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Google looks to raise its smartphone game with latest Pixel 7

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Google unveiled its Pixel 7 as it makes a bigger push into smartphone hardware
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Google is looking to up its smartphone game with the Pixel 7, the latest entrant in a competitive corner of personal electronics where it has traditionally been a bit player.

The device was unveiled this week in Brooklyn, where representatives from the Mountain View, California giant highlighted top-flight features that can silence background noise on the phone. 

First introduced in 2016, the Pixel was a late-comer to the portable phone trend, arriving nearly a decade after Apple’s iPhone and seven years after Samsung’s Galaxy model, the two products that dominate today’s market.

In 2020, global deliveries of the Google phone were just 2.7 million, next to more than 200 million for both the Apple and Samsung options.

Those paltry sales figures are partly due to the Google phone’s limited availability, with the Pixel 5 sold in less than 10 countries as the tech giant has focused its smartphone investment on software rather than its own hardware.

While Google’s phones are comparable in terms of quality to the top sellers, the product “has often lacked backing from Google” in terms of marketing, said Runar Bjørhovde, a research analyst at market research firm Canalys.

Google has instead focused on boosting its Android operating system, which was launched in 2008 and included more than 80 percent of the smartphones sold in the first half of 2022, according to Canalys.

Maurice Klaehne of Counterpoint Research said that “Google certainly has the capability and resources to become a major smartphone player, but that is not Pixel’s strategy,” noting that growing Android remains Google’s main objective.

But “Selling more Pixel devices might mean taking away share from other Android players, and this would go against Pixel’s goal,” he said.

Bjørhovde noted that, with the latest version of the phone, Google has pivoted somewhat, releasing a product that is compatible with wearables, earbuds and other devices produced by the company.

– Wonders of AI –

The prior phone version, the Pixel 6, was the first to employ Tensor processing developed by Google to enable more sophisticated artificial intelligence and machine learning. 

The Pixel 7 has a second-generation Tensor, the G2, which can make blurry photos more clear, excise distracting extras from photos and remove the background noise on telephone calls.

The upgraded system also can translate language in real-time, including idioms, and transmit more nuanced photos of  different skin tones.

At a launch event, Google vice president Rick Osterloh said the new product “represents years of development across Google, and a long-term investment in the Pixel portfolio.”

The company has seen an uptick in sales, reaching 6.2 million Pixels in the 12 months ending June 30, 2022, up 129 percent from the prior 12-month stretch, according to figures from Canalys.

This includes a doubling in market share in the United States, where Pixel now only accounts for two percent of smartphone sales.

Priced at $599 in the United States, the Pixel 7 is being positioned as relatively affordable. The latest versions of the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy are both around $800.

Google has been bolstering its Pixel marketing, partnering with the NBA professional basketball league. 

The company also plans to distribute Pixel 7 in 17 countries, compared to 13 markets for the prior version.

“Google has the potential to become a long-term player in the smartphone market,” said Bjørhovde. “However, it will be dependent upon global scale and breaking into new markets to achieve this and create a profitable business that can last.”

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Sam Bankman-Fried, the fallen wunderkind of cryptocurrency

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Samuel Bankman-Fried, founder and former CEO of FTX, faces a potential de facto life sentence after being found guilty of a massive fraud scheme
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He was the face of cryptocurrency, and a young one at that — a media darling seemingly destined to unite the sector.

But the stunning rise of Sam Bankman-Fried and his FTX platform would be matched by an equally spectacular fall when it was revealed that billions of dollars of clients’ funds had been moved and spent without their consent.

After a jury in 2023 found him guilty of seven counts, a federal judge in New York sentenced Bankman-Fried on Thursday to 25 years for leading the fraudulent scheme.

Before it all came crashing down, the native Californian had amassed a fortune at one point estimated to be worth $26 billion. “Save for Mark Zuckerberg, no one in history has ever gotten so rich so young,” read a headline in Forbes, which put Bankman-Fried on its cover in October 2021.

In the span of a few months, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate with a degree in physics had taken the startup he co-founded in 2019 and built it up into the world’s second largest crypto exchange platform.

He quickly became more than just a young entrepreneur, fashioning himself as an ambassador of crypto and making his first appearance in Congress in December 2021, testifying before lawmakers on the then-novel form of currency.

