H.E.R.O.’s Journey in Tech (7 May 2019) – Word’s new AI editor will improve your writing

H.E.R.O.’s Journey in Tech (7 May 2019) – Word’s new AI editor will improve your writing

Companies

BATTSS – Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, TSMC, Samsung, Softbank

• Alibaba re-evaluates India strategy, may focus on smaller deals; The potential shift in strategy follows Alibaba’s disappointments at some of its large e-commerce bets in India (LM)

FAANNMG – Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Nvidia, Netflix, Microsoft, Google

• Facebook is pivoting (TC)
• Facebook’s contract workers are looking at your private posts to train AI (Verge)
• Word’s new AI editor will improve your writing (TC); Microsoft wants you to work less (TC); Microsoft wants to reinvent documents and collaboration with its new Fluid Framework (TC); Microsoft and GitHub grow closer (TC); Microsoft and Red Hat launch a new event-driven Kubernetes autoscaling tool (TC); Microsoft’s IntelliCode for AI-assisted coding comes out of preview (TC); Microsoft open-sources its quantum computing development tools (TC); Microsoft launches a new platform for building autonomous robots (TC); Microsoft aims to modernize and secure voting with ElectionGuard (TC, JT); Microsoft is building Word into a serious Google Docs competitor (qz)
• Microsoft Forms Pact With VMware to Keep Up With Amazon (Bloomberg)
• It’s Microsoft vs. Comcast in infrastructure push to expand rural broadband (MW)
• Google Maps Could Point the Way to Alphabet Stock Gains (Barron’s)
• Apple has bought around two dozen companies in the past 6 months, Tim Cook says (MW)
• Apple’s New Video Service Is Unlikely to ‘Move the Needle’ on Profit, Analyst Says (Barron’s)
• Apple to Reveal New Home-Grown Apps, Software Features at WWDC; Tech giant will woo developers with new tools, but also compete with them through its own software. (Bloomberg)
• Ford Partners With Amazon to Enable Package Deliveries to Trunks (Bloomberg)
• Amazon squares up to local ecommerce groups in India; Online retail is booming in smaller cities as data prices fall and more people get web access (FT)

Asia Tech & Innovation Trends

• Jiangsu Hengshun Vinegar attributes some of its increase in profit to the AI taste-testing machines which increased productivity, improved product quality and stability, reduced production costs and provided technical support to promote traditional cuisine outside the country (SCMP)
• DeepGlint: the Chinese AI firm that helped police catch a criminal who had been on the run for 20 years (SCMP)
• Chinese Startup DouYu Delays U.S. IPO Launch on Trade Jitters (Bloomberg)
• Trump’s Tariffs on Chinese Electric Cars Seen as Likely to Last (Bloomberg)
• Tencent-backed health care giant DXY expands to cosmetic medicine (TN)
• Chinese video platform Kuai says its users in smaller cities love instructional videos (KRA)
• Failed anonymous chat app pivots to social shopping (TIA)
• Future standard to democratize image analysis AI raises 400 million yen (TC)
• South Korea’s booming ‘webtoons’ put Japan’s print manga on notice (JT)
• SendBird, a startup that enables developers to add messaging to their apps with a couple of lines of code, snags additional $50M for messaging API tool, as it extends Series B to $102M (TC)
• Grocery startup BigBasket becomes India’s newest unicorn with new $150M investment (TC)
• The world won’t take China’s money-and India’s online travel firms are benefiting (qz)
• Medlife acquires Myra Medicines for express delivery and data science capabilities; The e-pharmacy platform plans to invest $100 million to expand its operations, build additional services and gain greater market share (Forbes)
• Power Thieves Drain India’s Electric-Car Hopes; Widespread theft of electricity and a lack of charging stations render the country’s green-vehicle targets unrealistic. (Bloomberg)
• Uber Eats targets business customers in Australia ahead of IPO (Age)

Global Tech & Innovation Trends

• ServiceNow Unveils Google Pact on Path to $10 Billion Sales Goal (Bloomberg)
• Dropbox adds cold storage layer to reduce cost of storing less-frequently accessed files (TC)
• Carta, formerly known as eShares, had moved beyond replacing paper records and into selling as a monthly service appraisals of the fair market value of private companies’ common stock in order to determine their strike price (TC)
• Thunes raises $10M to make financial services more accessible in emerging markets (TC)
• VisaDB tells you all about your next destination – weather, paperwork, and plugs to bring (TNW)
• SaaS startup Black Lake raises RMB 150 million as factories shift to the cloud (TN)
• PagerDuty offers a subscription service that allows businesses to improve the constant interplay between software developers and operators – so-called DevOps – within their organization and lets them use real-time data to address incidents that occur (MW)
• Chewy Inc., the rapidly growing online seller feeding on the “pet humanization” trend, is going public. (MW)
• Stock Picks From Space; Investors are using real-time satellite images to predict retailers’ sales. Is that cheating? (Atlantic)
• What Pinterest is hiding, and why it may get in the way of a higher stock price (MW)
• Roku Stock Has Doubled and Will Keep Rising on Strong Ad Sales, Analyst Says (Barron’s)
• Forgers Are Forcing a $9 Trillion Business Into Digital Age (Bloomberg)
• The Sports TV Bubble Shows Signs of Weakness; Sinclair’s deal to buy the former Fox regional sports networks values them at less than expected. (Bloomberg)
• Lyft Shares Sell Off as Driver Strike Highlights Regulatory Risk (Bloomberg)
• Flexera’s Owners Pursue Sale for Up to $3 Billion; Flexera helps companies with IT services including software security, cloud management and software-as-a-service management (Bloomberg)

Life

• Buffett Confronts Tech-Driven Change Amid Investor Questions; “We just sat there sucking our thumbs,” Munger said of failing to invest in Google. “Maybe Apple was atonement.” (Bloomberg)
• To Master Your Work, Work to Master Your Mind (NW)