coffee behemoth is no exception as it works closely with Indian conglomerate Tata to operate more than 130 stores.

“We at Americana believe this MoU will revolutionize the food and beverage retail industry in the Greater Middle East and India, regions that provide promising prospects for new retail growth and expansion,” said Americana Group chief executive officer Kesri Kapur in a statement.

Luckin CEO Qian Zhiya noted that her company looks “forward to further expanding the freshly brewed coffee market internationally as we realize the incredible growth opportunities available to us through our innovative business model.”

The startup has indeed recorded months of stunning growth, but it is also facing skepticism from investors who are put off by its continued cash burn with no plans to achieve profitability on the horizon. Luckin is aiming to double its China-based operations from just over 2,000 locations to 4,500 by 2019, and its new global ambition is set to even further test investor patience.

Microsoft is making a $1 billion bet on OpenAI, the company formed by notable founders including Elon Musk and Sam Altman three years ago with the aim of doing research and development work to steer the growth of artificial intelligence towards the ‘friendlier’ end of the spectrum, in order to help mitigate what Musk sees as a potential existential threat from AI if it isn’t developed responsibly while it grows in capability.

On Monday, Microsoft and OpenAI announced a multiyear “exclusive computing partnership” that will include the two companies building new AI supercomputing technologies for Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform, and OpenAI will also port its existing services to work on Azure. Microsoft will also now be “OpenAI’s preferred partner” when it comes to the commercialization of new AI technologies it develops in future.

All the talk of ‘exclusivity’ and ‘preference’ in this announcement is particularly interesting because one of OpenAI’s founding principles was to “freely collaborate” among other AI researchers, and make both its work and patents available to others. But there are some caveats, including that there is OpenAI Inc. the non-profit organization, and its for-profit corporate subsidiary OpenAI LP, and that its current charter includes a provision that it may reduce its public publishing of its work as it moves forward out of “safety and security concerns.”

The goal of this partnership for Microsoft seems to be to provide it an edge in building out a broad-scale Azure AI platform, and ensure its supercomputing technologies are involved in the development of artificial general intelligence. OpenAI benefits because Microsoft will be party to its principles around developing advances in AGI safely and with humanity’s interest in mind – and there’s the $1 billion, too.

At its launch, OpenAI noted that it had $1 billion committed from Musk, Altman and co-founder and CTO Greg Brockman, as well as Reid Hoffman, Jessica Livingston, Peter Thiel, Amazon Web Services (this makes the Azure angle here particularly interesting), Infosys and YC Research, though it did not anticipate spending that much in the ensuing few years.

As part of a settlement with federal authorities over a data breach in 2017 that affected 147 million Americans, credit agency Equifax will pay up to $700 million in fines.

The Federal Trade Commission said in a statement Monday that Equifax has agreed to initially pay at least $575 million in fines as part of the settlement with the federal government and states over its “failure to take reasonable steps to secure its network” that led to the breach.

Hackers stole credit files on millions of Americans, but also British and Canadian nationals, including Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and thousands of payment card records in the May 2017 breach.

The company came under fire by congressional committees and security experts alike after it was found that Equifax had not properly rolled out publicly released patches on its network months prior to the data breach.

Former chief executive Richard Smith, who retired in the wake of the scandal, blamed the lack of patching on a single employee.

A House Oversight Committee said the breach was “entirely preventable.”

This marks the largest fine ever issued by the FTC following the $148 million fine handed to Uber following its own data breach. However, the fine amounts to as much as 20% of the company’s 2018 revenue.

U.K. authorities already issued its maximum penalty of £500,000 — about $624,000 — under its since-replaced legislation. Under the new GDPR rules which had not come into effect at the time of the Equifax breach, the credit rating agency would’ve been liable for fines of up to 4% of its global annual turnover.

As part of the settlement, the company will also have to improve its data security going forward, said Joe Simons, FTC chairman, including designating staff to oversee its information security program.