The public would come to know a seemingly oddball whiz kid with a mop of curly dark hair who, when not suited up for appearances on Capitol Hill, wore shorts and a T-shirt.

– Center of crypto world –

The son of two Stanford University professors, Bankman-Fried ventured outside the world of cryptocurrencies, making donations to US politicians and persuading celebrities like American football star Tom Brady or basketball player Stephen Curry to pitch FTX — endorsements for which they were richly rewarded. 

The young man known as SBF would charm US lawmakers with his straight talk and vision of crypto’s future, including recommendations for an extensive regulatory regime — a position at odds with many in the sector.

He devised project after project, from a platform for people to make donations in cryptocurrency to Ukraine to a market for financial derivative products that stepped on the toes of Wall Street.

A vegan, Bankman-Fried said he believed in the concept of effective altruism — finding the best way to help other people, in particular by donating all or part of one’s wealth to charity rather than, say, volunteering at a soup kitchen.

When the cryptocurrency world lurched into crisis in the spring of 2022, Bankman-Fried billed himself as a savior, buying the troubled platform BlockFi, and shares in another company that was in trouble, Voyager.

“We take our duty seriously to protect the digital asset ecosystem and its customers,” he tweeted at the time, as some people were comparing him — barely 30 years old then — to the legendary investing guru Warren Buffett.

– Financial high wire –

But behind his reassurances, Bankman-Fried was walking a financial high wire, as revealed later in court documents and testimony.

Without their knowledge, Bankman-Fried’s team used the money of FTX customers to cover risky operations by an affiliated trading company called Alameda Research, as well as to buy posh real estate and to make political donations.

In November 2022, the crypto news outlet CoinDesk revealed that Alameda had converted a large part of its assets into FTT, a crypto token created by FTX. The news caused that currency to plummet.

Hours later Changpeng Zhao, the head of Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange platform, announced it was selling all the FTT tokens it held, causing it to lose 90 percent of its value in a matter of days and taking the Bankman-Fried empire with it.

His fortune having vanished overnight, Bankman-Fried was extradited from the Bahamas, where FTX had its headquarters. In December 2022 he was indicted on charges of fraud and racketeering.

After five weeks of trial, the jury quickly reached a guilty verdict on all seven counts, which carry a potential maximum sentence of 110 years behind bars.

In closing arguments, the defense said their client had acted in “good faith” and was overtaken by circumstances and the financial ineptitude of close associates who testified against him to gain leniency from prosecutors.

Prosecutors portrayed the defendant as an extremely smart man consumed by greed who knew what he was doing when FTX funds were secretly funneled to his personal hedge fund.

According to prosecutors, at the time of the bankruptcy of FTX, just over $8 billion belonging to customers had vanished into bad investments at Alameda.

“Who had control? That’s the question. It was one person: the defendant,” the lead prosecutor concluded.

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Crypto fraudster Bankman-Fried faces sentencing

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Former FTX chief Sam Bankman-Fried is set to be sentenced after being convicted in November of fraud by a New York jury
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Disgraced cryptocurrency wunderkind Sam Bankman-Fried is set to be sentenced Thursday following his conviction in one of the biggest financial fraud cases in history.

US prosecutors are seeking a prison term of 40-50 years after a New York jury found Bankman-Fried, known by his initials SBF, guilty in November following a five-week trial that probed the one-time high roller’s spectacular fall.

Calling Bankman-Fried’s seven-count conviction reflective of the defendant’s “unmatched greed and hubris,” the government’s sentencing request argues for significant jail time in light of fraud it estimates at more than $10 billion.

Moreover, a lengthy sentence is necessary to “protect the public,” argued US Attorney Damian Williams, who characterized Bankman-Fried as an “adept” spin doctor capable of additional malfeasance.

If quickly freed, “it is realistic that he will settle on a narrative, lean into it, and convince other people to part with their money based on lies and the promise of false hope,” Williams said in a 113-page legal filing, accompanied by testimonials from dozens of victims.

Calling the government’s proposed sentence “barbaric,” Bankman-Fried’s attorneys depicted their client as a diligent young man motivated by philanthropy who got in over his head.

Their portrayal is similar to the one SBF’s defense presented at trial — which was quickly rejected by jurors after just five hours of deliberation.