Equifax will also have to undergo third-party assessments every two years.

A year after the breach was disclosed, the company came under fire for facing few — if any — consequences as a result of exposing its customers’ data.

“This settlement requires that the company take steps to improve its data security going forward, and will ensure that consumers harmed by this breach can receive help protecting themselves from identity theft and fraud,” said Simons.

An Equifax spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It’s that time of year again. When startup founders fret for weeks on end as the long-awaited Demo Day approaches. Investors pore through lists of startups participating in various accelerator programs and have their associates ping dozens of founders for coffee meetings.

Demo Day season is upon us. Soon Y Combinator’s latest cohort of startups will pitch to investors for two days, beginning August 19, and 500 Startups, another San Francisco-based accelerator program for early-stage companies, will host its own Demo Day on August 22.

We’ll report live from YC’s Demo Day next month. For now, here’s a closer look at all the startups finishing out 500 Startups’ latest program. As a reminder, through its four-month seed program, the 500 Startups seed fund invests $150,000 in participating companies in exchange for 6% equity. The companies below include a mix of fintech, digital health, edtech and e-commerce businesses, 33% of which 500 Startups says are women-led and 40% have Black or Latinx founders.

• Alluva: Rewards individual users for their blockchain and crypto price predictions.
• AMPAworks: An inventory management tool focused on hospitals. The startup uses computer vision AI to track and manage inventory in real time.
• BeatDapp: Helps music labels and artists track their songs to collect royalties by providing real-time audit reports of streaming-play counts.
• BlackCart: A try-before-you-buy app for fashion e-commerce stores.
• Blue Studios: The Peloton of STEM education focused on teaching 1 billion kids STEM skills.
• Blue Wire: A sports podcasting network.
• Bytez: Helps developers and data scientists work faster.
• Chemtech: An AI-product for manufacturing plant automatization.
• Crash: A tool to help people launch their career.
• Curie: A camera-based AI shopping assistant.
• Dispatchr: Helps electric utilities prevent wildfires, catastrophes and crippling outages.
• Docket: A system of record and workflow management SaaS for legal teams.
• EINO: An AI platform that produces predictive and historical insights on localized population movement and their intention in urban areas for enterprise business users.
• EZFarming: A marketplace that helps farmers finance their business and sell their produce.
• FitzyTV: An internet TV platform designed to help consumers watch and record all their streaming TV channels across multiple services.
• Gentem: A tool that provides instant claims reimbursements for physicians.
• Glyph: A digitally knit shoe company.
• Hearo Live: Turns passive media into a powerful, live social experience for games, sports, streaming and more.
• Heartex: Helps companies quickly build AI products and features.
• HYVE: Helps users navigate their social media universe by allowing them to follow more people.
• InnerTrends: A data science service for SaaS that uncovers insights in customer onboarding, retention and engagement without the need for data scientists.
• KIKI: The first app that pays you for having fun. A social marketplace where you can meet people, and buy and share experiences with them.
• Lucidact Health: An AI assistant for nurses and case managers to help them know what to do faster and eliminate errors.
• Nanno: The first on-demand childcare app that lets parents book vetted sitters nationwide.
• Nanogrid: Building advanced cost calculation technology that enables home energy companies to ensure their customers get the most value out of their products.
• NewoldStamp: An email signatures platform that turns every employee’s email into a marketing tool.
• Renaissance: Allows users to earn loyalty points by listening to music.
• Resonado: Reimagining audio systems for businesses with patented Flat Core Speaker technology.
• RestAR: 3D capturing and product visualization for e-commerce using AI with any mobile device.
• Rovilus: Developing safe and reliable battery packs for industrial vehicles and light electric aircraft.
• Send4: Enables retailers to offer a seamless post-purchase experience to their customers.
• Sharebee: A vertically integrated marketplace where anyone can book moving and storage in a couple of minutes for half of the traditional price.
• Tradespace: A global IP marketplace for companies to buy, sell, license and invest in technology.
• Visionful: Connects smart cities and autonomous vehicles leveraging AI and computer vision to provide full automation for parking and traffic monitoring.
• Voogy: An IP to domain name database that allows companies to track and discover the anonymous web visitors that do not convert into their sales funnel.

As more companies turn to Airbnb for Work to arrange work trips, the vacation rentals, homes and experiences business is making things easier for business travelers.

The company already provides thousands of listings catered to business travelers, complete with flexible access, personal kitchens for home-cooked meals and/or on-site laundry. Now, customers can easily locate those listings with Airbnb’s new search capabilities for business trips.

Airbnb’s work trip toggle, available globally as of today, allows guests to customize their search results for work travel and make more informed booking decisions by immediately filtering out vacation homes and other less convenient offerings. Airbnb is relying partly on social recommendations to ensure the correct listings — which includes entire homes, Airbnb Plus homes and boutique hotels — are showcased, including listings that have positive ratings from business travelers specifically.

Adobe XD, the company’s increasingly popular prototyping and design tool, is getting support for testing Amazon Alexa voice experiences on devices like the Echo Dot and the Echo Show. This work builds upon XD’s existing voice prototyping tools, which the company announced last October, and also includes Adobe’s first Alexa skill, which is unsurprisingly the XD skill that lets you test those prototypes.

Adobe’s latest voice tech survey shows that users are indeed interested in using voice tech, but at its core, XD was always a tool for building web and mobile experiences. Over the course of the last few months, Adobe has made several investments into building voice apps as well. The same designers and developers who have long been tasked with building regular apps are now often being asked with building voice apps as well. So it makes sense to use the same tool they are already familiar with for testing these new kinds of apps, too.

The integration includes the Alex skill, as well as the Alexa XD plugin that makes it easy to export voice prototypes to Alexa and then preview them. “Experiencing your prototypes on real devices can help your clients or stakeholders better understand and experience your vision,” writes Mark Webster, Adobe’s director of product for voice UI and UX. “Plus, by having voice prototypes readily available on an Alexa-enabled device, you can have more design-focused conversations about your Alexa skills and iterate without having to go through full product development cycles.”

In its earliest iteration, XD’s voice support was relatively rudimentary and only let you trigger speech playback when it understood a specific word. That’s great for a demo and to get some of the basic functionality down, but it’s not exactly a substitute for testing a skill on a real device.

Chances are, we’ll see support for testing with other voice assistants in the future, too. For now, though, XD only works Alexa.

For many years, the argument went that it would be hard to get large enterprises to move to the cloud, then that it would be impossible to get regulated industries like healthcare and financial services. Yet in recent years, Box and other cloud companies have shown that’s just not true, crafting solutions for even the most regulated industries. Today, Box announced a new partnership with Morgan Stanley on a digital vault.

The new tool takes advantage of Box’s storage and collaboration strengths to enable customers to store key life documents like wills, deeds and tax documents digitally in an encrypted Box storage repository on the Morgan Stanley wealth management platform.

The solution relies on the Box API to upload documents. Either Morgan Stanley or the client can add documents to the vault, and both parties receive a notification when new documents are added. It also includes the ability to comment, so the client and financial advisor can communicate about the documents if there are any questions or issues.

Naureen Hassan, chief digital officer at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management says that the company chose Box because of security on the back end and ease of use on the front. “Box was selected because it provides the comprehensive capabilities needed to deliver a rich client experience and meet the strict security standards for cloud based solutions,” she said.

Box CEO Aaron Levie saw the deal in digital transformation terms. Companies like Morgan Stanley, regardless of their business vertical, need to transform and provide better customer experiences online.

“In financial services today, companies need to reimagine how they connect and engage with their customers and how they empower their people. It’s a race to transform critical processes like loan origination and wealth management with digital technology. Many of these workflows center on content, and Morgan Stanley is a great example of how cloud content management from Box enables seamless new digital experiences,” Levie explained.