Bankman-Fried, 32, should serve about six years in prison, a sentence “that returns Sam promptly to a productive role in society,” said attorneys led by Marc Mukasey.

The final sentence will be meted out by US District Judge Lewis Kaplan. Bankman-Fried will be given an opportunity to address the court prior to sentencing. 

– FTX Implosion –

A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a billionaire before the age of 30, Bankman-Fried conquered the crypto world at breakneck speed, turning FTX, a small start-up he cofounded in 2019, into the world’s second largest exchange platform.

But in November 2022, the FTX empire imploded, unable to cope with massive withdrawal requests from customers panicked to learn that some of the funds stored at the company had been committed to risky operations at Bankman-Fried’s personal hedge fund, Alameda Research.

During the trial, some of Bankman-Fried’s closest associates said that he was key to all the decisions that saw $8 billion vanish from FTX.

This group included Caroline Ellison, the former Alameda CEO and Bankman-Fried’s on-and-off-again girlfriend, who testified that Alameda had stolen “around $14 billion” from FTX clients and that Bankman-Fried “directed me to commit those crimes.”

Filings from the prosecution and defense offered starkly different takes on Bankman-Fried, the son of two well regarded law professors at tony Stanford University.

“The lack of contrition is galling,” said Williams, who took issue with the image of Bankman-Fried as “selfless” and “altruistic,” as championed by the defense, noting he used funds for “luxury” real estate, donations to rub shoulders with political leaders, a Super Bowl television ad and “access to celebrities.”

The defense’s statement describes Bankman-Fried as “wracked” with remorse over the implosion of FTX. 

– Recovered funds –

Bankman-Fried’s attorneys also pointed to statements from FTX’s current leaders expressing confidence that FTX customers and creditors would get back their money, saying in the brief, that “the harm to customers, lenders and investors is zero.” 

That argument drew a scathing response from FTX Trading Chief Executive John Ray, who said ongoing recoveries of ill-gotten gains do not make up for fraud.

“That things he stole… were successfully recovered through the efforts of a dedicated group” of professionals “does not mean the things were not stolen,” Ray said in a letter to the court. 

“What it means is that we got some of them back.”

The recoveries are not likely to significantly affect the sentencing, said Jacob Frenkel, an attorney at Dickinson Wright who previously worked at the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“The sentencing determinant is not about a speculative return of funds,” Frenkel said. “It is about what was the fraud when he was convicted.”

Frenkel said he would be “shocked” by a sentence under 20 years, in part because of the need for the judge to send a strong signal that fraud in the emerging cryptocurrency sector will be taken as seriously as any other.

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Hyundai to invest more than $50 bn in South Korea in major EV push

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South Korea's Hyundai is one of the world's biggest automakers
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Hyundai on Wednesday revealed plans to invest more than $50 billion in South Korea by 2026, with a huge chunk dedicated to boosting the development and production of electric vehicles.

Along with its affiliate Kia, Hyundai is the world’s third-largest automaker by sales, but the South Korean giant lags in the EV sector behind Elon Musk’s Tesla and Chinese firm BYD.

Hyundai is keen to break into the global EV top three, saying last year that it was aiming to boost electric car production to more than 3.6 million units by 2030.

With the 68 trillion won ($50.5 billion) investment announced Wednesday, Hyundai Motor Group said it wants to “secure future growth engines in an uncertain business environment through constant change and innovation”.

“The automotive sector, including future mobility projects, accounts for… 63 percent of the Group’s total investment,” it added.

Under the plan, Hyundai will create 80,000 jobs in South Korea and build three new EV factories, with the aim of increasing annual EV production in the country to 1.51 million units by 2030.

The group’s EV strategy also includes investments in infrastructure, software, battery technology and autonomous driving.

A Greenpeace report in November said Hyundai’s growing sales of gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles had offset any climate gains from its transition to EVs.

It noted that Hyundai-Kia had posted SUV sales increases of more than 150 percent over the past decade.

SUVs emit approximately 12 percent more carbon dioxide than sedans, the environmental group said, urging Hyundai to reduce SUV sales.

When asked about the report, Hyundai said it was expanding its fleet of “fully electric SUV vehicles”, including Kia’s EV6 and EV9.

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